Why does it always seem to end up that the cheapest hotel you book ends up being the best?  During our 9 day stay in Europe, we stayed in 6 different hotels.  Hyatt, Hilton, Radisson – We’re talking some of the “best” hotels – 5-star hotels, with nightly room prices pushing $1000

We had a 9:40 a.m. flight out of Rome Fiumicino airport, so rather than dealing with trying to get from Rome city center to Fiumicino airport on Thursday morning, we decided to do that on Wednesday evening and stay our last night a little closer to the airport

Arriving at the Comfort Hotel Roma Airport Fiumicino

The Comfort Hotel Roma Airport Fiumicino does offer a complimentary airport shuttle, but on their website, it doesn’t really say very much about it.  I emailed them (info@hotel-roma.it) and they responded with:

Timetable from the Airport to the Hotel

06.40 – 07.20 – 08.00 – 08.40 – 09.20 – 10.00 – 10.40 – 11.20 – 12.00
13.00 – 13.50 – 14.40 – 15.30 – 16.20 – 17.10 – 18.00 – 18.50 – 19.40 – 20.30 – 21.20 – 22.10 – 23.00

The Shuttle stop is located in the Airport area “POLO BUS”, stopping place number 24. Leaving the railway station go to the  Terminal 3 Arrival and continue to the POLO BUS.
The service from the airport is not bookable in advance. Please go to the stopping place and wait for the first shuttle available.

So after we got off our Terravision bus from the Rome city center to Fiumicino airport, we walked over to Stop #24 where all the buses congregate.  It was actually fairly near the Terravision stop, so we waited for awhile.  There is of course no markings whatsoever that this is a stop for Comfort Hotel Roma Airport Fiumicno or anything else.  There was a group of English speaking tourists nearby, but they were waiting for the Marriott shuttle, which eventually came, and left us there alone. The “scheduled” 5:10 p.m. time came and went and then finally an unmarked big red van pulls up into Stop 24.

The driver spoke no English and of course we spoke no Italian.  I said “Comfort Hotel” and showed him the paper with the hotel on it.  He said yes, but I’ve watched enough Amazing Race to know that all taxi-type people say yes when you ask them if they are going to a particular place 🙂

My first worry was that it was just a “regular” taxi of some sort that was going to try to charge us when we got to the hotel, instead of the complimentary shuttle that we were expecting, and my 2nd worry was that he was going to take us to a deserted alley and kill us.  I know, I know, I’m a paranoid American that doesn’t travel enough, or maybe I’ve just been reading too much Deal Mommy…

As we made our way the 5 miles or so from the airport to the hotel, I tracked us on the GPS and I sat up in the front on “alert”, but of course, everything was fine.

The Comfort Hotel Roma Airport Fiumicino is in a fairly residential area, but the nearby restaurants were SUPER expensive, so we instead walked the block and a half to a nearby grocery store and picked up our dinner, grocery store-style.

Comfort Hotel Roma Airport Fiumicino room

After we got to the hotel and checked in, we went up to our room and were blown away.  We were expecting just a regular room, but this was a 2 bedroom SUITE.  I mean a 2 FLOOR SUITE!

The stairs going up to the 2nd floor.  Below is the bedroom upstairs – there was another queen bed downstairs.  Off to the left was a nice balcony where we had our dinner after we got back from our walk to the grocery store.

In looking at the hotel website, this 2 floor suite is NOT the base room – we must have gotten an upgrade.  Perks of being a famous travel blogger, I’m sure 🙂 (NOT).

The Comfort Hotel Roma Airport Fiumicino does offer free breakfast which was quite nice.

The shuttle back to the airport was regularly scheduled and arrived right on time.  The only problem there was that he didn’t take us to Terminal 5 (the international terminal) – instead we had to take the free airport shuttle between terminals.

I also left the best part for last – the Comfort Hotel Roma Airport Fiumicino is part of the Choice Hotels group, and even though it “sounds” like the Comfort Inns that we have here in the United States, the hotel itself is NOT the bare-bones budget motel you think of when you think Comfort Inn.  The great part was that the PRICE sure was bare-bones – the Comfort Hotel Roma Airport Fiumicino hotel was only 8000 Choice Privileges points!  Taking advantage of the Chase -> Amtrak -> Choice 1:3 points transfer trick (now much harder if not impossible to do), that’s only 2666 Chase Ultimate Rewards!

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