This first section is a brief explanation of my Italy blog posts, which were inspired by my 2-week trip to Italy in May, 2025. Feel free to skip this section if you’ve read it before.
Dear Reader, If you read my Italy posts in the order in which they’ve come out, it may seem as though we hopped back and forth all over the country, but I have decided not to write these posts sequentially. I want to write about the things that interest me most, as the spirit moves me. For some topics, I may even combine cities. I hope that by doing so, you’ll find it a lot more interesting than if I just give you a tedious day by day description of our itinerary, as if I were your Aunt Mabel forcing you to sit down and watch all her Super 8 films of the family road trip to Niagara Falls from 1966.
If you have any questions, comments or suggestions about how I’m approaching this travelogue-within-a-blog, please let me know in the comments below!
“What do you mean, it must be legitimate lodging because three people have it booked after us?”
We were on the phone with the Italian representative for VRBO, explaining that we’d just been scammed and wanted our money back and expected them to pay for the lodging we now had to scramble to find. They, of course, were finding this hard to accept. Believe me, so were we.
Earlier that evening, as Dear Husband drove us to Sorrento, I was looking forward to the part of our itinerary that I expected to be the most relaxing and stress-free of our entire trip. I couldn’t wait to settle in to what appeared online to be some really cute accommodations, and to not have to pack up and move again for four whole days. Heaven.
And then DH casually mentioned that he hadn’t gotten the check in instructions from our host yet.
“Uh…. What?”
Since I was focused on planning and coordinating all the things we’d see and do during the trip, I had left the logistics to him. He made the room reservations, booked the planes, trains, and automobiles, figured out the electrical converter thingies, made sure our cell phones would function—all the stuff that brings me no joy. We make a great team that way. So, this one tiny detail had fallen through the cracks. It’s not like cracks hadn’t gobbled up a thing or two on my end as well.
But it was late in the day, and one of my many quirks is that I’d prefer not to sleep on the streets. Moreover, I had to pee really badly. So this was a doozy of an oops.
DH tried calling them. Someone answered, and he started to ask, and they just said, “No English,” and hung up. That’s when I knew we were screwed. But DH is several orders of magnitude more optimistic than I am, so he held out hope.
We drove to the address. The cute little name of the rental was on a cute little Sorrentino tile above a buzzer. We buzzed. Someone spoke. We spoke. They said, “I sick.” Click. An old man came out, looking confused and irritated. Fortunately, at that moment, a young lady walked by and acted as translator. We explained that we had paid for 4 nights, and he said the place hadn’t been a rental for about two years. It didn’t even have plumbing.
“But you took our money.”
“We don’t know what you are talking about.”
We left. As we drove away, I looked at the listing. All the many 5 star reviews were from no later than 2018. How did we miss that? Moot point. We did.
I’m guessing somebody’s grandson got their password, posted the room, accepted the bookings, took the money and ran. We’ll never use VRBO again if we can possibly avoid it. But that wasn’t going to solve my bursting bladder or our newfound homeless status. I’m ashamed to admit that I lost the plot at that point.
DH squeezed our rental car down the narrow streets of Sorrento as we attempted to find a restroom. No luck. Finally, I said, through tears, “I don’t care!!! Pull into the next alley. I’m going to pee in the street!”
And so we did. And that’s how we met our guardian angel. The letter we’re sending him, parts of which I’m including below, describe what happened next.
We were too traumatized at that point to get his name. We don’t speak Italian. He didn’t speak English. I wrote the letter as if it’s from DH, because it’s a macho culture. There was a bit of a delay sending the letter as we wanted to find someone who speaks fluent Italian so they could make sure Google translate didn’t have us saying something silly or weird, but here’s the English version:
Dear Mr. ___________:
(We assume that is your name, and that you are the warehouse manager.)
You may not remember us, but we think of you every day.
On Tuesday, 13 May 2025, we accidentally turned down the alley to your warehouse while desperately searching for a bathroom, and a truck immediately came up behind us, so we could not back out of the alley. We had to drive into your warehouse. You came out of the office and were kind enough to allow us to use your bathroom.
You could see that my wife was very upset. With the help of Google Translate, we told you our story.
We were two foreigners who did not speak Italian, in a city where we had never been before. We knew no one, it was getting late, and we had no place to go. We had just found out that the room we had paid for in advance, for four nights, had stopped being a rental unit two years ago. The elderly couple who owned the home were very confused by our presence. We could tell that they knew nothing about the situation. Our money had been taken from us by someone who had pretended to be the owner online. We did not know what to do.
When you saw that my wife was in tears, you offered her water and chocolate. If you had done nothing else, she would remember you fondly just for that. But you went even further. After talking with the truck driver, you said that one of you had a family member that owns a hotel. Then you called and arranged for us to stay there.
The hotel is an absolutely beautiful place, better than we ever could have hoped for. Our room had a balcony that overlooked the Bay of Naples, with a wonderful view of Mount Vesuvius. After such a traumatic day, we felt like royalty!
At a time when we were feeling defeated, you came to our rescue. Like guardian angels, you and the truck driver turned what was a very scary situation into a wonderful one.
Because of this, we decided to send you this souvenir from Seattle, Washington, very close to where we live. The Space Needle is the most well-known building here. We hope that you will keep it, and when someone asks you why you have it, you will tell them our story.
When we tell the same story to people here at home, we always say, “Sometimes, all it takes is one kind gesture from strangers to restore your faith in humanity.”
Thank you, and may God bless you.
As I look back over my extensive travel history, I have to admit that there’s always some point in every trip where the travel train jumps off its rails. Just when things are falling apart and I am at the end of my rope, a kind stranger usually turns up and bails me out. That has been the case the world over.
The kindness of strangers, it seems, is universal. And yet it always takes me by surprise and gratifies me to the point of rendering me speechless. It’s one of the many reasons why I always try to pay it forward.
There really is goodness in the world. It will sneak up on you when you least expect it. That’s what gives me hope.
As for VRBO…
Not that I want to end this post on a harsh note, but I really don’t recommend them. I do know many people who swear by them, but there were several things that really concerned me about this situation. Even one of these things would be enough to deter me, but several? No VRBO for me.
First, they thought that other people getting sucked into this scam somehow made it legitimate. I had to urge them to cancel those bookings before this happened to the other people, too. And while they did refund our money immediately and offered to find us another place, we no longer trusted them. Besides, our guardian angel had already found us a place.
We were initially reassured by VRBO’s Italy representative that they’d refund our money for that place as well. And I think they should have, because of my next concern. What if we had been first-time travelers? We might have been teenage backpackers, alone in a foreign city with darkness descending. Or what if we were in a rural area? This could have been a really freakin’ dangerous situation. Yes, they refunded the money the scammer took, but based on the danger we were placed in, and the inconvenience, and the trauma, hell yes, they should have paid for our lodging elsewhere. And that’s what we were told would happen. But when we got home to America and provided them with receipts as instructed, they backpedaled. They’ve given us a $200 voucher for another VRBO stay.
But we don’t trust their system anymore, and the thought of booking another room with them fills me with anxiety. So now we don’t know what to do with that all-but-worthless piece of paper. So if anyone asks, in my personal opinion, I’d avoid VRBO. If I convince one person to not do $200 worth of business with them, I’ll feel vindicated. Just sayin’.
#VRBO are you listening?
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