Sadly speaking, we did not have a really great experience staying at Ciara and Ian’s place and it is perhaps one of the most terrible experiences that we have ever had throughout our journey in Ireland.
First of all, the location of this house is not really as conveniently located as the host claims on the listing description. While it is true that it only takes a couple of minutes’ walk to the bus station, this is only true when you are intending to take the bus to the city centre. If you are taking the bus back from the city centre, you actually need to get off the bus at a more faraway station and it is about 10 minutes’ walk to the house (instead of just a couple of minutes). Also, there is only one bus route to and from the city centre (not to mention the frequent delays or cancellations of the scheduled services). There are also no buses going to the city centre if you are leaving early say before 8am. This is something that you may be aware of if you do not drive around Cork.
Secondly, I think one of the major problems leading to a not so satisfactory stay is the miscommunication between the host and the guests. Upon check in, the host did not let us know that the property actually has a little baby and another guest staying in another room until we found out ourselves during our stay. I suggest the host should let other guests know that there is actually a little baby in the house that somebody need to be aware of. The host should also let us know that there are also other guests staying in another room at the same time upon check in.
Thirdly, there is one major serious incident that makes our stay extremely unpleasant is that there are traces of somebody entering our room without informing us or asking for our permission. Upon check in, we discovered that there is a hair dryer in the closet that probably belongs to the host. On our second day when we were back from a long day trip, we discovered that the hairdryer in the closet suddenly disappeared. We remembered clearly that the hairdryer was still there before we went out for the day trip. It is a strong evidence that somebody has entered our room to get the hairdryer when we were out. We were really worried that our valuables were stolen so we quickly checked over all our luggage. Luckily, we did not suffer any losses. Although I understand that the hairdryer probably belongs to the host, I would like to emphasise that it is actually the host’s responsibility to inform the guests or ask for the guests’ permission BEFORE entering our room to get anything from our room. We are paying for a private room to stay and therefore the room is actually OUR PRIVATE SPACE for the entire duration of our stay. We expect the host to respect the guests’ privacy as well as health and safety at all times. The host is not permitted to enter a guest’s room regardless of his intention without informing the guest or asking for the guest’s permission. This type of behaviour is extremely unsatisfactory and terrible that I would strong recommend all of you to consider carefully before deciding to stay at Ciara’s place.
Moreover, there is one more incident that makes our last night of stay extremely terrifying and unpleasant. During midnight at around 1am, there is light coming into our room from the corridor suddenly that made my girlfriend feel very frightened and anxious. We were not sure whether there were somebody trying to open our room door and come inside our room during midnight. However, this is already enough for us to stay awake most of the time during midnight to prevent somebody else trying to do the same thing again. We feel extremely anxious and uncomfortable during our whole stay.
This is completely unacceptable for an Airbnb stay and I will definitely not recommend staying in Ciara’s place.