On the Road: Our Hotel Experience

Recently, we took a trip to see family.   I love road trips, but this one was fairly significant averaging 12 hours each way with potty stops, traffic, construction and food stops.  On the way there it was agreed we would break the trip up with an overnight stop in a hotel.  This was exciting for me since Ryan has no recollection of being in a hotel and this time he would be able to appreciate the experience of a comfy room, little bottles of shampoos, soaps, trips to get ice from the ice machine, and perhaps a contenenental breakfast.

Traveling was complicated by our pooches.  They travel well, but bringing them makes finding a spot to stop for the night a little more interesting since we need to find a place that accepts dogs.  We price-lined a room at a place called Red Roof Inn.  We've had positive experiences with them before, and the room we found was a great deal.

Around 1a.m. we pulled into the place.  Josh offered to take the dogs up to our room first and then come back to help with sleeping kids, so I waited for him.  But when he returned he told me our room had some deficencies that concerned him. Primarily the fact that it was missing it's door knob. He said he would find it hard to sleep there also considering when he walked in, the headboards were laying on each bed.  I agreed that wouldn't work.

So he asked for another room.  He was given a room in an identical state of re-modeling.  Strike two. The lady apologetically offered him the "best room in the house." At this point it was about 1:30 am and both of us were feeling rather put out.  When we pulled up to the "best room in the house," the neighboring room's door was wide open and inside it was pitch black.  Josh, brave man, walked in said room and I wondered if he had taken leave of his senses.  But when he came back, he said the alarm was going off and he didn't want to hear it all night.  Our new non-smoking room, did have it's door knob and appeared to be put in order, but reeked of smoke.  Both kids immediately started to cry upon entering, loudly, that they were hungry.  I reminded them that it was 2 a.m and nothing was open, but they could have a banana, because that was the only thing I had to give them.   They each took one bite and then fell asleep.

So much for a great hotel experience!