Tell us your hotel horror stories!

[Mishetta]

We drive from Michigan to WDW & spend one night in Georgia on the way down. My husband always chooses 4 star hotels because we don't want to encounter any problems....

We checked into the Marietta Conference Center (I hope I'm spelling that right ~ it's also the name of the city in Georgia) at around 11pm. The first thing I always do before we start to unpack is check the bathroom & shower. I was shocked to find the shower curtain had all black mold all over the interior of it. Not for that kind of $$$ I'd better not see any mold! So we called the front desk & they said that they would have it cleaned in the morning. Nope...that wasn't good enough. I wanted it OUT of there. Furthermore, we had planned on getting an early start & we didn't want to have to be at the mercy of their timeframe when we had our own timeframe we wanted to keep! So, we insisted that they either take care of it right then or move us. They actually told us that probably all the shower curtains looked like that because of the humidity in Georgia (good try!) They finally agreed to send someone to our room.

A very sweet young girl came to our room & she had a brand new shower curtain for us. She hung it for us & was very apologetic. Before she left (& after we tipped her), I asked her if the gift shop was open because I wanted to buy some bottled water & she said they were closed, but that she'd get some for me. In a few minutes, she returned & had a few bottles of water for me. Again after a few minutes that she left, there was someone knocking at the door....it was room service. We had not ordered room service so I was quite leary but it turned out to be a huge basket filled with fresh fruits, cheeses, crackers & chocolates...compliments of the hotel for all of our trouble. Now that was very classy!

 

[julie_yet]

[color=0066ff]LOL!! OMG are you serious, Chell?![/color]

 

[TLinden16]

I have a couple of hotel horror stories. Back in 1988, I went to Disney World with two of my sisters (one was about seven months pregnant at the time), and my mom. We stayed at the 1776 Motel on International Drive. Our room was on the ground floor facing a convience floor. All night long, we heard motorcycles pulling into the lot of the store. There was also a large church group from Atlanta staying at the hotel. They were very loud, and would run around in front of our room at all hours of the night. Sometimes, they would knock on our door in the middle of the night, too. One day we wanted to go swimming in the pool, and the group had taken over the pool. They were letting the babies swim naked in the pool, and a few little boys (who were old enough to know better) were peeing into the pool. We never ended up going into that pool. When we think about it now, my sister wonders why we didn't just up and move to another hotel.

A few years ago, I stayed at a horrible Best Western in New York City. There were bars on the windows. The room was so small that there was only about a foot of walking space on each side of the twin beds. The door look didn't work, and when we called to have them fix it, they insisted it was fine. The toilet didn't flush, and the shower overflowed and spilled into the room. Luckily we were only staying there one night.

I once walked out of a Howard Johnson's in West Palm Beach. I didn't really want to stay on the ground floor as I was staying by myself, and the guy said they only had one room left. When I went into the room, the air conditioner was so loud that I couldn't turn the TV up loud enough to hear it. And the room was about 90 degrees even though the ac was on full blast. There were a bunch of bugs in the sink. When I went back to the front desk to ask for my money back, there was suddenly a great room available on the third floor. I ended up leaving and going to a great Hilton.

Karen

 

[Serena]

LOL!!! These are so bad and so funny.

My very worst one was when my h and I were driving to Georgia. Somewhere past Atlanta, about 3am, I say we need to find a hotel and stop somewhere. Where does he stop? At a gas station. He locked his door and went to sleep. My door didn't lock either.

 

[NCRedding]

Warning: This is not appropriate for children:OUr worst hotel stay was on our honeymoon. DH and I spent 3 weeks in Europe--we had no set agenda (I shutter now to think how I our parents would have gotten in touch with us if they had needed to). Anyway, we rented a car, and would drive to a town we wanted to see. We would drive to the center of the town, park the car and find a decent hotel close by. It worked well, until Amsterdam--we found this hotel that I was trying to send "NO" signals to DH, but he didn't pick up on my signals. He rented the room, we moved our luggage in. I wasn't real happy, but--it was our honeymoon so I tried to get along. Later that evening we went out and discovered our hotel next door to a very large gay bar--we're from a very small town--so not something we are used to seeing. That evening, after we returned from dinner, we went to sleep. Amsterdam was in the middle of a heat wave, so our window was open. During the middle of the night, I woke to hear sounds from the alley outside which sounded like someone being murdered--I was too naive to think of the alternative. (BTW, I don't care that the people involved were gay or hetero--the bad part was that it was happening in the alley right outside my window) The next morning, I got up and looked out the window expecting to see a dead body in the alley. Instead, across the way was a naked woman standing in the window--and I am the one that ducked down hiding, even though I was in a nightgown. Later in the trip, the bed collapsed--and we weren't even in it! The shower was rusted and I had to bend my neck to prevent hitting the ceiling. The bed was invested with some kind of bug--I never saw them, but when we checked out, I was covered with bug bites from my knees down--what a dive.

 

[Val]

Two awful hotel rooms.....one when I was VERY pregnant with our 4th child. Went with my husband to a conference the both of us usually attend. VERY upscale hotel in Chicago. Went to put my glasses in the drawer of the nightstand (they tend to get knocked off the top and I CAN'T see without them)....reached in and found a drawer full of used condoms......got a VERY nice gift basket and a free dinner. Unfortunately, I drove home the next day I was so disgusted....

The other: When I was fairly young (about 6 or 7, so this would be the early to mid 60's) some friends of my parents owned a "hotel" along the Oregon coast. These friends were, well, they would have been comfortable hanging out with the natives in Deliverance. The hotel was a real dive, to say the least. We stayed in one of their rooms with a double bed and a fold out couch (camping would have been cleaner and safer!).....I woke up to a scurrying sound. My Grandfather snores. I turned on the flashlight and found the source of the scurrying noise. The mouse was sitting on his chin, and from my perspective, about to jump in. I screamed, he woke up, and the family spent the rest of the night in our truck. We "had a sudden emergency" and left that morning! It is still a favorite family story today! These friends have long since passed on- but we treasure them for the great story today.

 

[cinlee3]

We stayed at a motel in a small town when I was 4 months pregnant and very queesy(sp?). After a few minutes in the room I could smeel a distinct vomit smell which was making me ill. It was pretty late and we called the front desk to see if we could be moved. Of course no rooms left. They brought up an electric air freshener which helped some.

I had to qet up in the middle of the night because I was 4 months pregnant and well you know. Anyway I stepped on the carpet and squish - the bathroom was flooded.

We told the desk in the am that we wanted to check out. They did not offer an apology, no discount on the room, nothing. It was a privately owned hotel so we knew we weren't going to get anywhere.

 

[debster812]

After reading these, my experience seems to pale in comparison.

I was on a business trip in Clearwater, FL. Staying at a Holiday Inn Express on my company's dime. I was upgraded to a suite at check in (so far, so good). My suite was on the ground floor. I was in the room, in the evening, and looked up, and there on the wall was a gecko. It startled me, and then I decided I would like it out of my room. I scooped it up in the ice bucket (only thing I could find) and was on my way to take it outside by the pool and let it go. I was walking down the hallway, when a maintenence man passed me, and said, oh ma'am, you passed the ice machine, it's back there. I told him I wasn't looking for ice, that I needed to release the lizard. He could not take the ice bucket away from me fast enough. lol.

The hotel comped my company for the night, and gave me a certificate for one free night for me to use personally.

All in all, I don't think they could have handled it any better, and went way above and beyond. They even offered to move me to a second floor room.

 

[Spaceman Spiff]

I think it was the summer of 1996(it was MK 25th B-Day) when an family friend invited us to go to WDW with them. We accepted and decided that it would be better for us to all stay at the same hotel. After much deliberation we came to the decision to all stayed at the Holiday Inn Suite next to Old Town on International Dr.. No problems what so ever with our stay until maybe a year later when watching TV we see 20/20 doing a feature on hotels secretly video taping guests. Imagine our surprise when we saw our hotel on TV.

How crazy is that!?! From then on we vowed to only stay with family or Universal/Disney resorts when vacationing in Orlando.

 

[CarolA]

I have traveled a lot and have some wonderful stories. However, my fav is the XXX Motor Lodge. (Shall remain nameless for reasons you will see) I worked for a company that owned a large hospital which had bought the 1950's motor lodge on the cornor. The lodge had a book value of zero and is a DUMP! Unfortunatley you have to stay there. SO you can hear the people in the rooms next to you doing what couples do, the floors are kind of grugy etc.... Our fav was that if the room next to your's flushed you were either scaled or frozen by the shower. One of the guys kept doing that to the girl next door, so one day she waited until she heard the shower cut off and called him. SHe can hear him galloping for the phone (and keep in mind it is COLD, the over the door things don't close!) And then she wants to have a LONG conversation with him while he drips dry. (The towels are typical hospital towels!) He learned.

We also had to stay at the hotel with red water, the hotel with blood stained towels and prison overflow and the hotel that asked if we needed the room all night. (They really did not understand why 3 men and 1 women needed 4 rooms, they wanted to give us one room!)

 

[grinningghost]

Can I just say that DISers are the best?! I asked for horror stories, and boy did I ever get them. Keep 'em coming, I'm enjoying this thread immensely.

 

[Krisu]

We stayed at a place where the door was about 4 inches too short. Good thing it wasn't winter!! The toilet overflowed around 1 am, I went to the desk and they gave me a plunger, then had the nerve to ask for it back an hour later. Apparently there were other plumbing problems. These other threads make me want to take a shower (bugs, mold )

 

[grinningghost]

Krisu, your door post reminded me of this one:

At a Knight's Inn in Cleveland, Tennessee (I think that's the town name), we got a sink where the faucet was so close to the basin, that you couldn't get your hands under the water stream. Sort of a strange thing to describe, but it was really bad. I had to wash my face with the bathtub faucet. And that was the GOOD part of this particular motel room.

 

[FOJMO]

We went to WDW 22 years ago in 1981, and there weren't all the WDW resorts there are now. We stayed at the Sheraton Inn Lakeside on Rt. 192. We had been up late the night before after the wedding reception and up early Sunday morning for the airport.

When we got to the hotel, we were so HOT and looking forward to peeling off our clothes and lounging in the A/C.

Well, you guessed it -- the A/C unit in our room was broken! It was the type of hotel where the rooms were all "outside" entrances and no indoor corridors. So, the A/C unit was in the wall, under the window, next to the hotel room door.

Well, instead of moving us to another room (I don't really think there was one -- it was July and peak tourist season), they sent a repairman to pull the unit entirely out of the wall and he had to completely replace it. But, of course, he had to wait for a replacement unit, so there we sat, on the bed, ON OUR HONEYMOON, watching the repairman fix the A/C.

PLUS, there was a big brushfire going on across the highway, and all you could smell was SMOKE!

 

[Margie J]

A couple years ago I decided to extend my stay in Orlando a few nights. I left my spacious, clean unit at OKW and moved to a suite hotel near Universal. BTW, I had been moved to this suite hotel after the first hotel informed me that they were overbooked (although I had a reservation for weeks) and they were moving me to "better" accomodations.

I drove to the suite hotel and it looked like an old, rundown apartment complex behind a gas station and fast food place. I checked in and the lobby and pool was ok. Instead of going right to the room I went to Universal to enjoy the day.

When I finally came back to the hotel that night I saw the room for the first time. OMG .... first of all it reeked! It smelled like a combo of mold and piss. Lamps in the LR were broken and there was no deadbolt on the door (I was on the first floor too). The carpets and floors were filthy and the vents were covered with black "fuzz".

I had to spend one night in that room since nobody was at the front desk after 10pm. It smelled so bad in the room that I kept windows and the sliding door open, even though it was freezing outside.

During the night I heard the people next door screaming. One kid kept yelling "Dad don't, stop it". It sounded like the kids were being abused. The next morning I saw the family out in the parking lot. Their two kids were very young. I wanted to smack the parents.

I asked to be moved to another room, upstairs. The hotel did that for me. I couldn't wait to go home.

 

[Emmyfaye]

I have a couple, too!

The first happened a few years after we were married (about 25 years ago), when DH, me and another couple travelled via rental car throughout Europe, "on the cheap". This mode of travel meant we stayed in a number of B&B's - cheap ones - one or two of which were wonderful, a couple were quirky and fun (did you ever watch Fawlty Towers? we stayed at similar places), and some were completely gross. However, when you pay something like $5 or $6 per night per person, I guess you get what you pay for. (BTW, each couple's budget for the six week trip was about $1,500, not counting airfare, but including the rented car). The gross B&B's had sagging floors and sagging beds, were grubby, dirty and damp and were managed by surly unhappy individuals. The great B&B's were clean and sparkling and felt like staying in a favorite relative's home. The quirky places were generally clean and were furnished with odd, mistmatched pieces, strange (to us) decorations like elephant foot umbrella stands, and managed by happy and funny folks who could easily be related to those wonderfully manic Monty Python people.

On a drive south to Florida, we once stopped - late in the evening and without reservations - at a motel in a place called Emporia (I can't remember which state - and I think it was a Day's Inn) which had clean bedding but an atmosphere reminiscent of the Bate's Motel. EEEEK!! A quick couple of hours uneasy sleep and we were back on the road again, with a mental note never to stay at any place in Emporia, wherever it is.

Just outside of Vancouver, British Columbia - after spending the night in what we thought was a clean, nice place - one of the kids opened the drawer of a bedside table - and it was crawling with silverfish bugs (ugh!).

A couple of years ago, we checked into a newly renovated Holiday Inn in the outskirts of Montreal (around Dorval Airport) - our room was fresh and clean and it turned out we were the newly reno'd room's first occupants. I happily sank into a hot bath to soothe my road weary bones, letting the water out of the tub as it cooled and refreshing it with hot...my husband answered the frantic knocking on our hotel door - it was hotel management notifying us that the plumbers had neglected to hook up some essential piece of pipe under the bathtub in our room, and I had inadvertently flooded the room under us (oops..).

And just a few weeks ago, when on a weekend jaunt, in the middle of the night bathroom run, the bathroom door fell over on top of me (the pins holding the hinges together had been removed?!?).

Finally, our brief stay - about 10 years ago - at the Econolodge Maingate in Kissimmee haunts me still - exploding toilet, ants in two rooms, very unhelpful staff.

 

[chell]

Originally posted by julie_yet
[color=0066ff]LOL!! OMG are you serious, Chell?![/color]

VERY!

 

[CourtasanSatine]

here's a classic:the room next to mine was honeymooners doing it for what seemed like hours

 

[cruisnfamily]

Originally posted by RUDisney
When I got to the front desk and told the woman that I wanted to check out... I couldn't possibly stay there... she said, "ok," and she asked me if we used the beds. Now, our entire round trip from the lobby to the room and back to the lobby was all of 5-minutes. I told her if we planned on being that quick, we'd have found a dark side-street and done it in the car.

ROTFLMAO

 

[jipsy]

One more - I went to a convention at Innisbrook Golf Resort in Florida. The place was awesome and the convention was great. The last night we were there, we had the usual "convention" dinner; some kind of chicken breast dish. I noticed that my iced tea tasted like coffee and made a remark that they must have brewed the tea in the coffee maker.

That night I woke up about 2 am with the worst stomach cramps I have ever had. I literally crawled on my hands and knees to the bathroom to throw up. This went on all night long.

I thought I was going to die. Literally.

The next day we had to drive home to Alabama, about a 12 hour drive. We had driven down with another couple, and it was their car ( a tiny Toyota something or other, two door) and I kept making them pull over so I could climb out of the back seat to puke. I could never understand why the wife didn't just let me have the passenger seat up front :lol: but I was too sick to ask.

By the time I got home, I felt ok. Either I had a really bad case of 24 hour flu, or I got food poisoning off that chicken. I never heard if anyone else at the convention got sick.