After spending a week at family’s house, mother, who became my travel companion, and I decided to really do the tourist thing and spend a few nights in a hotel in the downtown area.
“Take us to a cheap but nice hotel,” we told our cab driver. A few minutes later we’d arrived at Hotel Plaza Real Pereira on calle 25 between carreras 5 and 6.
Hotel Plaza Real, though quite plain looking from outside, is actually one of the nicest, safest, and most centrally located hotels in the heart of Pereira. $55.000 COP, roughly $28 USD, per night gets you exactly what you need: a double bed, TV with cable, a room phone, a private bathroom, a safe place for your belongings, and daily housekeeping.
Besides the necessities, Hotel Plaza Real offers free unsecured WiFi for all it’s rooms, with strength of signal increasing the closer you are to the front of the building. The only things I can say were lacking were outlets and some air flow in windowless rooms; the rooms tend to be muggy because bathrooms in Colombia are not entirely sealed off. More about that another time.
The friendly concierge, besides carrying all your luggage into your room, announcing visitors via the room phone, and holding your room key while you’re out, will also direct you towards your scene and delicious but cheap food in the area, and will also help you make reservations for those activities requiring them; ours helped us book a spa day in Termales de San Vicente.
Hotel Plaza Real has 19 rooms with windows in only the front rooms, does not require reservation, although it is always preferred, and is known by most, if not all, cab drivers. And don’t worry…cab drivers will take you there any time of day. 
The area is incredibly safe; what else would you expect when a police precinct and hospital are rght down the block?
All in all, Hotel Plaza Real, location, services, and staff, was perfect and I highly recommend it.
