Desirè Charming House Boat

This is a fantastic boat to stay on in a really gorgeous harbour area. Perfect location for access to the historic centre. 10 minutes walk and you are right in the heart of that area. Palermo was wonderful to visit. Mad, chaotic, a sensory overload, but fascinating, authentic, vibrant and packed with nice little piazzas and bars and restaurants in the evening. There is good supermarket 7 to 10 minutes walk from the boat. The boat has everything you could need in terms of kettle, cooking facilities, crockery etc, etc. Very comfortable main bedroom. You can sunbathe on the front of the boat and there is a seating area to eat and a small but excellently fitted out kitchen. Toilets on board as well as shower facilities, but it is much better to use the harbour shower and toilets which are 1 minute away from the boat. Security is very good. Codes to get into each wharf and the showers.In the day it is lovely and quiet and brilliant to chill out and sunbathe. Martina is lovely and could not have been better as a host. She was the best host we had in our trip around Sicily. Communication was excellent. She answered WhatsApp messages very promptly. And she was so very helpful picking us up and dropping us off at a car hire place for our next journey when we needed it. She had a welcome and leaving gift for us, which was such a lovely touch. She did everything she could to help solve problems; but sadly some are out of her control.

I am sorry to have to give any negatives because there are so many fabulous things about this place and Martina was such a fantastic host and tried her best to solve this. Overall I am still really glad we chose this boat. The advantages outweighed the one main problem. But I think I have to try and let guests be aware of potential problems. The harbour complex, whilst gorgeous and with several handy bars and restaurants, is very noisy at night. Each night we had 3 or 4 of the restaurants/ bars around the harbour area blasting out EXTREMELY loud bass heavy dance club type music. It was a cacophony of noise in the background, some nights until 1am. If we went to bed, the room was quite well soundproofed so it was not horribly loud then, but still audible. This may not bother many guests, of course , and some may like it. There is a busker a few minutes away from the boat every night who sings the same chorus of one song ( not even the whole song!)over and over and over again, which drove us mad! This, plus the competing restaurants music, made us feel like we were in a nightclub! We felt we had to go to bed rather than being able to sit out on the boat having drinks after having an evening meal in town . Again, that might not bother everyone, some may quite like it. Maybe this was my fault for expecting quiet in the harbour area. At the end of the day, this is Palermo, and pretty much everywhere we want had very loud music playing. But it is such a shame because sitting on that boat in an evening sipping wine, if the area had been quiet, would have been absolutely idyllic in such a great spot.

Excellent customer service, our flight was delayed and they waited for us until 4am.

I wish we could have stayed onger.

Täällä on kehuttu tätä majoitusta paljon, eikä suotta. Jos olisimme majoittuneet tavalliseen hotelliin, en sitä vuoden päästä enää muistaisi. Mutta tämän muistan aina. Ja vaikka helteet olivat kovat, veneessä oli mukavan viileää. Ei voi kuin suositella.

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Esperienza bellissima! Una notte in barca, accoglienza super disponibile e vino fresco ad accoglierci in una giornata calda. Barca curata e super organizzata. Avessimo avuto più tempo ci saremmo fermate anche per la cena a bordo. Stendersi a prua a guardare le stelle è stato magico. Torneremo a Palermo e sicuramente faremo un giorno in più per potersi godere di più l esperienza. Martina organizzatissima e piena di utili informazioni