My son and I stayed at Papa Vista Relais for a few days and agree with all of the reviews posted below. Its location overlooks the Vatican City queue out of the window corner and is very close to a metro stop and numerous bus stops, making it convenient and easy to travel around Rome.
The neighborhood looked run down in the dark of night, but was lively and interesting during the day. Papa Vista is located on the 3rd floor of a rather nondescript apartment building on a small Rome neighborhood street. The relais is comprised of a tightly-grouped series of 6 rooms clustered around a very small (but attractive and modern) kitchen where breakfast was served. We were nicely greeted upon our evening arrival and shown to our room--which did look just like the website photos. Our room had a lovely double-doored window that opened onto the street, and to the right our view was of the steps leading to the Vatican Museum entrance. While the street noise forced us to close the window at night and use the airconditioning (since the weather was quite warm), it was lovely to open it in the morning and enjoy the air and the sounds of life in Rome.
Our room was brilliantly clean. The bathroom is very modern, the shower is very small--so small that a large person would not be able to turn around it it. The large mounted flat-screen TV provides English language TV. There is a closet but no chest of drawers for your clothing. The room was adequately sized, not huge but not small--my son and I did notlike we trip over each other. Internet access worked fine with the ethernet cable they provided upon request, but wifi reception was spotty at best.
Breakfast in the morning started with fresh coffee/style of your choice--the cappuccino and expresso were heavenly. The small buffet included nice parma ham and cream cheese squares (Philadephia brand!) or what looked like American cheese squares (like Kraft brand), pastries, yogurt, granola and cereal, plain bread for toast, and canned fruit. I had hoped to find some kind of good bread and fresh fruit, but the store-bought sliced white bread, canned-tasting pineapple and peach halves were all that was offered. (My suggestion is to add a decent cheese and a more interesting sliced bread, and offer some sort of fresh fruit--these additions would make breakfast PERFECT).
The small hotel staff was helpful and accommodating, producing an iron and ironing board immediately upon request. They also accommodated a guest of ours for breakfast one day without charging us--a very nice and much-appreciated touch. The only slightly unexpected and unwelcome moment came when we were told, on our last morning, that before we went out at 8 am (we planned to return by 10 am), our bags would need to be moved out of our room since our room had to be cleaned before our return. This seemed odd since we were not warned of this upon check-in (check out time is 10 am). What if we had wanted to sleep in and pack on our last morning?
The neighborhood is lively during the day, a shopping street for moderately-priced clothing and other goods (walk to the corner, away from the Vatican museum, and turn right). Located next store to the apartment building is a gelato stand, but skip this one and walk two blocks (towards the metro) to Millenium--hugely popular gelato place that's open 'til 1am and is always hopping (even the smallest size includes 2 or 3 flavors--order by telling them the cost of the size you want).
Overall, Papa Vista provides excellent value for such an expensive city, and its inviting, comfortable atmosphere is heads above the typical B&B experience more typically found in cities.
