In italiano più in basso.
We actually have mixed feelings regarding our stay at this Airbnb. We were looking for a not too expensive place where to spend a week in Edinburgh. We prioritised position and a cheaper price, than comforts, but we did not expect what we got.
Let’s start with the positive things:
- the position is good, it is just outside the city center (it’s a 30ish minutes walk to Princess St) with the bust stop almost right outside of the building. If you take the bus, it’s possibile to get to the city center in just 10ish minutes and at the same bus stop it’s possible to take the bus to reach the airport in around 20 minutes.
- check-in: I’ve seen many people complain about the app Staymyway to open the doors, personally we had no trouble (nor using and Android phone, nor an iPhone). Only the first evening, we were troubled on hot to open the front door, but we soon learnt that we just needed to give a little push when hearing the sound on the device.
- the availability of the owner (Andy) and of the person (maybe multiple) that work in the Airbnb is great, we always had an answer to our questions or complaints in just a few minutes, at worst we had to wait 30 minutes more or less.
Let’s now talk about the negative aspects: everything else. The room that is advertised here it is NOT the one shown in the pictures! The room advertised is the number 14 as said in the title, but the one shown in the photos is the number 18. When we got there, we have found a completely different room than the one we expected. The room had a red moquette, it was dirty with a big spiderweb dropping from the ceiling and mould on the borders of the bathtub and with holes on the walls (possibly due to a sloppy removal of the curtains). One of the reasons we had chosen this room, it was exactly the absence of the moquette since I’m highly allergic to dust, so when we saw that the room was the wrong one, we contacted the owner, who initially tried to tell us that that was the room we paid for (which it wasn’t based on the pictures) and then we contacted Airbnb assistance. At the end, we managed to find an agreement with the owner and the next day we moved to the correct room which was the one shown in the pictures of this advertisement. If you want to see room 14, then it’s the one with the red moquette at the end of these photos: https://www.booking.com/hotel/gb/no-6-west-coates.en-gb.html?activeTab=photosGallery .
Room 18 was not that bad, it did not excel in cleanliness since the floor was dirty and there was water in the boiler with some mould, but for the rest it was a good room.
Let’ finish up by talking about the dining room: when we booked this Airbnb, we knew that the kitchen was shared with the other guests, what we did not know is that there would have been only a microwave oven and two little fridges, no sink nor stove. I shall remind you that there are 18 rooms and that it’s easy to not find enough cutlery nor enough clean ones (sometimes even the clean ones were not that clean). To end this note, the dining room has a hole in the ceiling due to a water leak which I hope that can get fixed as soon as possible since it is not horrible to see, but it seems to also be dangerous.
So the negative evaluation is due to:
- deceptive advertisement: who sees it, expects that the room 14 is the one depicted in the pictures, but it is not;
- cleanliness;
- value for money: if kept a little bit better, for example by removing the last few bits of moquette from the rooms, clean the mould in the bathrooms and take care of some details a little bit better, the increased price for the Xmas period could be applied all year long and it would be worth it, but as it is I would not spend more than 50€ (around 40£) per night at this hotel.
Why would you want to stay here? Well, the position is really good and the staff is available, so if you have to stay just for a few days and do not have to cook, well, this place could be good for you.
Questo Airbnb ci ha lasciato un po' l'amaro in bocca. L'idea era quella di trovare un posto non troppo costoso dove passare una settimana a Edimburgo. Abbiamo dato una maggiore priorità alla posizione e a un costo non troppo elevato e meno invece ai confort, ma non ci aspettavamo quello che abbiamo trovato.
Partiamo con le cose positive:
- la posizione è molto buona, appena fuori dal centro di Edimburgo (20/25 minuti a piedi per Princess St) con la fermata dell'autobus praticamente fuori dall'edificio. Prendendo l'autobus è possibile arrivare in centro in 10/15 minuti in base alla quantità di traffico e sempre alla stessa fermata è possibile prendere l'autobus che porta all'aeroporto di Edimburgo in una 20ina di minuti.
- il check-in: ho visto che in molti si sono lamentati dell'app Staymyway per aprire le porte, personalmente non abbiamo mai avuto problemi (né su Android né su iPhone), se non la prima sera in quanto non riuscivamo ad aprire la porta d'ingresso: quando sentite il suono di apertura, basta che diate una spinta e questa si apre.
- la disponibilità del titolare (Andy) e delle persona (forse persone?) che lavorano all'interno dell'Airbnb è ottima, abbiamo sempre avuto risposta ai messaggi con domande o esigenze in pochi minuti, al più una mezz'oretta.
Veniamo ora alle cose negative: tutto il resto. La stanza che viene proposta in questo annuncio NON è quella messa nelle foto! La stanza di questo annuncio,