Online directions and hotels

So far with dance, we have been lucky enough not to need to stay at a hotel for a competition. This past weekend, however, with Josh's family being in town, I didn't want to worry about getting to a friend's house too late, so we ponied up and got a hotel room. I found a great rate at one of those online discount websites and read it to make sure I could cancel and that I wasn't being swindled. After a really bad experience a few years ago with expedia, I was wary, but it all looked good, so I clicked pay. After I entered all of my info and debit card number and pressed process payment, the website informed me that there would be a $24 nonrefundable processing fee. I was irritated because it was no longer a great deal.

Too late to do anything about it and running out of time to get ready for the rest of the day, I copied the address on their site for the hotel, plugged it into google maps, and sent it to my phone.

Fast forward to 11:30 Saturday night, when, after 30 minutes of following the directions over and over again, I broke down and called the hotel. They gave me better directions and we pulled into the parking lot ready to shower and crawl in bed. When we checked in we found out there was one room left . . . a king size handicap access room. I will be honest, I was irritated again because I had booked 2 double beds so Caroline and I could spread out, but at that point, I just wanted to go to bed.

I love the smell of a hotel. I can't explain it, but I do. So I was disappointed when we walked into an odd shaped hotel room that smelled like a bathroom at a camp site. I couldn't figure it out until Caroline got in the shower and ran out panicked, "MOMMY! THE WATER ISN'T DRAINING-IT'S RUNNING EVERYWHERE!!"

I dashed over to the bathroom in my sock feet and discovered that the water was out of the bathroom and standing in the bathroom. I called the front desk and the lady said, "Yeah, you are in a handicap access room so there are no sides to the shower. We recommend laying a bunch of towels on the floor. Will you need extras?"

Um, what? Yes. I will need extra towels. And that explains the wet smell.

Who doesn't put a drain in the floor?

The next morning I padded into the bathroom, wrung out my socks and showered, stepped on the wet towels and tried to make it to a dry place to put on new socks. We went downstairs to eat and checkout and I explained to the lady up front that it smelled bad and was wet and she attempted to adjust my rate.

Guess what? If you use an online service, the hotel cannot refund your stay or adjust your rate. Did everyone but me know that?

So they gave us some free bottles of water.

Because apparently we hadn't had enough water at that hotel.