Hotel not centrally located

You must be in Penzance? Just finished that tour last Friday and that was not a good location. The hotel itself was fine and I was lucky enough to have a spectacular view of St Michael’s Mount but not well-sited for bus pick up/drop offs or for seeing the town.

I thought the other hotels on this tour were well-located.

This was tour #9 for me and out of all the hotels I’ve stayed in this was near the bottom location-wise.

I did have a terrific time on the tour, though! Are you enjoying yourself?

I've been on a couple of tours where the hotels were not centrally located.

In Penzance the hill was so steep the hotel sent a van for our luggage so we didn't have to try to lug that stuff uphill.

The other was in Ireland where the B&B we were in was so far and in such an unlit area that the guide was worried about us walking back after dark and arranged for group taxis.

Bob, is this the Hotel Penzance? I remember when we stayed there the hill was, ummm, challenging, but I don't remember it being a mile from the center.

We had a gorgeous view from our corner room there. And good cider in the bar, as I recall. A pleasant walk into town as well. I remember that Stan stayed on after our pub dinner to listen to the music, and I walked back to the hotel. I don't remember having any trouble. Maybe it's a different hotel?

BTW, on the Village Italy tour at least two of the hotels are not central; one of them, more of a villa actually, was not even close to walking distance from much of anything. But I think it was supposed to be a destination in itself. That one was near Siena.

This is my beef with every tour I've been on and it's one of the main reasons why I shy away from tours, mostly. On my RS Scotland tour a l-o-n-g time ago, we were placed at some hotel in Inverness that was away from the lovely walking core and right next to a beef rendering plant. The smell when we walked outside the room was unbelievable. On my Smartours Turkey, the Cappodocia hotel was not near anything at all and I feel we really missed being able to walk around there on our own in the evening. On our Smartours China, our Xian hotel was not near the old city at all and so we when did our evening strolling, we were in a neighborhood that was mostly just really wide roads and a lot of traffic.

We've taken eight RS tours and the only accommodations that were not within easy walking distance of the main part of town was an agritourismo (sp?) in Italy.

On our recent Village Italy tour our "Tuscan country hotel" was 100 km one-way from Siena. (We skirted Florence to/from our day trip to Sienna.) The itinerary states we will enjoy the afternoon back at the hotel, but we didn't get back to the hotel until after 5.

In seeing mention of the Villages of Italy tours, we took that as our first RS tour last year. Any yes the our stay in Tuscany at the Hotel Velvedere di San Leonino was not located near anything in walking distance. Group dinners were planned for both night stay. I do have to say this was if not the best hotel we stayed in on that trip is was in the top 2. We had an incredible sunset one night. Dinners were outside and just sitting there looking out over the Tuscan landscape made me think back to Etruscan/Roman times and imagine how little this area has changed over the centuries.

There was one on the Greece tour, Monemvasia, 2 years ago that was up a steep hill and about a 15min walk into town. It was so dark my husband and I could not see the road to cross the 10ft ravine to get to the hotel. Thank god there was a younger tour member out smoking a cigarette that heard/saw us trying to figure it out and guided us in. We did not see him at all until we were upon him.

This hotel is not in Penzance. It is in St. Ives which has replaced Penzance as a stop on the Southern England trip. We are staying here 3 nights and have to make this trip each night for dinner. Even the group dinner was in town. Some of the people took a cab back to the hotel.

I’d not say it has replaced Penzance but it is an alternate hotel. As mentioned, I finished this tour last Saturday, June 2, so was in Penzance last week on Tues/Wed/Thurs.

I feel like this tour struggles in a couple of places. Penzance is one, now also St Ives. I, personally, didn’t care much for either town.

I did do a Road Scholar tour of Cornwall last Fall and saw some different things on the 6 nights we were there. That tour stayed in Falmouth which I found more charming/interesting than Penzance or St Ives. And yes, I’ll mention that on my evaluation.

Pam, I agree with you; I was not thrilled with either Penzance or St. Ives. OK but not great. I am so happy to read you will be mentioning this on your tour eval. I did, also. I really do think our opinions are listened to and valued by the staff. Maybe there will be some changes made. I do know tour itineraries, restaurants and accommodations are tweaked all the time.

We weren't crazy about Penzance, either. In fact, on my tour evaluation I suggested that St Ives might be a better choice. We enjoyed our day there, although hotels were not an issue.

We hit St Ives for the afternoon during Half-term so it was jammed. Robert did have us take the train over there which was a good move.

And this hotel did one better. Our last night there they had a wedding party. The band and party were in the room below ours and the band kept playing until midnight. It was so loud the floor actually vibrated (like a drum skin) and the furniture moved. Oh, and this was the morning we had an early departure. Yes, this will be in my tour comments.

That reminds me of our recent stay in Montefalco where we stayed in a very cold room in the annex. On night two, after the truffle hunt meal (no real hunt because of rain), I was ready to get some sleep. We were welcomed back to our building by drum and horn lines practicing in the parking lot right across the street. The horns went home, but the drummers were diligent about their practice. Our kids were in competition marching bands, and our son-in-law is a professional musician, so we just laughed it off - pretty much;)

On the RS GAS tour the "Munich" hotel we stayed in was a 90 minute train ride outside the city. Not at all what could be considered centrally located. It wasn't Octoberfest time, so we never did understand why. Must have been a really good price. It was also one of the wurst hotels I ever stayed in on a RS tour. It was being renovated and parts of it were scarily dangerous, or at least looked that way.