I carefully read all the reviews before booking with Sally, and the issues we had were not mentioned or I would not have booked the stay. The worst problem we had was that the house reeked of cigarette smoke and dog, and I never read anywhere In Sally's ad that said it wasn't a non-smoking house or that she had two large dogs. It was very offensive, and I was coughing and smelling smoke on our clothes and luggage for the rest of my vacation.
Sally was not friendly; she wasn't mean or nasty, but it was like she was having a bad day the whole time we were there. We were so anxious to get out of there by the next morning that we skipped our full Irish breakfast, changed our ferry tickets, and fled the island 4 hours early.
Let me start at the beginning. Sally was standing in the next yard, taking clothes off the line when we arrived. I thought she was a neighbor. We had been walking up and down the streets, dragging our luggage behind us, looking for the house (there were no signs saying Costello's B&B anywhere, and only a "Vacancy" sign in the window). Instead of greeting us in a friendly manner, she kept taking down her laundry, and only spoke to us when we asked if the house we were standing in front of was the Costello B&B. Her reply was, "wait there a few minutes," while she finished with her laundry. She finally came around the wall to let us into the house, and the reek was very strong.
I am very sensitive to cigarette smoke, so I really wanted to just leave, but my husband pointed out that we only had a short time on the island, and he didn't want to spend it looking for other lodging. After she let us into the front room, she left us for "2 minutes" (Irish time), which lasted 5 or 6 minutes. She then only came in to discuss breakfast. Our options were full Irish (which she wanted to serve at 9:30 a.m.), or cereal and toast. We had to negotiate to get an earlier time, but she finally conceded to 8 a.m. We wanted to spend the morning sightseeing, not waiting for food.
The moment we finally settled the breakfast issue, she fled the room again, this time for 20 minutes. She only said "She's vacuuming" before departing. Since Sally had still not introduced herself, we took her to be the help and waited patiently for the vacuuming noise to stop. It finally did, and Sally returned. It was very strange. She never actually did introduce herself; we just figured it out. I never found out who "She" (who was doing the vacuuming) was.
Sallie showed us to our rooms, and the first one had the strong odor of wet dog. My son has a problem with smelling, so he got that room. The second one had a fainter smell, and we were very glad the window was open. It only started reeking when we shut the window, which was during the night.
The water pressure in both of our bathrooms was intensely strong, and the bathroom sink was so tiny that when I turned the water on it hit the sink and sprayed the entire left side of the room! Our son had the same problem in his bathroom. Luckily the shower had a pressure adjustment because we could only stand it at half-power.
Long story short, we woke up at 6 a.m., decided to take the 9 a.m. ferry, gulped down some tea and toast, and left the house around 7:30. It was only as we were leaving that Sally showed any social skills at all and became slightly pleasant. We were leaving very early, and she was happy! I was trying to be gracious, and complemented the super strong water pressure, and she told me that it's electrically enhanced and costs 30 cents each time the toilet is flushed. It made me feel a little guilty for using it. In summary, I cannot recommend Costello's B&B in any other way than to recommend avoiding it.