Guest House Maria — Local services in Dubrovnik

The first thing that upset me is that Maria (the owner of the hostel) put me in a smoking room. A senior man who seems to be the husband of Maria kept smoking all time. Even though I closed my door the entire time, the room still smelt bad. Actually I noticed the rooms upstairs have AC (my room only has a fan) and they are non-smoking rooms. So I asked Maria the day I arrived if I could live upstairs. She mentioned something like “boys” and kept saying “it’s okay”. I assumed that the rooms upstairs are for boys, but later it turned out girls live there too. I thought, it’s only two nights; I could live with it. So the first mistake they made is that, they put me, a non-smoker, in a smoking room.||The day I arrived the hostel, I noticed that there’s a dog. I usually love puppies, but the dog actually barked at people a lot. It made me uncomfortable to hear the dog barking quite often. It seems like they never trained the dog. However, they should have mentioned that they have a dog on the website. Imagine, if someone is allergic to dogs’ hair, it would be a huge problem. ||And then something happened the first night. I was about to take a shower at the bathroom. And my room’s door is slightly open. Somehow the dog came out and barked at me. I felt so comfortable and closed the bathroom’s door. The dog then ran into my room took my new sandal upstairs. When I got my sandal back, it was broken. However, I just bought the Birkenstock sandals two days ago. My sandals were still brand new, but then they were ruined by the dog (attached picture). I talked to Maria. She took a look at my sandals and asked me how much. I said 70 euros; you can check the price for Birkenstock shoes. She then said “it’s okay. No money. It’s okay. Goodnight!” She was very rude and I could not believe she would do anything. My personality is not strong and I did not want to argue hard to run into any trouble. So I was very upset and cried. She then found someone who speaks English and the woman said, they could give like 20 euros for repairing the shoes. At that point I was not asking for money, but they did not even apologize. And they never gave me back any money as they promised. It was just very frustrating that they did not do anything to make up for my loss. It was their dog coming to my room. I did not do anything wrong, but Maria just yelled at me when she heard 70 euros. Completely speechless. ||Another issue I found is that Maria’s English is not sufficient to host international travelers. When she asked me when my bus is heading to the airport, I said 9 pm and 4 am. She could not understand. I used translator most of the time when I need to communicate with her. If there is no issue with the stay, she seems pretty friendly. She was also friendly the moment I moved in. But when I had trouble understanding her English or telling her any issues, she just kept say “it’s okay” and sent me away. I honestly think this hostel is not ideal for someone who can’t...

Maria is a wonderful host, and the guesthouse is very cute. It's about a mile out from the Old City, and I'm so glad that we stayed here as opposed to Lapad, which is more resorty. Loved the walk to and from the city each evening - it's very pretty and if you catch the stunning sunset on the way home, it's an absolute bonus. No AC, but I think this is reflected in the price. It was very hot the week that we went, but there are fans in the room to help out. Clean, helpful, very cheap, good location and Maria's son Pieter also gave us transfers which was an added bonus. We loved...

Guesthouse Maria is a small family run business which was a refreshing change from many of the other places we had stayed on our trip. The family are very warm, kind and welcoming. They went above and beyond to make our stay as comfortable as possible. The room was comfortable and air conditioned, the kitchen was well equipped and the view from the building was very beautiful. The walk into old town only takes around ten minutes and is rather pretty if you take the cobbled back streets. Overall I would highly recommend Guesthouse Maria for a comfortable and affordable stay...