Figline Valdarno Hotels

Hotel Villa Casagrande: Horrible Front Desk Personnel, Terrific Restaurant

We arrived the day before the time change in March (but we were unaware of this fact). We had booked a cooking class for 10 the following morning, so we got up at what we thought was 7 a.m., ate breakfast and drove the 25 miles to a nearby village to board the bus for our cooking class (for which we had paid in advance). We waited and waited and no bus came to pick us up, so we finally found a public telephone and called the number given on our online booking confirmation. The English-speaking person who answered the phone said they had waited on us for 15 minutes, then left. We asked how that could be when we arrived at 9:30 to meet the 10 a.m. bus. It was then that we learned that it wasn't (at that time) 10:15 a.m., but in fact, 11:15 a.m. Fortunately they refunded our prepaid fees for the cooking class, but when we got back to the hotel and asked the front desk people why they hadn't told us there was a time change, they just shrugged. We experienced their indifferent, non-caring attitude the entire time we were there. We took clothes to the front desk to be sent to the cleaners and when, after 5 days, they were not back inquired what was taking so long and the girl at the front desk said she had no idea, but we should get our clothes back in a day or two. We told them we would be leaving in two days and needed our clothes now. It was only when we asked to speak to a manager that our clothes magically arrived later in the day. I really have never experienced such impudence and indifference in a hotel's front desk personnel. With the exception of one woman, everyone else acted as if our being there or asking questions was an imposition. In spite of the ghastly front desk experiences, I would still recommend this hotel to someone else, advising them that the front desk personnel are not the friendliest, but also telling them that the food in the hotel's restaurant is worth the bad front desk experience!

Unique Quality: Our room was quite nice, actually. We were on the second floor of the main building and our room overlooked a courtyard. The room was furnished with two twin beds, a desk and chair and a small table and two upholstered chairs. The bathroom was nice and well equipped.

The best thing about Villa Casagrande is the restaurant. The food is excellent and the service is wonderful. Our waiters and wine steward were quite knowledgeable and very personable. We explained that we were both watching our weight and didn't want the large portions generally served in most Italian restaurants, so our waiter suggested we order "one for two" and split our entrees, thereby enabling us to have smaller portions and experience two different entrees at dinner. This worked beautifully and the wine suggestions were also "right on." We didn't have one bad glass of wine or one bad dinner throughout our stay there.

• Opinion of Price: N/A
• Address: Via Castelguinelli 84
• Phone: 0039055952554
• Related to: Family Travel, Food and Dining, Women's Travel
• Written April 17, 2008

Lobby, Hotel Villa Casagrande

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