Casale Porto Contessa

100% recommended. The place is beautiful. Super tidy, clean, modern yet keeps the local feel. While others chase the typical hotel feel, here you’ll get more than that, you’ll feel exclusive, with a nice patio for meals. Modern and cozy bathroom with all the essentials. Disconnect on their 360 view terrace, or head to their garden and lay down for a relax evening. Their homemade focaccia will water your mouth! The property’s staff will make you feel like family and they are very attentive. Ask them for suggestions, they’ll hook you up so you can enjoy you stay even more. Having a car is essential, but if not, don’t worry, a tuk tuk will get you wherever you want. This is the type of place you recommend to people so you look like you know the good stuff!

Unfortunately, this place was not as described or as pictured in the photos. I’m sorry to the lovely host, who took ill on the last day so I didn’t say anything to her directly, but we spent nearly €1000 to stay here for three nights and it wasn’t at all as expected. Based on the photos, descriptions on online reviews (Google, Trip Advisor and Booking.com) I thought that we were coming to a resort-style location close to the beach (if you wanted to walk to the beach it was over a kilometre away and partly on a main road with no sidewalk). I deliberately booked a “suite” to suit three young adults because it was specifically described as having “Bedroom 1” and “Bedroom 2”. “Bedroom 2” consisted of bunk beds (which was fine and as stated) but these were located in the corner of the open kitchen/dining space, so there was no privacy at all for the third guest. I would absolutely not have chosen this place had I known that, even though I double checked that this was a “separate room” before we arrived. There was a sliding door between the kitchen/dining/bunk bed area and the main bedroom, but once this was closed for guests to sleep, it made that area very hot as there was no air conditioning or fan in there. Other relatively minor but disappointing things - the kitchen cupboard was broken so I had to use my head to hold it open to get out the crockery, and the kitchen curtain fell off and almost caught on fire because I was cooking at the time. The whole outdoor area of property was also quite bizarre, with broken things, unfinished walls and pipes, and discarded items everywhere. You were also greeted by overflowing garbage bins at the entry gate. The bed base was peeling off and the outdoor furniture was falling apart. I have loads of photos but can’t seem to add them all here. I hate giving bad reviews, but I can’t tell you how disappointed we were with this property- we even double checked the photos to compare what we saw in real life to see if we had imagined it. I’m not sure how long ago the website images were taken, but it is nothing like this now. I do have to wonder if the reviews online are legitimate, because some were from the week before we arrived and described it very differently. It is absolutely not 5 star. It was an experience, but not the one we had planned or pictured. :(