Hotel Arcadia

The Arcadia is not the Ritz!! Having said that, Vivien & I found this the ideal ‘launch pad’ for exploring everything that Rome has to offer – and that’s a lot! The hotel rooms are basic but clean & functional. You will not find a kettle because of strict Italian Health & Safety rules. – This applies to most hotels. On the upside, there is a fridge, great for beers and a spot of home catering!! The reception staff are probable the best we’ve ever come across. Their English is great, they are really friendly, helpful and nothing is too much trouble – they even have a corkscrew handy, in case you buy a bottle of wine with a cork – and all of the bottles in the supermarket seemed to have a cork!! Breakfast is served from 7am until 10am and is the typical continental style. Possibly an additional option to cornflakes would be good. There is an excellent supermarket virtually underneath the hotel. Just go out of the reception entrance, turn right, go up the steps on your right, walk straight across to the steps down, turn left and there you are!! To get into the city is so easy, both of us being a right pair of ‘country bumkins’ and not having used any form of public transport for many years, thought this to be a tad daunting – How wrong we were!! – After just one day of ‘commuting’ we felt like seasoned Romans!!! A good idea is to buy a couple of ‘Metrobus’ tickets per person at the hotel reception. (one to get into the city and one to get back @ 1.5 Euros each) Each ticket will give you 100 minutes of travel. Just outside the hotel, catch the 506 bus ( Reception will give you the bus times) to the bus park at Anagnina. The buses run approximately every 40 minutes. You need to ‘validate’ your ticket on the bus. There is a yellow box on board into which you insert your ticket, this ‘stamps’ the time on it. At Anagnina, follow everyone else and walk the 200 metres or so to the Metro (tube) station, insert your ticket to open the gate and jump on!! Anagnina is at the start of the ‘red’ line, so you can only go in one direction! The first stop we made was at ‘Barbarini’ which took us to the Trevi Fountain. Again, the Arcadia staff will provide and explain a map of the area. Everything was going fine until, the Friday afternoon before we were due to fly back to Manchester, we received a text from Ryanair, telling us that, thanks to the Italian union which governs Air Traffic Control, our return flight was cancelled because they were having a strike!! In total, Ryanair had cancelled 109 flights that Saturday morning. Imagine the thousands of people who had had their holidays disrupted. TIP! – Make sure you have a mobile phone and that your airline has the number, otherwise you will know nothing about any problems, until you’ve checked out and arrived at the airport. In this case, an iPad also proved more than useful. However, despite all the hassle of finding a return flight home on webchat with Ryanair, an extra two nights at the Arcadia was no problem at all. Apparently, the Italian Unions are very good at striking, so it may be a good idea to allow a few extra days after you are due to return, and if you are on any medication, make sure you have a plentiful supply. If you fly with Ryanair, don’t expect there to be a ‘rescue package’!! – because there isn’t!!! The best that they could do was two days later to Stansted, instead of Manchester! Unfortunately, there do not seem to be many other airlines using Ciampino airport, so taking the option of a refund, was pretty much pointless!! The Arcadia staff were brilliant, allowing me to check in and print out new boarding passes on their PC & printer, not to mention finding and booking our train tickets from Stansted to Manchester. Visiting Rome is an amazing experience, and you could do a lot worse than using the ‘Arcadia’ as your ‘base’.