Biker Friendly

Stayed here
July 2004  

This is a gold nugget of a hotel, not over posh but it's very clean and comfortable. The peace and quiet here may not be to everyone's taste, but if you want to get away from all the hustle and bustle of city life for a while then you won't find much better than this place. Situated next to a Sanctuary and yet not too far off the main road to Andorra la Vella, makes the location ideal.

We never came to Andorra on the bikes, this trip was done by car but Elisabet  & Jean Philippe, the hotel owners would make anybody welcome here.  If you did arrive here by motorcycle then the parking is quite secure at the front, but there is also a small area to the rear of the hotel where I daresay you'd be allowed to park.  The hotel also has a bar and a very good restaurant where we ate on a couple of occasions and can highly recommend it.   It also has a small gym and a sauna  

Stayed July 2009

Biker friendly

The Residenza il Fiore isn't a hotel in the strictest sense, it's more of a self catering hostel. The owner has a few rooms in a larger apartment complex. Don't let that put you off though, what we found here was an exceptionally clean and comfortable place to stay for a night.  Everything we needed for a hearty continental breakfast was provided, we had a well stocked fridge in our room with tea and coffee making facilities and bread etc to be found just outside the bedroom door.  A pair of French doors open out onto a little paved patio area and garden - a very pleasant place to sit out and have breakfast.

The owner, Mateo met us at the hostel upon our arrival and was very amiable and helpful, he also invited us around the corner to his small bar /cafe for complimentary drinks. As we wanted to go up into the old town - "Citte Alta" - he even organised a taxi to take us there.  A 15 minute taxi ride from the Hostel will find you in the old town amongst the ancient architecture. Plenty of places to eat & drink here whilst you take in the atmosphere of the place

From a motorcyclists point of view there were a few minor concerns about the security of the bikes, but Mateo assured us they would  fine parked up and locked together at the side of the hostel  - and they were. But one of the bikes we took was a Moto Guzzi - something of a passion in Italy and we got the impression at several places we stayed, that if anyone had tampered with it then they'd have woken up with a horses head in their bed!

This is a highly recommended little hostel for a visit to Bergamo, a great way of seeing the city without breaking the bank. I daresay if you had more time than we did then it's possible to amble up to the old town and back again, the taxi fare was about 11 Euro.

Stayed July 2009

Biker friendly

Very basic accommodation here at Caldin's in Chioggia. The hotel has no eating facilities so you'll have to pop out to one of the many local bars / cafes for breakfast, but then again it is cheap here. Not the cleanest hotel we've stayed at but certainly not the dirtiest either, and there is quite a climb up several flights of stairs to the Caldin apartments, which are rooms in a larger apartment complex. Not a particular problem for us, but for holiday makers who are elderly, infirm or have young children and all the paraphernalia that goes with them - prams etc - it could be. 

There was lots of what looked like long term building work going on outside as the canal there is being extended, but it will be every nice when it's finished. We pondered on whether the price of rooms here would rise when it was all finished and the the view from the rooms was a lot more pleasant than now. Waterfront accommodation the world over attracts a higher price so there's no reason to suppose this would be any different.

The owner is quite helpful and amiable, he let us park the bikes in a secure garage around the back of the hotel. I'd like to come back here when the building work is complete on the new canal, it will be a very nice backdrop to the hotel.  

Stayed August 2009

Biker friendly

The Villa Annamaria is a circa 17th century house split into about 4 holiday apartments. The owner lives on site.

The apartment we stayed in was the oddly named "Nelly". This is a two floored apartment consisting of a large sitting / dining room, a kitchen / diner and toilet /shower. A narrow, wooden spiral staircase leads up to the two bedrooms and a second toilet /shower.  The bedrooms have no windows but they do have a skylight which guests can open and if you stand on a chair there is a view of sorts.

 The two bedrooms are quite spacious but there is a lack of storage space for clothes etc - a few drawers wouldn't go amiss. The whole apartment is clean and well appointed, but we were a bit annoyed that on our arrival the owner Giovanni told us that the oven in the cooker was broken. He still took the full fee from us though, and given that this isn't a cheap place to stay he wasn't terribly apologetic. We also had a bit of an ant problem in the kitchen and had to go ask for ant powder, this had obviously been a problem before so we thought he may have left some out for us to use instead of us having to wait for  him to come home to ask. There are no bins at the villa for guests rubbish, so we had to walk to a communal bin area behind the church about 150 mtrs away. This is obviously done for hygiene purposes, but anybody who has trouble walking should be made aware of the fact  

The pool area is very nice, but it's in the front garden of the house with a small road running outside. The pool is clean and well maintained, and has a very nice jacuzzi built in and is well shielded from the road and passers by. There is a shaded communal patio / yard area with a few tables and chairs which is nice to sit in during the evenings.

Domaso itself is a lovely little town and on first appearances is idyllic. It's only when our peace was shattered by the constant church bell ringing that we realised we were in for a sleepless week! They strike out the hour every hour - 1 through 12 and again on the half hour with a small ding on the end. All day and all night they ring out and they start the local dogs off barking - it's bedlam some nights! I guess the locals must get used to it but heaven help guests who come here looking for a bit of peace and tranquility.  The church is just a stones throw from the villa and these bells are very loud!   At 6 every morning they peal out yet again for about 15 mins and again at 6pm. We honestly never got a decent nights sleep the whole week we were there - even with ear plugs in.

From a biker point of view there is an open fronted garage (more of a car port really) to leave the bikes in  - for a fee of course! But if you're in a car there's no parking on site and there isn't really much locally. We noticed on a few occasions all the spaces were taken by  mid to late afternoon. If you came home from a day out after this you'd be struggling to park anywhere nearby. In fairness though, we were there main holiday weeks, I'm sure it wouldn't be this crowded any other time.

There is a lot to see and do in the area for a weeks stay. Domaso itself is nice to stroll around, there are quite a few restaurants and shops. If you're self catering here rather than eating out there are two supermarkets about a ten min walk away.

To sum up: a nice Villa apartment, but overpriced we though for what was on offer and not the quietest place to stay. Having said that we had a really nice week at Lake Como, it's a lovey area.

Stayed here
Jan 2006  

                                              
Just what I expected an ex-Russian state hotel to be. A quite austere and unwelcoming building, but the staff were friendly and made our stay a pleasure. The ambience of the place is steeped in communist history, you can well imagine the KGB spies lurking around corners passing microfilm to the double agents of other major players during the cold war years ! 

The location near to the Opera House is ideal for checking out the lovely old town of Riga and also for walking into other parts of the city.  Breakfast was excellent, they cater for every taste be it American, English or Continental. There is also a well stocked bar in the hotel and prices there aren't too bad for a hotel of this class. 

Whether they'd make bikers welcome here is open to debate, probably yes, but anybody arriving in Riga by motorcycle would actually be damned lucky to make it to the hotel in one piece, such are the diabolical driving standards in the city! The taxi drivers are particularly "Kamikazee".    An interesting hotel in a fabulous city, where the natives are exceptionally friendly
 

Hotel 
Wyspianski

Stayed here
Jan 2007

Biker Friendly?
Probably but check before booking

Krakow used to be a walled city,  in 1807 the walls were pulled down and a circular park called the "The Garden Planty Ring" was constructed in its place in 1820.  Everything within the circumference of the park is the "Old Town" and on the outside is the "Modern" town.  The Hotel Wyspianski is just outside the park and more or less overlooks it making it officially in the modern town.  The situation makes it ideal for the train station which is a 5 minute walk away and a slow walk to the main square of the old town will take about 10 minutes. 

The hotel itself is about the cleanest you'll find anywhere, everywhere is spotless.  The twin bedded rooms are unusual in that the beds are placed end to end rather than side by side. This is due to the rooms being long and narrow, but this doesn't detract in any way from the rooms function, in fact it adds a certain character to it. The bathroom was beautifully prepared for our stay, and as was the rest of the room and the hotel in general it was immaculately clean.  The showers are superb, piping hot and powerful. 

The only downside of the hotel is that the staff aren't over friendly. We locked our key in the room and they had to get one of the cleaners to take us up and let us in...She got into a bit of a tut with having to perform this small task!  Having said that though they did let us leave our bags there on our last day as our flight home wasn't 'til late and we didn't fancy lugging them around Krakow until it was time to go to the airport. 

The bar is well stocked but not cheap compared with the bars etc in the rest of Krakow, but that could be said of any hotel the world over - they all hike their bar prices.  Breakfast here wasn't anything special, the usual offerings of cold meats and cheeses etc but served up Polish style ..i.e, unappetising, although the coffee was good.  There was some hot food bubbling away in a stainless steel oven affair in the corner of the restaurant, but again, having been cooked in the ubiquitous Polish lard it was greasy, salty and not very attractive. 

In all a very good hotel, clean and comfortable, it would have scored a lot higher had the staff been more friendly and the breakfast been slightly more edible. Not sure if they'd welcome bikers but if so parking wouldn't  be too bad, not terribly secure but the hotel isn't in a bad part of town.

Biker Friendly   

Stayed here
Aug 2005 

                                                                  
Great hotel with friendly and helpful staff.  Couvet is a bit "back of beyond" but the hotel is a delight with huge spacious rooms, and a half decent bar. This is Absinthe country, and there's a local museum which tells all about it. Needless to say there are a few Absinthe related artifacts around the bar of the hotel. 

We ate here on both nights of our stay, mainly because everywhere else was closed in the town (see page 4 of Euro tour 2005).  The food was good, we enjoyed it, which was just as well really seeing as there was nowhere else to eat.  Bike parking is good, nice and secure in the car park at the rear of the hotel. 

Biker Friendy??
Check before booking.     

 Stayed here 
Aug 2006  

It felt a bit like walking into a Grimm Fairytale when we arrived at the Schloss Hotel Swiss Chalet, such is its "tweeness". To say it's a bit over the the top in it's exterior appearance would be a gross understatement. Think cake decoration!  Food in the restaurant was good but nothing special  The staff here are a bit robotic, and unsmiling but maybe that's the Swiss way. There's a tendency towards  subservience, which if you like that kind of "forelock tugging" service from hotel 
 staff is fine, but I find it demeaning and would rather be served with a smile and bit of friendly banter!  

For all that though the hotel is interesting and certainly different, the rooms are well prepared for the guests stay, being clean  and very cosy.  Our bathroom was huge, but once again windowless which made it a bit stuffy in there, but not smelly or unpleasant.  The inside of the building is really quite nice, and they've tried to get an authentic Swiss Chalet ambience in the place, and have mostly succeeded - unlike the outside where they've gone just a bit too far!  

There's not a lot locally so if you want to eat without driving off somewhere then you've no other choice but the hotel. There's also no separate bar.  Parking is ok, but near to a main road,  this is Switzerland though so there should be no problems leaving cars or bikes here.  Not sure if they'd be happy with bikes 
though, best check first as it is quite a pretentious hotel.   

If it was cheaper I'd have given it 3 "yo" marks but it was way too expensive for what it offered, I think the management have an over inflated view of it's worth.   The whole package didn't work for me, but I don't think it was designed to appeal to the English taste, there were a few Germans staying here though which would explain a lot!  Ok for a one night stopover but any more would be a bit dull.