My husband and I finally got passports and went to Rome for my niece's wedding. We had a wonderful trip and the wedding was beautiful. I hope someone can answer a couple questions about hotel services.

We stayed at a Daphne Bed & Breakfast and paid $150 per night for a room with a private bath. We received towels on the day we checked in and were told we would not receive fresh ones, as it was customary not to Europe. Is this true? They moved us to another rooms and even moved the towels and our sheets! I know they were the same sheets because I got a bit of lipstick on my pillowcase when I fell asleep napping.

I can understand not changing the sheets if we were in the same room, but it seemed a bit skeevy not to change sheet if we changed rooms. Using the same towel for 4 nights/5 days seemed unhygentic. Is this truly the norm for Italy and/or Europe?

We plan on heading back to Europe this spring. Maybe I'll pack my own towels.

I'm not an expert on this, but we've never had this experience in a wide variety of hotels we've stayed at, most of which cost us less than $150 a night.

Recently in hotels in the UK I've noticed that you are given a choice. There's a notice explaining that washing towels after each use in wasteful of resources and bad for the environment. You are told that if you leave your towels on the rail they will be left for another day. If you want them changed, you are asked to leave them in the bath.
There may be a similar system in Italy.

We haven't either. Sometimes the towels aren't terry cloth, like towels in the US, but they were changed daily. I don't think our sheets have been changed daily in all cases, but taking the sheets to the room they moved you to was weird to say the least. I don't think you need to pack towels for your next visit to Italy, just stay at a different hotel/b&b. I doubt you'll have the same experience.

Even in a budget hotel where they don't necessarily change the sheets and towels every day, I would never think of their moving the same sheets and towels to another room, not that I've changed rooms that often.

I would have asked for fresh sheets and towels.

I hope it was YOUR lipstick.

During the last few years, I have found it quite common for hotels in Italy to have a conspicuous sign (often in Italian only) saying that, as a environmental conservation measure, towels will be changed only upon request, and specifying that the way to request a change in towels in to throw them on the floor. If they are hanging on the rod they'll be presumed to be still clean and usable. However, sometimes my towel has been changed even when I have not thrown it on the floor, so I have no complaint. (Well, actually I do have one complaint: when I'm in a double room used as a single, it is made up as a double, but sometimes after one night, one of the towels (still perfectly usable) is removed just because the room is being used as a single, even though I didn't ask for a fresh towel.)

More often than not, the towels are not terry cloth, but are a smooth woven cloth, but sometimes with a waffle texture. When they are terry cloth, they usually are pretty stiff and scratchy because I think they are line dried, not fluffed in an electric dryer. Though I prefer soft terry cloth, none of this bothers me especially. The differences from what i'm used to at home just add to the sense of place.

I think this is more than I have ever written in my life on the subject of TOWELS.

I have never heard of this either. They do sometimes ask you if you want your towels changed daily (for example leave them on the floor if you want them changed, hang them up if not) but moving sheets is something new! At $150 a night this is very unexpected. Stay somewhere else next time.

Sounds cheap and strange to me. I've also noted that "ecology" move that offers to change your towels only if you leave them on the floor, and I proudly often hang mine up on the racks thinking I can easily do my part for ecology. But half the time, it seems they take them anyway and still replace with new ones. That happens both in the US and in Europe.

I've never been to Rome, but I had a similar weird experience in Switzerland. We were staying at a hotel where breakfast and dinner were included in the rate. The first night at dinner we were given envelopes and we noticed other guests placing their used dinner napkins in the envelopes. Thinking this was rather bizarre, and perhaps voluntary, we opted to leave our napkins on the table.

When we turned up for breakfast the following day, we found that our used dinner napkins had been folded, placed in the envelopes, and left for us to re-use.

Weird, weird. Melnq8, bizarre indeed. And a little gross if you ask me. I'm all for conservation but that's a bit much. What's the name of this place? Was it recent?

Back to the original question: I have seen this done in both Germany and in Switzerland...the no changing towels bit. But in my experience I have always been given the choice...put them on the floor and they get changed; hang them up again and they don't. I do not agree that it is "customary in Europe" for towels not to be changed, especially in full-service hotels, unless the guest is first given that option.
In all the hotels I have stayed in in Italy, and as recently as May of this year, the towels were routinely changed on a daily basis.

I've seen the no changing towels thing even in the US. Usually they have a card saying to leave the towel on the floor if you want a new one though.
But the sheets and napkin things are both just plain weird. Even in my own house, I only use cloth napkins once before washing. (So obviously we usually have paper napkins.)

Samtraveler -

It was at the Hotel Brunner in Wengen, Switzerland, about three years ago.

I've never had this happened to us except in Brugges. There were three of us in a room. The floor was wet because the shower curtain didn't close well. We put the used towels on the floor to dry it and they were all mixed up. We piled them in the corner. When we returned, they were hanging over the shower to dry. We called the owner and insisted they give us clean towels. That was disgusting.

Seriously, does my not taking new clean towels make this world any better for future generations? I always felt this was the biggest scam in the hotel business. I take that back - mini bars are the absolute biggest ripoff. They're just looking for a way to cut costs despite charging you $150.00 a night just for a place to sleep. No wonder I prefer Pensions and B&B's.

I agree that the items in the minibars are rip-offs, but so are the groceries carried in gas station convenience stores and the toothpaste carried in hotel gift shops.

You can simply not play, or else agree to pay the price for the convenience.

I first came upon the "wet towels" and water conservation in Australia in '95, so haven't been surprised to see that this is moving around the world. In most cases it does make sense - how many of us actually change our own towels at home daily? Maybe every other or third day, but daily? Don't think so. But actually moving your "used" sheets from one room to another room is ridiculous. That new room should have been made up for any guest who would be occupying it.

Many of us in the US are rather spoiled with the service in most well-rated hotels - the Hiltons, Sheratons, Inter-continentals, Hyatts, etc. where sheets are changed daily, as people are moving in/out daily - it's just easier to change the room entirely. Rarely can I recall when I've had the same sheets more than one-day, though some hotels, if they definitely know a guest will be occupying the room for say 2-or 3-days, will keep the same sheets (unless obviously spoiled).

Back to moving your sheets - at $150/nt. they were treating you as if you were staying at a "room-by-the-hour" hotel - Get the picture? Disgusting and Amazing!

I've heard of the reused napkin event before, but only in fiction. Years ago I read many George Simenon mysteries. Set in Paris, his famous inspector often lunched at the same brasserie. The books detailed how the lunch regulars had a weekly cloth napkin that they returned to a cubbyhole behind the bar after each meal. The books were written in the 1940s-60s.

Perhaps the habit then was not to use a napkin in quite the same way as some do today.

In Prague, I was given fresh towels ONLY if I threw my used ones on the floor. I DID get beautiful, thick washcloths, however, which I made SURE to throw on the floor every day!! There was a sign saying that if I wanted to use my towel again, to leave it on the rack. Also, I was using a double as a single, and the amount of towels that I received changed every day, depending on who the housekeeper was!

In French households, they do use the same napkins for more than one day; each person has his/her own identifiable napkin ring and receives the same napkin back. (I've never figured out just how long one uses the same napkin.) Knowing this, I guess the hotel napkin thing is not that unusual, although I have never experienced it in a hotel.