The best
Communication with Solmar Villas was good, keys in the key safe, detailed villa brochure. The villa is about five minutes' walk to the bottom of the Calvary Steps and the main square, with a bakery and bar 2-3 minutes' walk away. The property is true to its photos and description. Our double room had patio doors to the stairs leading to the pool terrace; we mostly slept with these open at night to keep cool, as we don't like air conditioning, although our friends used it in their rooms. The shower was powerful with plenty of hot water, although it took some time in other rooms for the hot water to come through. The kitchen has plenty of storage space and is well-equipped.
The dishwasher is oddly installed on a slope, so the trays fall out when you try to fill them, which was a bit awkward. A welcome pack was provided even though the villa information said there wasn't any; this included a bottle of red wine, small bottle of olive oil, salt, bag of sugar, small box of tea bags, cartons of milk and orange juice, a loaf of sliced bread and biscuits. Tea towels, 2 dishwasher tablets and a small sachet of washing up liquid were also provided, along with two large bottles of water. There is a filter coffee maker (requires filter papers). The washing machine worked well (no laundry powder provided, but we took laundry leaves).
Detailed instructions for disposal of rubbish are provided and are easy to follow. Unexpectedly, there was a mid-week clean and change of towels and linen, which was very welcome, but a bit of a surprise (and the cleaner took all our carefully sorted rubbish/recycling, meaning we didn't have any bags for the rest of the week's rubbish).
The pool terrace is lovely, with plenty of space for sunbathing (pool towels are provided although, again, the blurb said they were an 'extra' chargeable service, so we brought our own).
To be improved
We didn't use the second roof terrace, as it had no shade at all, and was in the sun until well into the evening; with views over the city, it would have been a nice space for a sundowner, although the pool terrace area was also lovely for this. There is a large cactus-type plant in the corner of the pool terrace which, part-way through our stay, starting ejecting its seeds which are in hard cases, firing all over the pool area/sunbeds. So we had to move around a bit to avoid them, but it was quite interesting!
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