Verona hotels
 

Anyone stay in the Hotel Aurora recently? How about the Abacus (aka casabellaitalia?
Any other hotels of character (but clean and comfortable too)or off the beaten path that you could recommend? I want to be in or within walking distance of the historic center but I would love to be in a "neighborhood" rather than a tourist center.

Thanks for any help

Verona is not blessed with memorable hotels. You might do better looking for B&B.

If you want to avoid the tourist center (a good idea) simply don't book directly around the Piazza Bra or the Piazza dell'Erbe. However, it does make sense to book within the "centro storico" or within the city walls or anyplace that advertises itself as 500 meters from Piazza Bra or the Arena.

If you find a hotel advertising itself as near the Duomo or near the Roman theater, that might be what you are looking for. Otherwise, anything across the Adige is purely residential. I'm not even sure you could find a hotel over there. It's rather suburban.

I stayed just a teeny bit outside the city walls in the Best Western, which was well-located, clean and comfortable and rather boring. But when you get to Verona you will see that you really don't need to flee a lot of other tourists or touristy corners. But you probably want to avoid the noise at night from the popular piazzas.

PS: If you avoid the Romeo and Juliet stuff, I doubt you will see much tourist kitsch at all in Verona. Even though my hotel was billed as "across from Romeo's tomb," I never went there and didn't ever feel I was in tourist trap. Verona just isn't that way.

If you are interested in an apt., I can highly recommend L'Ospite de Federica di Rossi which you can find very good reports on trip advisor. I stayed there for 2 nights with my family (of three people all together). It was a very nice and spacious apt. which included a bedroom, bathroom, huge living room which included a dining area, nicely outfitted kitchen and another sleeping area where at least two more people could have slept (i.e. a total of four). The proprietor, Federica, could not have been nicer. The price was right (about 90 Euros per night) and the only drawback is that you are "on your own", i.e. it is not a hotel where you get your towels changed daily or your beds made. However, it is not in a touristy area, it is more of in the neighborhood type place you are looking for. We loved Verona and enjoyed walking all over the city. There were several nice little trattorias in the area of our apt. and a supermarket as well.

If the Aurora is the small hotel facing the Piazza delle Erbe, I stayed there three years ago. It was one of the only well-priced central hotels open in January.

Thanks all.

Ekscrunchy-that's the same Aurora. It seems nice and I've been quoted 135 euros for a double. I also just got a quote from the Torcolo for 95 euros. Can anyone tell me if the Aurora is worh the difference in price?

I'll check L'ospite de Frederica. Many of the B&B's I've read about (San Faustino, Franciscus) are already booked for when I'll be there in September or they don't have air conditioning which is a must for my traveling partner.

Thanks again for any more info anyone can give.

I remember also being in touch with the Torcolo at the time I was searching for a hotel. I nixed them because they wanted some unreturnable fee paid up front which I thought was very strange and unusual for a hotel. Plus if I remember correctly, the reviews on trip advisor were pretty mixed on it.

I've just booked the Torcolo b/c the
Aurora would not let me reserve by
CC# rather they requested an Euro
cheque/draft/money order or CASH!
Also, they do not have non-smoking
rooms or parking arrangements plus
the 4 top floor view rooms were
already booked for October.

The reviews for the Torcolo seemed to
be even better than the Aurora - so
we'll see!

I do not remember all that much about the Aurora except that we had to climb lots of steps to reach the lobby. The location was great but I recall that the woman at the front desk was not particularly helpful. It was January and the hotel had only a few guests. Nevertheless, when we asked to shorten our stay by one day, meaning check out a day early, they charged us for that day. I had never done this before and I realize they had a cancellation policy but I thought they could have waived it since there were very few other guests. So I would not go out of my way to stay here given the other options. But perhaps I was wrong to expect that they would accommodate our change of plans.

Thanks. I'm going in September and had llamalady's experience with the Aurora. The Torcolo will take a credit card deposit but it loooks like they'll return it if you cancel within 2 days of arrival. And I agree, the web comments about both seem to be about equal.


Does anyone know the Europa? That seems to be another one in Verona often mentioned favorably.