The reception by and communication with Bravissimo was very good. They met us by the apartment when we arrived, and we could check in quickly with no trouble at all. The photos of the apartment quite fairly represent how it actually looks once you’re there. It is small, but it has most if not all you need. The wifi is good and fast enough to allow streaming and browsing with no problem what so ever. There is a washing machine, which we were particularly thankful for. The oven is a microwave/normal oven-combined, and it works well. The bed, mattress and pillows are very comfortable.
There is a big free parking lot nearby; here we could park easily most of the time, but it gets very busy and full at certain times of the day/week.
We were extremely curious as to who the woman was living in the apartment next door, because her personality and circadian rhythm is something previously unseen to us. In short, while the neighbour is not doing anything illegally (no mega-loud parties or music or anything), the wall isolation is very poor, and you can hear just about everything she is doing. At all times. She has a lifestyle where she would typically come home around 11 pm or so, and then talk more or less uninterrupted for hours, either on the phone or with her friend who was there, several times until 4-5 pm in the morning. To give you an idea of the volume, we could listen to and understand what her friend on the other end of the phone was saying. I am sure they were solving important world problems, warranting such lengthy telephone discussions every night. If they momentarily stopped, it would on several occasions be due to passionate sexual activity in which we could take part in both the sinusoidal moaning build-ups, and as the sound rose to crescendos of climaxes. Again, they are probably not doing anything they’re not allowed to, but be prepared for it. We stayed there for two weeks, so we got our dose by the end.
The apartment has a 4.97 cleanliness score by the time I am typing this. While key areas such as the bed was very clean and we could see they had made a fair attempt to clean the apartment, there were a few places in the kitchen with dirt/spots from past visitors (hairs and lemon seeds in the sink), which is no big deal, but a bit unfortunate, as it gives you a bit that “eeww”-feeling. The space between the bed and the wall was very dusty.
Finally, there was water leakage both under the sink in the kitchen (we had to dry up the area around the trash bin) and, most importantly, from the shower cabinet out on the bathroom floor. The latter is a problem which must have gone on for quite a while, as you could see how the water was and had been making its way down into brown darks cracks between the wall and floor. This produces a musty and mouldy smell which is quite strong and uncomfortable. We attempted to stop the leakage by placing towels at critical areas inside and outside the shower cabinet, which helped somewhat with the water ingress, but not really with the smell. Constant airing of the bathroom and apartment was necessary, and generally we had to keep the bathroom door shut to avoid the worst of it.
We did not mention any of these problems to Bravissimo, as there was probably little they could do with the neighbour situation, whereas the water leakage problem would require more lengthy work to fix, and we were not really interested in having workers going in and out of the place while we were there.
All in all, Bravissimo were good hosts, and the apartment had some positives and also some drawbacks. In the end, you probably get what you pay for.