As we were getting close to Bolinas, the host texted us to report that her husband was at the hospital with a medical emergency and that she had therefore been unable to prepare the cottage for us. She suggested that we postpone our trip for a day, which would have been impossible to fit into our schedules and also wouldn’t have worked because the purpose of the trip was to celebrate my wife’s birthday, in addition to the fact that we had already driven most of the way to Bolinas.
Based on the host’s description of the issues with the cottage, we told her that we would stay at the cottage as planned and we proceeded to go there. When we arrived at 4:30, we found that the beds weren’t made and, more importantly, that much of the cottage was filthy, particularly the kitchen and bathroom. We started to clean the place, but there was too much to do and in some cases we didn’t know what was clean or dirty. At 4:44, we asked the host whether the towels in the bathroom were clean. When we didn’t hear back for more than two hours, we informed the host at 6:50 that we were leaving and that we expected a full refund.
At 7:10, after we were on the road and had already booked a new place, the host offered to come by to clean the cottage, but by then it was too late. The host initially refused to provide a refund (except for the cleaning fee) and ultimately agreed to a refund only after a long, unpleasant argument while we were trying to eat dinner at a restaurant.