There’s a venerable hotel in a prime tourist location in Italy whose historic guest list includes Mary Shelley, Charles Dickens and Puccini. Who wouldn’t want to share the same rooms and views as they did? Recent reviews of this establishment, however, suggest that while it is undeniably atmospheric, dating as it does to the 11th century, in certain respects it remains trapped in the middle ages. It’s like Fawlty Towers meets a bug hotel.

Disgruntled posts carry headlines such as “Truly awful!” and “Run away”. Then: “Electrics look seriously questionable. Bathrooms are like a scene out of The Shining with a lack of water, stains and strange noises. The beds are not vintage, they are decrepit.”

Another asked of the booking agency: “when did you last audit this health risk of a building?” and complained that not only was there no hot water but the cold water was brown. There was also a power cut and: “I used a spare pillow out of the wardrobe and got eaten alive!”

One guest had to ask for a different room on arrival because the bathroom was so unhygienic. In his new room, “I also found multiple spiders inside the bed…” Other unfortunates catalogued exposed wiring, fused lights, rotten shutters and broken beds.

You might assume nobody in their right minds would take a room in such a place. Well, we did. Normally we read reviews before booking, but because we have stayed in this hotel before, and thought it shabby but appealingly quirky, we didn’t do our usual due diligence. That won’t happen again. The wiring in the bedside light was indeed exposed, and the frescoed ceiling was so riven with cracks I feared the slightest........

© Herald Scotland