Hotel Villa Liana - Florence, Italy     

We stayed at the hotel Liana on my birthday. It was supposed to be a special treat, but it turned out to be a special nightmare. We were given a "garden" room on the ground floor. Its connection to the garden was that it faced a garden wall. The room was very basic and the furniture arrangement totally defied common sense. Our bathroom was only accessible after we removed the desk chair. The bathroom was very basic and very small, ones elbows were in danger of getting abbreviated when brushing hair. There was a stench in the room when we arrived, but we attributed it to the city problems. It turned out that the problem was a stench from a toilet across the hall. We could not get any sleep as the toilet was used frequently during the night and the door of that toilet was slammed each time. The lack of any sound proofing made it appear as if someone was right in our room. To make a reservation we first contacted the hotel via e-mail to make inquiries regarding availability and prices. We were offered a room at a rate of 150 euro a night. We made a final reservation by phone because we did not want to give our credit card number via e-mail. When we were checking out we were charged 170 euro a night. The person who corresponded with us via e-mail and offered 150 euro per night, was not working the day we were checking out and the staff claimed that they had no knowledge of that original rate quote, since our correspondent left no notes to that effect. The e-mail offering that rate was apparently not sufficient. I wrote a letter to the hotel owner/ manger describing the experience but received not even a word of apology - it was ignored. I would suggest that travelers to Florence IGNORE THIS HOTEL.

I just got back from a week in Italy, and received a very pleasant surprise at Hotel Liana. The room was very spacious with extremely high frescoed ceilings. The furnishing was very tasteful, and the bathroom was recently remodeled. The hotel has a romantic atmosphere, and is in a quiet, but yet somewhat central location. The breakfast was excellent and plentiful. Overall, you will receive a great value for your money.