Review of Hotel Floridiana 3*

A Hidden Gem! The Hotel Floridiana is somewhat tucked away in the middle of the historic district of Amalfi, sharing the building with another hotel and businesses. You will not have a room with a view here but the Floridiana more than made up for this in other ways and although we were there only three nights, we were glad that we had picked the Floridiana in hindsight for a number of reasons. First, while it is somewhat buried in the town it is in the center of the historic district which means that you are near everything (not that Amalfi is that big to begin with, mind you). But still, a minute walk to the cathedral, and main plaza, two minutes to the pier, two minutes to the paper museum, etc. Amalfi is quite touristy so there are many, many cafés, bars, and restaurants scattered about, all within a couple of minutes walk from the hotel. The Floridiana, along with several other Amalfi hotels offers complimentary walking tours of both Amalfi as well as Ravello which are well worth the time. Second, the accomodations themselves were very nice. We had room 103, a spacious room with a loft that had a small coffee table and an en-suite jacuzzi tub! The Floridiana also shares the roof with the other hotels in the building but there is a nice space up there to sit and enjoy the sunshine and get a view down towards the marina. The hotel offers complimentary breakfast which was incredible! Great Italian Roast coffee and an offering of both hot, cold, and sweet buffet items. If you are driving into Amalfi, the Floridiana does offer complimentary parking just a few hundred meters up the road in a nearby parking garage. Lastly, the people were welcoming, friendly, and full of advice for us. They were also very responsive ahead of our stay; both sending detailed instructions on getting in and out of the historic district and in responding to email questions that I had. While we tried to speak as much Italian as we could, there was never any problem with English either. Some practical tips… If you are coming from the U. S. Be sure to bring European travel adapter for the outlets. It’s possible the hotel has some available but since we brought our own we didn’t have to ask. The plugs are all the old-style European model that cannot accept U. S. Plugs. If you are driving in for your stay, be ready for a crazy drive from the coast road up into the ZTL to the parking garage. Crazy in the sense that it will be chock-full of tourists and there is a stretch about half-way up that is narrow enough that they have it controlled by a traffic light which might be hard to see, especially on the drive up from the coast road as there is a lot of visual noise. The hotel is good about sending you the allowed times for traffic in the ZTL (no traffic allowed when schools are starting or ending, for example).