In "Amsterdam and The Netherlands" by Rick Steves, the Wildervanck B & B in Amsterdam is listed as a "charming B & B". This place is devoid of charm and extremely dirty and run-down. Walls have gaping cracks, some with what look like mold, the paint is bunged up, the pillows are flat, the amenities are non-existent. The breakfast is nice, the bathrooms are spacious and modern, and the location is perfect but we would not stay there again nor would we ever recommend it to our friends.
Posted by
Northamptonshire, England
33819 posts
the pain is bunged up
What does that mean? Does it mean that you had a cold and were in pain during your visit? Do you think that you caught you cold there?
Posted by
Portland
3643 posts
After a couple of pretty dismal experiences using RS recommendations, I never go to his guides for lodgings. Before a chorus of “I stayed at ______, and it was wonderful” starts up, let me be clear that some of his listings are good. However, I find his guides unreliable in this respect. Any printed source will be a couple of years out of date, and I must say that I think our standards are not the same.
Booking.com and Hotels.com have current, verified reviews. Tripadvisor, while somewhat less reliable, will give a general drift of user experiences. Even if you wind up booking directly, you can use those sites to ferret out good options.
Posted by
Reading, PA, USA
1637 posts
Nigel,
Look more closely at what the OP wrote. He said "paint", not "pain".
Posted by
Northamptonshire, England
33819 posts
Ah, Bob - it has changed now. The copy in my post was a copy before the change.
Posted by
Green Bay
21142 posts
If it wasn,t far the ability to edit miss spellings, all my pasts wood lock vary strang.
Posted by
Seattle, WA, US
1005 posts
I found it charming when I stayed there a few years ago, and it was a great chance to meet the Dutch owners and discuss life in Amsterdam. If it's going downhill, you should make a report in the guidebook feedback page.
Posted by
Southeast US
4045 posts
In my opinion, Rosalyn offers excellent advice. For my second trip to Europe, I looked up RS's recommendations for a city on TripAdvisor, and pretty much every recommendation had a marginal to poor rating. For other places, I found RS recommendations with good ratings. The moral of the story for me was that anyone using RS recommendations for lodging should check another source to avoid surprises. At this point, I don't even look at his recommendations because for me there seems to be markedly better options for finding lodging that appeals to me.