2/10 Terrible
Michael R.
9 Sept 2018
This property has many drawbacks and is poorly maintained
This property is indeed "big", and is "beautiful" in parts. But it has many drawbacks. I will list five:
1) Lack of air conditioning. Immediately after booking I asked the owner whether there was air conditioning. The answer was no, but
"we have never had to use air conditioning as the thick stone walls and the fact that the downstairs is built partly into the hill keep the house nice and cool in summer (and warm in winter). There is also a choice of full sun to shade in the garden and terrace, so heat isn't a problem at all".
It is true that two big downstairs rooms (a dining room and a TV room) have thick walls, but they are so dark as to be unuseable. It was insufferably hot at night in the bedrooms. The fans provided merely circulated the hot air, but did not cool it.
2) The house was infested with ants, mosquitos and other insects. OK, it's in a wood, but clearly no effort had been made to control the insects
3) The lighting was very poor in most parts of the house. It was almost immpossible to read in the evenings.
4) The house has not been adequately maintained. The front door was extremely hard to open. Some people might find the heavy chests of drawers in the bedrooms romantic. We found them impractical, since the drawers did not run freely. The house had also not been cleaned properly. There was dust and dirt in corners.
5) The biggest problem was the plumbing. Half way through our stay we reported to the owner's son that the kitchen sinks were not draining properly. He offered half a bottle of Mr Muscle. By our last evening the sinks were totally blocked and the effluent from the upstairs toilets was flooding into them and on to the kitchen floor. This is simply unacceptable.
The owner and her son were pleasant and helpful. But the overall experience was of a campsite holiday at a 5-star hotel price. Not good enough.
Michael R.
Stayed 7 nights in Aug 2018
