This hotel was founded in 1897 as a playground for the Argentine and international elite.
In its prime, its guests included Albert Einstein (as part of an international scientific delegation in the 1920s), Rubén Darío (the
Nicaraguan poet, arguably Latin America's greatest literary figure), and various Argentine and Brazilian presidents, including Juan Perón.
Its German owner made the mistake of supporting the Nazis a little too overtly during World War Two, and
was stripped of his possession after the war, until the Argentine government had a change of heart
and restored it to him a few years later. (A popular local myth has it that Hitler himself spent some time
here, in one of the outlying cabañas, after faking his death, fleeing Germany, and emigrating to Argentina
along with Adolf Eichmann et al.) The town of La Falda grew up around the hotel, and eventually crowded
it out with competition; the Edén was maintained through the mid-1960s, until it fell into disrepair and was abandoned.
Today it is home to a bar, a pretty boring Leonardo da Vinci exhibition (go figure), and a tour guide named Gustavo
who showed us around the dilapidated remains. Wonderful stuff.
All photographs are copyright Adam Jones 2004. Permission is granted for non-commercial use if the author is acknowledged and informed. For commercial use, please contact the author. Photos are also available in large-size, high-resolution format (approx. 1.4 mb per image), suitable for printing up to 11" x 17".
