Hello all.. I never thought of asking my hotels whether or not there are elevators. I booked at Del Senato in Rome, Beacci Tornabuoni in Florence and Pensione Accademia in Venice.

I just read a post about Pension Accademia and a poster mentioned climbing two flights of stairs.. although not a problem for me, my mother in law will not be too pleased and after a full day of walking and touring, I don't think I'll like it either.

Does anyone know if there are elevators in these hotels? and when booking your hotel reservations, do you assume there is an elevator? I just thought that it would have been mentioned in the guidebooks.

Thanks for your help.

Del Senato certainly has an elevator.

The website http://www.tornabuonihotels.com/visita_ing.asp apepars to show an elevator.

And the website http://www.pensioneaccademia.it/leggend-e.html shows NO elevator - - but I think that many of the rooms are on the ground floor, and they do show "some" access for handicapped guests (two steps at the ground floor lobby). I would write to them and see what you can do, booking your room.

An alternative hotel would be Bonvecchiati.

Best wishes,

Rex

The Beacci Tornabuoni has an elevator. It is in a multistory building and the hotel occupies only the top two or three floors. Enjoy breakfast on the beautiful roof terrace.

It may be a bit late to point this out, but if your mother-in-law is stair-averse you might want to consider avoiding Venice entirely. It is pretty much up and down all day long, as you have to go up and down stairs every time you go over a bridge, and you go over lots of bridges. The big bridges (like Accademia) are the equivalent of several flights of stairs.

It is too late to reschedule and I wouldn't anyway. My mother-in-law will have to get off her duff and do more walking to prepare for this vacation. If not, she'll have to sit at the hotel.
Thanks all for your replies!!

There are ways to get around most of the stairs in Venice (plan walking routes, creative use of vaporetti, etc.)--many of the bridges are small anyway. Some bridges have devices to help the handicapped get over them--but it doesn't sound as though this would apply to your mum-in-law

Once your mother-in-law sees all the elderly Venetians managing to make their ways up and down stairs with canes and walkers she'll delight in her own mobility.

And she'll burn off gelato calories.

In answer to a part of your original question... no, I would not assume there is an elevator, unless the hotel specifically mentions it.

Several months ago we actually e-mailed to Beacci Tornabuoni in Florence asking the same question as you. They replied that the rooms on the third and fourth floors are served by an elevator, while the room on the fifth floor have two flights of stairs to climb. We requested a room on one of the floors served by the elevator.