Hotel Carignano in Lucca

The hotel is almost 30 minutes away from city center therefore the two stars. Otherwise a nice drive from the hotel to the city center if you have a vehicle. We checked in late in the night, but our room was not cleaned from the previous occupants. Used towels on the floor, bed unmade and lots of mosquitoes.

We were told to go back down and wait till the room got cleaned at 10 in the night as they could not provide us with an alternative room.

Very disappointed. Breakfast was fine.

I would have given only one star for the service regarding the room cleaning, but the two stars are for the breakfast staff that helped during breakfast and generally being polite.

They can definitely be better if they look at the details.

Rooms were decent, pool was lovely.
Restaurant food was the worst meal I have ever had in a restaurant. Avoid this restaurant at all costs. Flys and ants in the dining area, Horrible food and when we reviewed the bill on check out additional items had been added that we didn't order or have.

We arrived earlier than expected after cycling during a very hot day. They made an effort to make our room ready earlier. There are positives, but our experience had many negatives.

My daughter had fallen down during the ride and grazed her knee. Despite this being very evident, we were not even asked if she/we needed anything. Yes. We put this within the context of being asked about her knee in several hotels after we left this one.

The hotel has a storage room for bicycles and we were never offered to use it. We only saw it existed when we checked out and we saw other guests taking their bicycles out. And they knew we were cycling from the moment we arrived...

Let's move on to the restaurant... Due to my daughter's knee issue, we decided to have dinner there. We were the only customers. The dinner was nice, but very over-priced. We had much better quality meals in Lucca for a much better cost. When we finished the meal they were very quick to bring the bill without even asking if we wanted dessert/coffee. We of course ordered dessert, ate, paid and left. Breakfast... Not a bad one, with lots of variety and selection, but we noticed that despite being busy, all their eggs and warm meals were not being kept warm at the buffet. Our eggs were at room temperature when we were served them. The coffee was not great either. The worst amongst several hotel we visited. Many in the same region as this one.

The rooms... Ours was spacious with a very large and comfortable balcony. However, the air-conditioning despite working was not cooling the room. Staying cool in the room was for us an act of survival. We thought it was due to high external heat, but yet again... We were in other hotels in the region even during warmer days and the A/C worked like wonders. Lastly, their plugs for charging mobiles and devices were very limited and use non-standard EU plugs. We had to unplug the fridge to charge our mobiles by turns because it was the only plug that worked.

Location... About 3 km from Lucca. That is not the center of Lucca as some replies in other reviews seem to emphasize. The taxi from the hotel costs 20-30 euros. That tells you how close to Lucca's centre it actually is. If you do not have your own/rented car and you are expecting to be close to things, then don't stay here. This was not a problem for us even on bicycles, but still worth mentioning it. Marketing of the hotel itself is very misleading. "The peaceful surroundings, filled with fruit trees, vineyards and olive groves" seriously disappoint. They are there, but quite far from the hotel and not accessible from the hotel itself (unless you are keen on jumping fences, invading your neighbour's garden, and things like that). The hotel itself has limited green spaces beyond those that surround the swimming pool. And they have limited fruit trees. The swimming pool however, is very nice and we had a good time using it.

More on customer service... Because of my daughter's knee accident, we spent most of our first/second day in the room with the "don't disturb" sign outside the door. Nevertheless, there was ample time without the sign and we were not even asked if we needed a change of towels or our bin emptied. This is something that yet again was done in other hotels that in contrast showed better customer service. Even in hotels for which we paid less.

So in summary... We do not recommend this hotel at all. I usually give places a second opportunity. In fact I only tend to write reviews when I have nothing negative to say. Our experience was however, so bad that it would be unfair to future customers not to say it. It is a place to avoid as it stands. Hopefully management can address these issues and make the hotel much better. It certainly has the potential, but check other reviews after this one for improvement before booking.