Old Town Residence BIS

The apartment is a walk from the main hustle and bustle, though visiting Krakow means you'll get plenty of walking in and quickly rack up the miles around town. It's a big, old building, and you can hear everything. At night, you might think someone's in your apartment, so it took a night to get used to that. Otherwise, the place was clean, with new decor, a nice kitchen, tall windows, and a little balcony. The bathroom was beautiful and large, and there was a spacious living area with an open-plan kitchen and dining space.

The one good thing was that the beds were comfortable, and the place was near the city center. But this was old, dirty, and incredibly hot. We stayed in their other building, the royal patch aparhotel, which appears on booking with inaccurate photos. It looked newly renovated in the listing, but in reality it was small, old, and nowhere near clean, as the photos show. The beds in those photos had already been used by us. They added another bed in an upstairs space, reached by a very dangerous staircase with hardly any room on the steps or landing, and the “big” bed upstairs was just a mattress on the floor. The bathroom, especially the shower, was dirty. The basic items were left on a small table with no chair. We visited in September, and the heat was unbearable, though thankfully they provided a fan. The area they call a kitchen was dirty too, and had no table or chairs.

We left this apart hotel and rented somewhere else. Four of us were in the apartment, and two had to sleep on the sofa, which was hard as wood and creaked under our weight. The furniture and walls were scratched and old, and the sofa leg where I was meant to sleep was broken. The administrator offered us another apartment, but it also didn't match the listing photos, and its walls and furniture were scratched in the same way. The air conditioner was a floor-standing unit, though the listing showed one on the wall. It only works with the window open, which let in the street sounds of the clock tower. With the window open, the AC made no sense. I complained to the manager because I wanted 156 euro back for two nights. They returned only 119 euro, and only on condition that I delete my review. Now I'm writing it again. Be careful, the photos in the offer don't match reality. This hotel is a total scam.

The location was spot on, an easy walk to the square, but the room let us down during our three-night stay. It was very dark, the main light didn't work, and the bedside lights were unreliable and flickered when switched on. The beds didn't have enough blankets or a duvet, and the pillow was rubbish. The shower was very small. It was the noisiest hotel we've stayed in. Traffic outside was constant despite the double glazing, and sometimes the inside shutter shook as cars went past. You could hear people on the stairs and other guests coming and going, with doors banging. Guests upstairs were loud and shouted when they came back late, with no respect for others. Sorry, I wouldn't recommend it.