Excelsior Palace Hotel - Palermo, Italy 

I was not very excited about our recent trip to Sicily--going to Palermo in particular. After reading many reviews of Palermo hotels on TripAdvisor, I decided on The Excelsior Palace--primarily because of locaton. It was a wonderful selection. The hotel arranged for a private car and driver to pick us up at the airport (we later hired the driver for a 3 hour tour of Palermo's historic sites). The superior room was beautiful--nice linens, lovely furnishings, fantastic bathroom with glass shower. My only fault with the hotel was their lack of interest in helping secure reservations or making suggestions for restaurants--probably because there was no one eating in the hotel restaurant. I would definitely recommend you visit the bar--Raymond or Giovanni are absolutely delightful. Raymond previously worked on a cruise ship and he is a real charmer. The location of the hotel cannot be topped--adjacent to the English Gardens and right on the best street for shopping in Palermo. Very safe, quiet (as anyplace in Sicily can be--lol). Make reservations here and be assured of a nice stay in Palermo.

My wife and I along with two friends stayed for two nights last week. We pre-paid for the rooms at a cost of ?95 per room per night. The staff were excellent, efficient and at least one person on duty was English speaking. Valet car parking was ?20 per day which in my experience is about average for a city center hotel. The room was large (about the same size as a typical up-scale American hotel) with usable desk space for working on and two electrical outlets at table height for laptop and mobile phone (for example). The hotel doesn't provide Ethernet connection to the Internet but does offer WiFi through either T-Mobile or Vodafone (I forget which) at either ?12 or ?15 for 24 hours. This was one of the few complaints I had regarding the hotel, while this appears to be the typical pricing in European hotels I find it irritating that luxury hotels continue to charge what I consider to be an excessive amount. The WiFi did provide a good signal in the room. There was cable (or Sky) television with (I believe) two English speaking channels; CNN and BBC Worldnews. While the public rooms (lobby, stairways, restaurant) appeared a little tired the bedrooms themselves were in excellent condition. We had booked a "Standard" room and either we were upgraded to a "Superior" room or the Standard room is tremendous value. The furnishings in the bedroom were all new and in excellent condition. The bathroom was extremely large (by American standards) with a full size bath containing a shower, toilet, bidet and sink with ample counter space and hair dryer. While the bathroom fixtures were new the design was retro 1920s or 1930s giving it a classic look. We only eat breakfast at the hotel so I cannot comment on the restaurant or bar. The breakfast was better than average; buffet style with a typical selection of cold meats, bacon sausage and bacon, a cheese selection and breads including toast making facilities. I thought the hotel location was very satisfactory. It was about a ten minute walk to the "Old Town", fifteen minutes to the symphony and slightly less than twenty minutes to the Opera House. The walk into town was along a broad boulevard with high end shops, it always had many pedestrians on it and felt very safe (although on the first afternoon there was a body on the street under our window, I think it was an accident rather than violence). Overall an excellent hotel and one I would unreservedly recommend.