B&B Cavour 124

Tea and coffee are available at the entrance, and the rooms are serviced and comfortable, with a modernised bathroom. It's a short walk to the main shopping areas, theatre, and harbour, while the historic old town is about 15 minutes away on foot. A central base for visiting Bari.

There was mold on the ceiling above the shower, a bad smell because the toilet window opened into the room, faulty sockets, poor cleaning, no shelves, and only one tiny bedside table. Breakfast was two packaged croissants, hardly something you could eat comfortably, and there was no TV. The place felt like a moldy corner fenced off from a larger apartment. The main problem was the pump. A badly installed shower cubicle with its own drainage and electric pump sat in the middle of our room. Its sensor seemed faulty, switching on several times a minute all day and night. We were told it would stop at midnight and stay off until 6 a.m., and the owner offered some money back for the inconvenience. That wasn't true: it kept buzzing through the night. In the morning he said that if we wanted to sleep, we should book an expensive palazzo, and even sent us a link. The smiling young owner refused to communicate through Booking.com and asked us to use Viber instead. When we asked how to turn off the pump so we could sleep, he said everything was fine. He behaved like a rude liar. Other guests had also mentioned noise, and one guest from Greece had identified the same homemade sewage pump as the source, so this wasn't street noise. I wouldn't recommend this experience to anyone.

The host was friendly and spoke English, and the Wi-Fi was fast. We had a clean bathroom and a good bed in a spacious room. Breakfast was packaged croissants and trancetos, with good coffee or tea. We didn't have air conditioning, unfortunately. There was also mold above the tiles, which could be cleaned up or covered with a few more tiles to stop shower water splashing there. If you're unsure which building it is, check the names on the doorbells.

The location is good, and Daniele is a really nice guy. The air conditioning was excellent too, and could be a lifesaver in summer. Still, for the price, especially for couples, you may find something better. Check-in was a hassle because nobody was there when we arrived. We had to call Daniele, and we didn't have an Italian SIM card. He came quickly, but other guests said they'd had the same issue. There was no internet during our stay because the credit with the local provider had run out, and nobody fixed it while we were there. The shared bathroom had water damage, and its window looked onto someone's balcony. The shower had weak water pressure and awful curtains.