We just returned home from a two week vacation in Italy, with the final 5 nights spent at the hotel Grand Ritz in Rome.

First the good things: The hotel is situated in a decent area with the Metro downstairs, which allows good access to most areas (as long as you are ok with some walking, it's fine). Some restaurants and shops are nearby but you will have to take the train to really get out of the residential area you're in. The hotel is generally clean and tidy and you won't have any problems with critters. Room size is decent and we whd no problems with safety.

Now the bad: NOISY!!! If you want to experience what it feels like to have a garbage truck drive though your room in the middle of the night, stay at the Hotel Ritz. This place is by far the noisiest hotel I have ever stayed in and I'm not a sensitive sleeper. Whether it's cars driving by or people talking outside, it makes no difference if your windows are open or closed. The noise level is all the same. After the first night, all three couples that were travelling with us all bought ear plugs - they were all in different rooms and were all disappointed about the noise, and it was still noisy. Also, our bathroom shower had the dumbest design ever. It had this water shield at the edge of the tub that was supposed to block any splashes from getting out of the shower area. Problem is, the shield was not sealed at the bottom so as water would splash against the screen, it would just flow to the bottom of the glass and leak out. I swear, by the end of each shower, there was major flash flooding in our bathroom. Everynight my wife and I had to use all of the towels in the room to keep the bathroom from filling up with water. Also, the floors are tile and I damn near broke my neck in there walking through. Finally, the cost is ridiculous. We paid 219 euro per night and this place wasn't even up to par with chain MOTELS here in the US. To top it off, as we were checking out, the front desk was so disorganized, they didn't have any record of our length of stay or that we had paid already. We had to present them with the receipts that they gave us when we checked in to prove that we really checked in when we did and paid. In the whole mess of waiting for them to work it all out, our cabbie was outside waiting and just the wait costed us 11 euro on the meter.

All in all, the place was kind of a disaster and I would look elsewhere unless you can get a killer deal. At $250 USD per night, it's robbery. At the end of the day you get a hotel so you can 1) sleep at night and 2) bathe yourself, and you can barely do either given the environment. I would advise you to look elsewhere.

I have been back in this country for 2 days and all I can say is I want to go back!!! I loved every minute of my time in Rome the country is amazing and the hotel was just the cherry on the cake. The staff were all very friendly and helpful and only to happy to advise us of the best sites to see and best places to eat, all in all it was a very enjoyable experience. The hotel is a quite large so the only time you ever really bumped into anyone was at breakfast time. Apart from all the site seeing it was quite a relaxing time. I would certainly stay there again and hopefully will pretty soon.

After the ride from hell from the airport and then to be ripped off by the cabbie just for the fun of it, he over charged us by 25 Euro's total charge for a near death experience was 80 Euro's........ So first impressions of Rome were to say the least not very good. Finally arrived at the hotel the surrounding areas were not very nice. The actual hotel was in need of a lot of repair. Very dated and old fashioned. The actual rooms were very depressing. The balcony wasn't much better falling apart with wires hanging out of the wall. The staff not very helpful at all. Would not recommend this hotel. Did enjoy my time in Rome but it could of been a lot better.

My partner and myself recently stayed at this hotel and it was fantastic. The staff members were great, the breakfast was suitable and the times fitted our schedules. The bar was a nice looking room and it was quiet were you can have a nice conversation over drinks.

The room itself was of a good standard, with nice décor. The bed was one of the most conformatble I had ever slept on. The balcony however was not nice and looks better if you get the blinds shut, but that could have just been our allocated room. The bathroom was large although, could do with some decorating. The shower wasn’t very strong and even though it was on a good hot temperature around 0730, it was freezing cold around 1430.

Rome itself was fabulous; a lot nicer once you get into the tourist area so don’t be alarmed. The hotel was not where is said it was on the Expedia website, where it said 1 mile from the Spanish Steps, it was more like 3 miles. This cost us a lot more in taxis, but compared to what could have happened, was a relatively small matter.

There is a taxi rank outside of the hotel, and another about a 5-minute walk up the hill. The trams also run a short distance away. We would recommend a tour bus and also the Coliseum, forum and famous squares and fountain tours. Fantastic tours with fantastic guides; we would not know what we know now, if we hadn’t taken these tours.