Pousada Sonho Meu - Penha

Really good!!!

The bathroom had dead mosquitoes on the wall, and the room was full of them too. The curtain rod was coming down and the curtain was held up with a pin. When I moved it, even more mosquitoes came out. I struggled to open the window, only to find it blocked with boards, so there was no way to air out the already stuffy room. It was dark, and the air conditioner wasn't working properly. They seemed to know, since they asked whether it was cooling. I booked through booking. The receptionist was quick to help when we arrived, and I paid, but after seeing the room I asked for a refund. They promptly agreed, so I left. The bath towels were old, and the place didn't feel equipped to be a family guesthouse. One employee even said he felt sorry for whoever stayed in room 4 because of all the mosquitoes. The poor condition of the place meant I had to return to São Paulo early. Terrible.

The receptionist and the woman in the kitchen were kind and attentive, doing what they could to make guests happy, and breakfast was very good. But the building itself was in awful shape. The first room smelled horribly of sewage, and the old bedding smelled dusty and moldy. The towels were old too. The electrical maintenance was terrible: I lost the lights and air conditioning for a while, then there was no water because the power had gone out. The person in charge complained to the electricity supplier and moved me to another room, but water backed up through the drain there and flooded the room. The floor got slippery and I fell. Wi-Fi was awful, and the TVs didn't work.

As soon as we put our bags in the room and went out for a short walk, we decided within five minutes that we had to leave. The place was completely unsanitary and the rooms had no proper setup. The bunk bed wobbled, the bathroom smelled like a dive bar, the sheets seemed dirty, as if someone had slept in them for days, and the shower only dripped instead of giving a proper stream. It felt more like a prison than an inn. This stay at pousada sonhos de Penha turned into a nightmare for my family and me. We contacted the owner to ask for a refund. He said it would take 7 to 10 days, but we were from São Paulo and needed somewhere else to stay with 3 children. My husband managed to get 60% of what we paid back. The owner also said they were considering closing the inn because of its poor condition. I wonder how someone planning to shut a place down can keep taking bookings and then not return the money, leaving guests so upset and uncomfortable. We wouldn't go back and I don't recommend it. Luckily, we found a wonderful inn for the same price, with one extra day of stay and great comfort. If you want to avoid a dreadful stay and a headache when you get to Penha, don't choose this inn.