Hotels

Ibis Hotel Reims Tinqueux, France

Room very small but comfortable. WiFi was quite sluggish. Quite a largish restaurant for a budget hotel and the food was fine. However, my wife had a pork roll meal with an evening meal and although we can’t prove anything, my wife subsequently had serious diarrhoea which required a hospital visit to receive appropriate medication. It was noticeable at the time that the restaurant staff were rushing around to complete their shift at 9pm.

Parma Congressi Hotel, Parma, Italy

This is a 4* quality hotel and we had an excellent room. However, we were a bit surprised that there were some issues we would not have expected, ie the air conditioning control was broken, the plumbing was very noisy and we could easily hear our neighbours talking. As we were on a Leger coach party we must have had the budget meals provided since the food was not great and we were kept separate from other guests.

Hotel Mary, Vico Equense, Italy

This is a typical Italian Hotel situated on a steep hillside overlooking the Bay of Naples. As such the views from our balcony were outstanding and the sunset at night was quite spectacular. As we were part of a coach party we didn’t get the standard of room as shown on the Hotel website but it was very comfortable and typically Italian with the local style of quaint plumbing in the bathroom. The accommodation was clean and the room service excellent. However, because the hotel was on a steep hillside in a valley, noise is magnified when the weather is fine and at night barking dogs and church bells can be disturbing. We were also bitten a couple of times at night in bed so I resorted to a Deet-Up each night and that cured the problem. My wife had a medical issue whilst staying there and a member of staff was good enough to take us to the local hospital and translate for my wife when she saw the doctor so we were extremely grateful for that. The food was very good but the only issue we had was that no water was freely available at meal times, all water had to be purchased as bottled water. This might have been because the local water quality was suspect.

Hotel Mediterraneo, ChianCiano Terme, Italy

We had a room in this Hotel with a balcony overlooking the front of the Hotel. The room itself was very comfortable and we had a very good night’s sleep. We were only at the Hotel for one night as part of a coach party so we all had the same evening meal. For a starter we had Lasagne and for me this was the best Lasagne I have ever tasted and our expectations were quite high for the rest of the meal but the main course was a chicken leg, lukewarm mash and stone cold French beans. This may have been a normal local dish but a number of the party were not very happy. Whilst our bedroom was fine, the bathroom was not. There was no light working in the bathroom, there was only a dribble of cold water from the sink tap and the toilet was smelly and quite disgusting below the waterline.......no excuse for that in a modern hotel.

Hotel Continental, Cremona, Italy

A very smart modern Hotel. We had a very comfortable room with a nice high ceiling. The lighting system was a bit of a puzzle since all light were controlled by the room card and either on or off so to enable just our bedside lights we had to unplug the rest in order to sleep. The food was very good. Because Cremona is the home of the Stradivarius violin, all the corridor walls were covered in music, very unusual.

Cottage Hotel, Reims, France.

Having stayed at the Ibis in Reims, we thought we had already found the smallest double room in a budget French Hotel but no, the double room in the Cottage Hotel was minute. With 2 people and 2 cases in the room, it was full up, we has to be quite careful moving about. The bed itself was a standard double but comfortable. It looked as if the room had been refurbished and a drencher shower fitted in the bathroom, however, the drencher spray itself had slightly come apart so when we turned it on we nearly flooded the bathroom. We only had breakfast here and although the spread was a bit limited, the food quality was good.

Coach and Drivers

Our drivers Steve and Neil certainly did a lot of miles on the tour, I think you would have to like driving a lot to work on these tours. Certainly they looked after us very well. I am not qualified to comment on their standard of driving but we all felt very safe in their hands. The only thing I would say is that if you want to pass an advanced driving test Neil, it is both hands on the wheel at all times. As to any cons, it would have been useful to have some information about the coach, the controls above our heads for example, we only found out there was a USB charging station at the rear of the coach on the penultimate day. Also. we were promised a DVD on the long haul days which didn’t happen nor did a promised quiz. We were given headphones but in fact, on a lot of days there was nothing to listen to on any of the 8 channels. The coach was a new Aviva coach but we didn’t find the seats that comfortable, there was very little lumbar support. The Mercedes coaches on the feeder trips were far more comfortable.

Guides

Certain of the optional visit days were handed over to local guides.

On the day trip to the Isle of Capri, our guide Josephine was excellent. She was quite exceptional considering all the locations we visited on the Island and all of the individual pick-up buses she had to organise throughout the day.

For the Amalfi Coast drive our guide was Victoria. She was a bit bossy and rather boring but the thing that really we did not like was the lunch stop she conned us into at a restaurant out in the sticks which in effect we lost an hour of the tour since we couldn’t go anywhere if we chose not to eat. The bus that was organised was extremely uncomfortable.

For the Rome walking tour our guide was awful. We were given short range radios for some reason but they didn’t enhance the tour one bit as she hardly used the facility. It was very crowded in Rome which made the whole walk chaotic with us losing her a few times in the crowds. When we got to the Spanish Steps she would not let me walk up them, instead choosing to hang around at the bottom of the steps for some time for no real reason.

Italian Drivers

Generally quite appalling, many examples of overtaking on bends, overtaking on the inside on bends and a seemingly disregard of speed limits in towns. Road markings would appear to be for decoration only and for a pedestrian, crossing the road at a crossing does not mean a vehicle will stop.....they will generally try to dodge around you. We saw a family on a motorbike with a young child at the front and a young child in the passenger seat of a car with no restraint and of course everyone is on a mobile phone when driving and even a scooter rider we saw. We were in Rome for only a few hours yet saw 2 accidents, a lorry rear-ended by another lorry and a motorcycle under a taxi.

Below are the photos of the crocheted car and other items in the main square of Chiacano plus some views of the cathedral in Cremona.

Below are the photos from the Rome visit.

I will be commenting separately on the Hotels on this tour, the Guides, our Drivers and Italian drivers at the end of the tour.