Mami Camilla Sant'Agnello

Great Food!

Mami Camilla was a wondeful place to stay, the rooms were clean and bright. Although, not too cenrtal its a nice walk into town. And as for the food...fantastic! Would definately recommend to anyone planning a visit.

Mami Camilla is wonderful!

My sister and I spent a week (Sept 19-25) at Mami Camilla, where we had a wonderful time. We took the Italian language classes in the morning and went to the cooking classes in the evening.

To put my experience in context, I have traveled all over southern Europe, in Australia, and all of Latin America. I have stayed in yucky places and in wonderful places. Mami Camilla is one of the wonderful places.

Biagio, Giuseppe's dad and Mami Camilla's husband (this is a family business) is a chef. He does all the cooking for Mami Camilla and teaches the classes. He is absolutely hilarious, loves what he does, and is always encouraging the students to sample. "Mangia, mangia!" he says.

The course included a trip to Pompeii (it is worth the trip alone just to not have to make your own way to Pompeii), a visit to Positano and a drive around the Amalfi coast.

The food was wonderful. Breakfast and supper are provided if you are in the cooking course. I think supper is available for an extra charge if you are a B&B guest.

The rooms are fine -- clean and bright and airy. No TV or telephone in the room, but who wants that stuff when you are on vacation anyhow? Mami Camilla is very accomodating. When I asked for an extra pillow, she told me she didn't have one right then but would buy one the next day, which she did.

The B&B is about a 15-minute walk from downtown Sorrento. It is tucked back from the road, so you don't get traffic noise. There are roosters who crow at odd hours -- unfortunately, that's just the way roosters are.

As far as the guy who wrote that Mami Camilla shouldn't treat customers as idiots -- what happened was that Giuseppe was doing some improvements to those rooms. It rained the night before the guest was supposed to arrive and Giuseppe discovered a leak. He did not want this guy to be stuck in a room with a leaky window and roof, so he offered to put him up in a four-star hotel in town. The guy pitched a fit. Completely unwarrented reaction as far as I am concerned. Giuseppe and his family do everything they can to accomodate their guests and make them comfortable.

Mami Camilla is a fun place to stay. You get to meet travelers from all over the world and be cossetted by an Italian family. I recommend it highly and will probably return.

OK, but they shouldn't treat their customers as idiots...

When we first arrived at the Mami Camilla, we were greeted by Giuseppe, who told us that our reservation had been "upgraded". When I asked about this "upgrade", he told us that we would be staying at a completely different hotel nearby.

Of course, this started to smell more like a scam rather than any kind of upgrade. I told Giuseppe that we had carefully chosen the Mami Camilla based on our research prior to our trip, and that we were not interested in another hotel. He replied saying that they didn't have any room left at their hotel, after which I showed him the confirmation of our reservation (which had already been paid in full), as well as mentioning that I had emailed the hotel directly and gotten a second confirmation of our reservation (which I had done after hearing similar horror stories about other hotels in Italy). If they had no room, I asked, then why did they confirm our reservation?

Anyway, Giuseppe finally agreed to honor our reservation. Once in our room, I found the quality to be quite mediocre and rather noisy (contrary to what they had told me by email and to their website which overstates most facts).

On the plus side, the hotel is relatively close to town (15 minutes by foot), and their dogs are great : ) Most of the rest of the family seem to be genuinely nice people, and the people we met who were also staying there were also very nice.

All in all, I'm not sure I can recommend the Mami Camilla. The attempted bait-and-switch upon trying to check in was a real shame. It's always a bad idea to treat your customers as idiots.

We love Mami!

We loved our stay here! The atmosphere is very warm and inviting. You can sit until late at the tables where you eat the dinner that Mami cooks, and enjoy chatting with the other guests. The grounds are very nice too, and you can wander and feed the horses. The rooms are also nice.

Our only complaints were:

1) It was not easy to find. We recommend you take a cab from the train station if you arrive by train. We walked by it several times and missed the small sign.

2) Their rooster woke us up all night long the first night (starting at 4am). By the second night we were more used to it (and very tired), but it was still crowing away.

Loved Loved Loved

I stayed at Mami Camillas earlier this month and it was by far the best place I stayed in all of Italy. The minute I walked in the door I was welcomed with open arms. Giuseppe and the family are so kind. They are unbeleivably accomadating and I cant thank them enough. Anything I needed or asked for they were right there to assist me. They made my trip to Italy a superb one. When they say they take you in and make you feel like part of the family they do just that. I will defnitley return to Italy again and when I do I will stay in no other place but Mami Camillas. I loved loved loved it there.

Italy with a personal touch

We spent a week at Mami Camilla in late January 2004, participated in three days of the cooking school, and made visits to a local artisan cheese factory, a vintner who produced the table wine and side trips to Pompei, Capri and the Amalfi coast. Our hosts assisted us with our travel plans. My husband and I particularly enjoyed the evening meals served family style, the food was superb, the Longo family welcoming and our fellow guests delightful. The week we attended the cooking school fellow students were amateur cooks doing the short course. A culinary school graduate arrived as we left to do the more serious 2 month course.