Restaurante Atalaya

This did the job for a visit to the mines. Clean, cheap, basic . About 100 metres from the mining museum, 4km drive to the train. It's true nobody speaks English - it is Spain after all. Reception staff fine, restaurant staff less so; a bit miserable in fact. In the evening we went to the restaurant up the hill which was very nice and the staff friendly. No English there, either, but it didn't matter. Pidgin Spanish seemed to work fine with a bit of patience all round.

Reading other reviews about the staff not speaking English - it's Spain after all! I used my limited Spanish and got on fine with the staff. The room was basic, had a small but functional bathroom. With outside temperatures in the range of 40 Celsius the air con in the room was excellent. Breakfast was a little chaotic (not included in the room price) the place seems very popular with locals, but after watching what was going on I sussed it out - basically order toast, fresh squeezed orange juice and a coffee (in Spanish, not difficult) job done - grab butter, jam/marmalade off the side and you are sorted! Although billed as a restaurant, didn't see much evidence of a menu at night more a daytime tapas type venue. A 50m walk up the road gets you to the excellent Galan restaurant - very popular with the locals, particularly on a Friday night. Note they don't start serving food at night until 20:15 (when visited in September) don't get there too early! Hotel Atalaya is very handy for the mining museum, literally 50m or so, but if you are doing the full museum tour including the train trip it pays to drive up to the museum so you can join the convoy quickly when it sets off (you follow the museum bus to the remote sites and train ride - all well thought out). I used the hotel car park with the lift to the various floors, very handy.

In the two week tour of Spain this was the only one we would avoid next time We were not made welcome - forced to park motorbikes outside in the rain in spite of a large covered parking area, bad service in the bar/breakfast area and then locked in when trying to leave. Apparently we had not paid for something - but there were no staff around - must have been watching the cameras though to lock the gates!