I don’t understand how this apartment has so many positive reviews.
We arrived to no key in our lockbox and having to wait an hour for someone to come open the unit. The photos show a beautiful romantic charming courtyard. There was a street festival happening in all of Alfama which was not communicated accurately. The listing noted there was late night events on the 12/13 of June and celebrations throughout the month. It was not mentioned that you will be unable to use the terrace (which isn’t even a terrace in reality, it’s a narrow walkway to multiple apartments) because there are food vendors grilling fish directly outside our door. We arrived home after dinner to party-goers having a table set up against our front door inhaling drugs until 2:30am resulting in us feeling unsafe and checking into a hotel the next day instead of continuing our reservation.
Additionally, we couldn’t open any windows or else we would be on display to the whole party and the smells of the party would come inside so we felt trapped in a dark basement. This was especially unfortunate because the entire apartment is so damp that we felt like we were sleeping in a wet tent. Even the mattress was damp. All our clothing smelled like mould and had to be washed after only being in the unit for a total of 15 hours. They mitigate this by leaving a space heater, which is not what you want to have to use in the heat of the summer in an apartment without AC. (We knew there would be no A/C in advance, however, so I can’t complain about that.) had we stayed our second night there is no way our towels would ever have been able to dry in that space.
Overall, my biggest concern was the complete lack of communication about the parties, how this changed the guest experience in regards to the indoor/outdoor use of the space, the disgusting mess in the courtyard, and ultimately how all of this impacted our safety.
I have been staying at Airbnb’s for years and this is the only bad review I have ever left. My husband and I came all the way from Canada to celebrate our wedding anniversary and instead had to deal with all of this. We are yet to be offered any compensation and instead incurred additional costs of having to change to a new accommodation last minute.
The only positive I can say is that the unit was clean inside and looked mostly accurate to the photos, and that they left a bottle of wine for us. I cannot under any circumstances recommend this place to anyone. I can see how the location might be nice during other months of the year but I could certainly see the mildew of the apartment impacting your health if you stayed more than a night or two.