ls -la will show something like: >> >> d------ 2 ? ? 4096 2008-04-25 07:37 .gvfs
> ~/.gvfs is used as a mount point for the Gnome gvfs of a given user. It
> stays mounted even when user is logged off.
> You need to umount it prior to delete it.
>
> Try "umount -fl /home/XXXXX/.gvfs" . That should do the trick.