We have stayed here twice before to visit the outlets. Never a problem previously - other than very mediocre breakfasts. But this time as we tried to sleep before catching a long intercontinental flight, we were kept up till after 2am in the morning. Our room was right above the dining area and one staff member, a woman, spent four hours scrapping stacks of chairs over the parquetry floor. She was preparing for a conference the next morning as it turned out. (This appears to be the main business of the hotel.) Sleep was impossible and when I went to explain our difficulty, I was met with amazing rudeness. I speak some Italian and even offered to help her in her task in the hope that this would finish the job more quickly but my offer was met with another torrent of abuse. We were told by other staff the next morning that the woman is the restaurant manager. It was clear what their attitude was to her. We will find another hotel in the area in future.

Villa Pomela is considered a 4-star hotel and while it is nice, I think that's a bit generous. I don't recall what the standards are for 4-star qualification, but there were some simple things that I would have expected.

The hotel is beautiful, old and stately. The rooms just a little tired - the shower tiles needed re-grouting, the bedspread was a bit worn. There was no clock in the room, which was a little odd.

The staff was friendly, but there was no one available to help with luggage. The whole hotel had kind of a ghost town feel - we only saw a couple of other guests over 4 days.

They had a great restaurant with good wine and were very accommodating when we arrived close to their closing time.

The rooms have huge balconies with a gorgeous view over vineyards. Even though we were there in winter, it was great to get fresh air and just take in the view.

The location is tough - there wasn't much to do in the local area. We ventured out to Torino and other places in Piemonte by train. The hotel is a few kilometers away from the Novi Ligure train station and you need to get a taxi to get to the hotel. Novi Ligure is a sleepy little town at night and there are NO taxis driving around, so you need to call the hotel and ask them to call a taxi for you while you wait 30 minutes in front of the train station. It's not the kind of road you could walk on. The wait wasn't bad, just something to be aware of. In hindsight, we should have rented a car.

I think there may be other things to do in Novi Ligure in the summer (bicycle tours, tours of vineyards) - something to look into!