Villa Volpi - Lucca, Italy     

We have just retuned fom a wonderful two night stay at the Villa Volpip. We stayed in their villa which is close to the hotel. The hotel is in the most wonderful location and the villa had amazing, dreamlike views of the suounding hills and countryside. I notice that lots of people commented on the 'bad' service. The service is NOT like a first class hotel but I think this is made up for enormously and is probably due to the fact that the hotel is so very relaxed. The whole place almost has the feel that it actually belongs to you! Very relaxed indeed. No feelings at all, which one sometimes gets elsewhere, that you might be doing something wong. We were part of a wedding party and the hotel was happy to let the group stay the whole of the day before thei flight and hang around the swimming pool etc. There is a lovely, cool,romantic library and reception rooms and the swimming pool area is beautiful with lovely comfortable sun loungers. The service suited us very well but I can see that it might annoy some people who might want a bit moe'obsequiousness' as it were. The staff were definitely no t'obseqious' - it was moe like asking your family to do things - but what we ask did happen. One of the main things, I think, that could be improved is that there could be some kind of snacks available for people arriving - I know that some of our party arrived very hungy and asked fo a bite of lunch- I think perhaps it might have been worth offering them a sandwich or bread and cheese or something. The views were fabulous, my daughters could get drinks whenever they wanted, taxis were ordered, queries answered, lots of very helpful advice given and so on. I would definitely return to the beautiful Villa Volpi- it felt like the most wonderful home - almost as if we had just bought a fabulous villa in Tuscany with helpalready installed.