To travel by myself has some risks. When I plan my trips I have some standards in mind and sometimes to keep them I try some hotels from some group I had experienced before. But this is not a guarantee of quality, unfortunately. That’s why I am risking a bit more in small hotels sometimes. Curiously most of my bad experiences are linked to the experience in the hotel. All the rest usually is good enough.
For me, hotels must offer privacy (no thin walls, please!); a well trained team (once I was sleeping completely naked and someone tried to enter the room, maybe to clean it. Fortunately the door had a lock that I used before to sleep); comfort (a queen size bed and an excellent shower are the minimum. Something to keep a nice temperature inside the room is also necessary); security (a place to keep precious things like jewels and the laptop without the risk to be seen by the staff); and currently be pet friendly with nylon webs on the windows for my cat don’t escape, and a staff trained not to enter the room if signed the cat is inside (my cat hates humans), obviously offering the door signs for this. Free, quick and safe internet is obligatory! And TV with many different channels available are good although I usually don’t spend a lot of time in front of the TV (once I was in a hotel where the TV had options, but the only channel everyone could watch was the one played on the reception room. Don’t do this, please!). Activities inside the hotel are welcome. A great restaurant, swimming pool, a bar with excellent cocktails, are good things even in trips for businesses. More than that is highly recommended if the goal is leisure or if the city doesn’t have interesting attractions. Yes, the poorest the options in the city are, the better must be a hotel to create a nice experience for the traveler.
My worst travel experiences wasn’t planned by me. They were simply horrible because they were much bellow my standards. All the trips paid by myself were done according to my budget, sometimes very limited. Lately, much more comfortable.
In one of these experiences I went to Porto Seguro, a marvellous brazilian beach, although the structure is poor for a famous destination, and I traveled with a group, including some family members (who have standards inferior to mine). The trip started in Montes Claros and we went by bus. The bus broke twice in the road before to cross the frontier between Minas Gerais and Bahia, and this was the beginning of a horrible experience. My will was to stop in the first city and take another bus back home, but I was an adolescent and my family didn’t allow that. When we arrived, we had a lot of people in the same room at the small hotel we stayed. Everybody from the group, but it was weird anyway. I acquainted with some girls in this group and we went to a show at night at the beach, but although I liked the main band, who played axé music (brazilian regional music from Bahia, usually played during the carnival in Salvador), the other band who opened the gig played.., U2 songs! Ok, I like U2, but both musical styles are too different. Outside the time on the beach during the day, when I could have some time alone, and the seafood, the trip was terrible.
Among the times I traveled with my mother, only one was good because I chose the hotel. She normally goes to the cheapest options and that time I found through the internet one that was much better and just a bit more expensive. She felt as if she was in a five stars hotel, and compared to those she used to stay it was really marvellous, although it was a very simple hotel.
But twice I had bad experiences planned by myself. In one of them, I went to Belo Horizonte for businesses. I chose a hotel close to the places I wanted to go, although my aunt invited me to stay with my cousin, her daughter, who is a medical doctor in the city and lives in a very beautiful house. The aunt would travel and the cousin lived too far from where I needed to go, so, I spent some money to stay in a hotel instead of spending with cabs. The hotel was too simple. There was one from the same group of the one I mentioned in the previous paragraph, where my mother felt as if a five stars hotel, close to that point and I don’t know why I didn’t discovered it before, because chances are it would be better. But although the one I unfortunately chose was weird, I survived, as I only needed a place to sleep and take a shower and spent all day outside solving business questions, and part of the night I enjoyed restaurants and malls in the neighbourhood.
The other bad experience was once I went to Sao Paulo to the Fashion Week, and went to a hotel close to the place. This is a case of hotel I experienced the same brand before and this time was disappointing. The room seemed an apartment. A nice hall with a TV, a place to work with the laptop, a comfortable couch. Then the bedroom with a big double bed, the wardrobe, and an enormous wall of transparent glass besides the bed! At night the room was charmingly lighted by the moon. There was no big buildings close to the hotel from that side, so I could have a nice view from my bed. But when I entered the bathroom, the first deception. It was too small. Specially the place under the shower. I am thin and I couldn’t move in that small space that had no more than 80cm from a side to the other. The other deception was when I noticed I could hear the other guests from my room! The walls were too thin!
Ah, twice I noticed the hotels were less clean than I deserved. Once I was with my mother, it was her choice and the worst nightmare I could have. The TV was dirty and the bathroom was even worse. Fortunately it was just to sleep that night and travel in the morning, but it was horrible anyway. The other I was in Sao Paulo, and I chose a charming hotel close to Oscar Freire street, but I noticed long hair under the pillows. The trip wasn’t bad, but I never returned to this hotel, nor to any other I had bad experiences.
I had some good experiences I didn’t return, but these cases for not having the opportunity. Two of them in Sao Paulo, because I go there often but I prefer hotels close to the places I want to go. So, these two are much better than the one I stay more often but they are not good considering the distance between them and my interests in the city.
Nycka, the nomad
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