Grrrrrrr... LOVE italy, LOVE italians, HATE how slack the customer service is. Can anyone help Aitch find an apartment to stay in for a week in Rome at the end of May?

[AitchTwoOhelicopterfraek]

sorry about that, it's naff when you put your own name in a title but i'm a bit desperate.

anyhoo, i know, i know, i'm rubbish, i always go to Rome but you know a holiday is about me having a nice time and i know the city so well.

so i'm looking for CHEAP accommodation (under 100 euro per night) in Rome for between the 27th May and 4th June.

i've found some great places on a website but when you email they just try to upsell you to more expensive accommodation and so far have taken 72 hours to get back to me anyway so it's most frustrating. i've phoned and emailed etc but they couldn't care less really...

does anyone have any recommendations? (at this rate i'll be forced to ask my Italian mates which would be fine were it not for the fact that they would instantly invite us to stay with them, the generous bastards, and it would be awkward refusing but all i want to do is potter around just the three of us).

really it needn't be nice, just fairly central. dd can sleep in our bed if necessary so we don't need a lot of space, i'd rather spend money in restaurants than on accommodation that we'll just be flopping into anyway.

areas? navona, colosseo, spanish steps, trastevere, campo di fiori, anywhere really. preferably not st p's as it's a bit antiseptic round there.

if anyone can help me that would be FABULOUS. i've looked here www.rentalinrome.com and here www.homelidays.com mostly so far, so any good websites (with some actual fookin customer service) would be really helpful.

Never had you down as a WAG, Aitch...

Ooh - how about this? Loads of testimonials, and a garden for dd...

lol. does that stand for Wife And Gritting (her teeth)?

i'd seen that, habs, it's great but tbh it's miles out even on their map so we'd have to add another mile or two for italian exaggeration. i reckon we'll have to take the buggy for dd so i'd rather stick to the middle or colosseo so we can walk and catch buses easily. anywhere on either side of the river is great. i'm getting a bit depressed now, actually, it would all have been so easy if those fuckers had actually emailed back in the first place.

aitch the sawday ones are

they do look good, tuts, but i was hoping to get something for under 100 Euro a night. that other fkn website had LOADS for 90 euros a night, that were really nice (and thus either imaginary or unavailable). the sawday ones look GORGEOUS though.

oh sorry, got my currencies muddled

This?. Shall I stop looking at homelidays? LittleHab (now 18 mo!) LOVED Bologna - marched into a restaurant, walked up to owner and said "PASTA!". And pasta she had. A Lot...

i've emailed your one and sawdays as well. i'm getting a bit stuck on orangina's friend's friend's site as well... it's so confusing...

how did you get to blogner, habs? from edinburgh?

pmsl by the way isn't homelidays just the shittest name for a website?

is it too needy if i bump this?

this is the park near rome-it's 25 miles awy so not very close. you fly to rome and go on from there.

Have you tried www.bbplanet.it
We found a fab self catering apartment there (in Bergamo for 100 euro Per night) Photos and reviews from other people who have stayed there. Good luck.

Yes, homelidays terrible name, but site not bad, I think. Yes, Edinburgh to Gatwick, then on to Bologna. Pretty painless, all things considered.

it would be dd's first ever flight (and second-ever holiday as you know...) so i'm really keen to get a direct one. am i being a twat?

i want to write to EVERY SINGLE WEBSITE i've looked at in the last few days and ask them if they are designed to be as cunty as possible...

at this stage i'm laboriously spamming most of the apartments on spub's site, just Because I Can.

btw crunchtime thanks for the link to the campsite. maybe next time, it looks good but i just want to step out of my front door and onto some roman cobbles.

You could fly Ryanair from Prestwick direct to Rome Ciampino. Changing at Gatwick was pretty painless, but a direct flight does avoid going through security twice. I was on my own with dd for the last leg, as I was going to Manchester, and DH back home, and it was fine - wish we hadn't checked the buggy straight through, mind. She's getting very heavy these days!
If you do ever fancy a change from Rome, cannot recommend here highly enough. Planning on going there next year with dd.

another here

and here - also terrible site name. Can you tell I should be sorting the washing out?

ROFL hysterically at holiday-velvet.com.
it's a pisser, this, i'm getting answers from teh owners coming through by email and it's all johnny ball mathematics. think of a sodding number, needn't bear any relation to the advert...

habs, that castle thing is AMAZING. we are so shit at taking holidays in this house. [freelance icon]

Try 'Bed & Breakfast Marcantoni'.
en.venere.com/bed_and_breakfasts_rome/san_giovanni/bed_and_breakfast_marcantoni.html?geoid=3425&ref= 27054
It is a 2 room appartment in a central location, very reasonably priced!