Mistake #1: I booked through hotels.com.
While I almost never book through an agent website (typically I get better deals elsewhere) I made an exception this time around because my husband wanted to cash in on the whole stay 10 nights get 1 free thing. Anyway, we found a hotel with a pool, free breakfast, non-smoking rooms in an okay location, and at a good price so we booked it. My mistake will become apparent later...let's move on to...
Mistake #2: I did not prep.
I had a horribly busy week. I typically am the first packed and first ready to head out the door for trips, but on this occassion I had not even done laundry. We had planned to leave our home at 6pm that night and arrive in Iowa around 11pm. Yeah, right. I think I was sort of packed around 6:15pm. Sort of had the kids fed around 6:30pm and sort of had the car packed by 6:45pm. Sort of.
Yeah, we left late. This put us on the road late and thus, to the pre-booked hotel late. After midnight late. With two drowsy kids (and parents) we pulled into the hotel lot and my husband ran to the front desk to check in while I waited in the car with the kids. He got the room keys and we parked and couldn't wait to crawl into bed. We got up to the room and it REEKED of smoke. The hotel had given us a smoking room. Even better, the hotel was 100% booked and could not give us the room we had reserved. So...
Mistake #3: I called hotels.com to help resolve the issue.
I was on the phone trying to resolve the issue until nearly 2am. Mostly on hold. With two kids. Sitting in the lobby. Naturally, every hotel within 100 miles was booked (or so said hotels.com). And, at 2 am, the conclusion was that we had to stay for that night in the smoking room. So, our exhausted bodies walked back to the hotel room and immediately began unloading so we could finally sleep. That is when I made...
Mistake #4: I didn't do the normal check.
I travel for work all of the time. I have a routine. I walk into the room, leave my stuff by the door and check for things. I check for intruders, I check that the room is clean and I check for bedbugs. I always check. But not this time. This time I was too tired. It wasn't until Noelle had taken the top blanket off her bed that I yelled "STOP! Don't touch anything!"
There is was. A bedbug.
::shudders::
Now, I'm not bug expert or anything, but a bug that resembles an appleseed = bedbug to me. So we immediately got the hell out of there. Did I stick around to figure out if there were bedbugs? Nope. I was OUT.
Which, you guessed it, lead to...
Mistake #5: Thinking anyone would help me with a refund for the smoke-filled, bedbug infested, un-used at 2am hotel room.
Yeah, I will spare you the details of my still on-going battle for a refund from stupid hotels.com.
Anyway, we fortunately did find a hotel room that night (er, morning). A very nice hotel clerk got us into a super small room with one queen and also tracked down a rollaway bed so we could all finally go to sleep (sans bedbugs). I owe that man a thank you card.
Our vacation was on the up and up thereafter. We found a nice hotel with two beds, a pool, free breakfast and NO bedbugs/smoke. We also had a ton of fun!
We went to the zoo and fed some birds...
Nikolai worked on his climbing skills...
We rode the kiddie train...
Nikolai found an awesome car...
Noelle did a little arts & crafts...
And we all got some sleep.
So, my friends. Next time you plan your vacation - learn from my mistakes. Oh, and check for bedbugs :)
0 comments:
Post a Comment