Where to stay in Mendoza

Park Hyatt Mendoza

Chile 1124, 5500 Mendoza, Argentina

If you are looking for a destination vacation, we would highly recommend Mendoza in Argentina. We have lots of posts about this area because we enjoyed doing wine tasting tours and savoring the wonderful food. I’ve talked before about the difference between a tourist and a traveler. This would be a good traveler destination. You don’t want a tour to point at Mendoza from a bus and tell you that it’s a good place for wine. For us, it’s a chance to get to a hotel and experience the area and get to know the wines, the people, the climate and the beauty.

For us, there was nowhere else to stay other than the Park Hyatt Mendoza. This is a fabulous property in the heart of the city. With its beautifully restored 19th-century Spanish colonial façade, it is a real five-star hotel. The hotel is situated in the main business district in the center of Mendoza, in front of Plaza Independencia.

We thought it was odd to see that it was in Chile street when we had just arrived from Chile. However, there is a lot of love between Chile and Argentina. Mendoza even has a main square in the city dedicated to Chile. It’s there because Chile and its people helped the city come back from a terrible earthquake in 1861. Bernardo O'Higgins and José Francisco de San Martín are depicted in the above picture and shaking hands.

We travel quite a lot with Hyatt. The brand is a smaller hotel chain than Marriott worldwide by quite a bit. We are lifetime Titanium members of Marriott, and we love the brand as well. However, in Mendoza, the Park Hyatt was the place to stay.

The hotel is beautiful as you approach it. It feels like a palace, and you are the guest. The doormen greeted us as if we were old friends and dutifully grabbed all our bags somewhere while we checked in. I had made email communication in advance with the concierge staff all of whom are simply amazing.

While we were being checked in, we were offered a glass of Malbec. Mendoza is known for Malbec. Our room was upgraded to a suite because of our Globalist status. The front desk staff were so professional, cheerful and simply warm. I felt like my family reserved the best room in the house for us. It turned out that it probably was.

As you walk through the hotel, there were many art exhibit pieces. The ones above were quite amusing. I’m not sure what the artist was thinking but we definitely stared at them more than once.

There is a long walkway from the front desk to the elevators and there were granite sculptures along the walkway – specifically created for the Park Hyatt.

There was the Uvas Lounge & Bar that was oriented toward wine but served all spirits with tapas. There is also an Argentine steak house called Grill Q – Parrilla Argentina and another restaurant called Bistro M that served a wide variety of foods.

Bistro M offers a 6-course wine paired offering, so we signed up for that immediately. The picture above shows some of the wines they were pouring that night for our benefit.

Later in the week was a wine tasting that was offered in the bar that we received compliments of the hotel. The sommelier, Erica, asked us about our wine palate. Which wines did we like and why? Which wines did we not like and why? From that, she brought out a white wine and 2 red wines to taste. She was 3 for 3 because we enjoyed all of the varietals, and this usually would be trial and error for us ordinarily. Thanks Erica!

The room we had was a suite and it was splendid. All the furnishings and special touches were there. We didn’t have to worry about a thing. We were greeted in our room with a bottle of wine with some chocolate. They were pleased to see us and simply put this wonderful welcome gift in the room with a very nice note welcoming us into the hotel.

This was our “sitting area” with a full-sized dining table, lounge chairs, couch, etc. This was quite a suite!

A few days later, we received another bottle of wine from the general manager of the hotel. This wine was specially produced for Park Hyatt. The Monteagrelo Bressia Corte de Tintas 2017 was the wine that was created especially for Park Hyatt Mendoza. The wine was a blend of Malbec grapes from three different areas which include Gualtallary, Vista Flores and Agrelo. These three were blended with a Cabernet Sauvignon from Agrelo.

The label of the wine has the traditional and emotional "angel" of the Bressia family. It was a great introduction to Malbec for us because we were not aware of it. The wine blend spent 8 months in barrels, in the Park Hyatt hotel's cellar. It is unique and the one and only vintage of the Monteagrelo Bressia line.

So. by now, I am more than impressed with the hospitality of the hotel. The hotel exuded hospitality and they greeted us by name as often as they saw us. They asked us repeatedly if there is anything they can do to improve our stay – and they meant it.

Our primary concierge was Esperanza, and she asked every day how things were going. She was on top of all our tours and asked how they were. We worked collaboratively with her because we had recommendations from Amanda, the sommelier in the Hyatt Centric Los Condes hotel in Santiago. We also wanted help from Esperanza on which was the best lunch location for wine pairing. Esperanza did all of that.

We highly recommend this hotel. I worked with Esperanza, and she arranged all of the wine tours. She must be part sommelier and part concierge!  Esperanza was so easy to work with. She arranged all of the reservations, the driver, etc. I knew many of the places we wanted to see but she also made her own suggestions which we followed. Esperanza was particularly helpful for the wine pairing lunch suggestions at each vineyard since she knew nearly all of the vineyard restaurants within a 50-mile area.

The hotel is located across from the Plaza Independencia which is the anchor plaza for four other famous Mendoza plazas – all within walking distance.

Sheraton Mendoza Hotel

Primitivo de la Reta 989 Mendoza, Argentina 5500

We saw the Sheraton Mendoza since it is quite close to the Park Hyatt. It is a category 3 hotel, so it is not really comparable to the Park Hyatt Mendoza, but it is less expensive. When we travel, we try to improve our stay with loyalty points so I would recommend that you use some points for either the Sheraton or the Park Hyatt. Sheraton hotels are part of Marriott now, so your Marriott points are good at the Sheraton.

The Sheraton is a high-rise hotel with plenty of amenities. It is close to the five plazas mentioned previously and you will get a good feel for the city by just taking a short walking tour. All of the restaurants we reviewed in our Mendoza Restaurants post are within walking distance of the Sheraton as well.

So, no matter what you choose, you’ll be in a nice hotel. My recommendation is to book your wine tours well in advance because the lunch dates fill up quickly so the more you can plan, the happier you will be.