Arrive as a guest and leave a friend....

We are ready to receive! We’ve cleaned, made the beds, the kitchen sink (and hob) is sparkling, the welcome basket is fit to bust, the prosecco is in the fridge…….. waiting.  The apprehension is terrible, these guests are new ones. Never been here before. We know they have landed and we are waiting. We know that in a hour or so they will be here and we know we are ready……… but still we wait. We are so please they have chosen to come here, what will they be like, we have communicated with them by email and they seem very nice, but until they are here in person, you just don’t know. The tension of ‘arrival day’ hits and still… we wait.

Sometimes it’s different. Sometimes it’s not guests, it’s friends, once they were new arrivals, new, unknown guests, but now they are friends and they are coming again.  We like these days as we know who’s coming and we don’t feel the apprehension, we feel excited, it’s like a family reunion.

Probably our new guests are apprehensive too – trying to manage Italian motorways for a start, and of course the famous Italian style of driving which can be an eye opener to any new comer. Following step by step instructions to get here and hoping they won’t get lost or worse still think that their sat nav will find us (as it won’t). They are probably wondering, as we do, what are these people like to who we have entrusted our holiday to.  Will the house really look like the photos they sent us? Will they really be as helpful as they said they would be?  Will we, more importantly, like them? The motorway seems so long (but it won’t next time), journeys always seem so long when you do them for the first time.

Our wait is nearly over.  We can see a car turning the corner and heading down our drive (is that the hire car that was here the week before last?) …….. the moment we have been waiting for, introductions.  Smiley happy holiday makers, relieved to have arrived, and we are glad they made it.

A holiday cottage shouldn’t be a place where you feel temporary, passing through. It should be a place where you feel as home, where everything works and everything you need is at hand. A home from home, but without the stress.  When a guest begins to relax and shed the stresses of work, you can see it. When the most important thoughts for the day are;

• Where’s the cork screw to open the Wine? What’s more, which wine shall we try?
• Where’s my book?
• Which sun lounger shall I lie on today?
• Where shall we go and explore this afternoon?
• Which restaurant shall we try out next?

But help is at hand, we are here to take up the strain of these taxing questions!

During the week we all manage to spend time together, perhaps for a BBQ, or just pottering about in the garden. We all get to know a bit about each other and friendship starts to blossom. These people are no longer ‘the unknown’ they are part of our lives. That’s the beauty of what we do. World wide we have a whole circle of new friends, arriving as guests and leaving as friends.

Departure day come all too quickly. The children cry as their new found playmates climb begrudgingly into back seat and wave sadly from the window. We, as adults, get that empty feeling as our new friends drive away down the drive.  We are pretty sure we will see that hire car again this season, but we hope that those lovely people in it will be back again one day.

Comments

[Claire]

I think you're spot on with your heading for this one as we definitely left as friends! And by god DID YOU WAIT!!...mind you, that's because we 'wanted' to frequent a few toll booths & waste crazy amts of euros en route first! Yes our first journey to you was certainly eventful & if you want me to tailor your 'directions' to Il Pero any day soon, do let me know. Of course, Dan was navigating so it's all his fault...ahem!....

It felt so great to finally arrive at your little island of paradise and the apartment was amazing. It was rather extravagant of us, being that we were only two, but hey, what the heck, we was on us 'olidays.

Certainly your hospitality was brill and we felt right at home immediately.

I think we've proven our love of your pad & you by laying down a deposit on our own island of paradise on day seven of our first trip...and returning just over two months later to Il Pero :-)

We set a record, I do believe... & we hope to be back in the next few weeks too!!!