Hotel Frustrations

As I posted earlier we found another hotel & finally settled in on Wednesday at the Best Western. Yesterday was a smoother day...lunch out with my husband & then when he went to work we did a full day of school in the hotel room. Then I checked my bank account online last night & the Econolodge has not removed the charge from my debit card yet. It is still pending so it may never actually be taken out of my account, but the fact that it has not been credited yet disturbs me. Not only is the full amount on there for the three nights we would have stayed, but there is a second charge for $62.00 for who knows what? So I am patiently waiting to see what happens. I am hoping all the pending items clear tonight before the weekend otherwise that deduction will be on there until Monday. At least if it goes through I can go over there tomorrow & confront them...otherwise I will have to deal with them by phone. The bad thing is if they refuse to remove the charge I can dispute it with my bank but it is a lot of paper work, getting forms notarized & it takes weeks to be taken off...so I am hoping this clears itself up so I can quit worrying about it.

We had to change rooms at the Best Western this morning to a smoking room but at least the smell is not as bad as the Econolodge & it is just for one night. Unfortunately, all the smoking rooms are upstairs & there is NO elevator! How can you have a supposed 3 star hotel with no elevator? Up until now I have had no complaints about the hotel, but after dragging stuff up the stairs it has altered my view. Still a nice place to stay but make sure you ask for a first floor room if you ever stay here.

The smoke is still evident in the room so we stopped & bought some air freshener which helped. I am thinking though that I need to do it again because I am starting to smell the smoke again.

The hotel pool is not open yet because it is not summer officially, even though it hit 87 today. For an outdoor pool it is rather small. Most indoor pools in hotels are 5 ft. deep & not very big but most outdoor pools are usually a good size. Their outdoor pool is the size of an indoor pool & is 3 feet on each end & 5 feet in the middle! I have never seen a pool like that before, kind of odd. So if you are looking for a hotel with a great pool, this is not the place.

Wow, I think I am starting to sound negative...hotels can do that to you - HA! Just the stress of traveling can get to you sometimes. I am usually happy to be away from cooking & cleaning but some weeks I am ready for home, this is one of those weeks. I am just worried about that hotel bill....but I need to quit thinking about it. All in all I would give the Best Western 2 thumbs up. Nice hotel if you can get the first floor, good breakfast & great location. Small pool, no elevator & no exercise room are some of the minuses.

Opelika itself is a nice place to visit...so no complaints there.

Opelika, Alabama

We traveled today to Opelika, Alabama. My husband is taking photos at the First Baptist in the historic district downtown. I have not had the time to explore the town yet but I hope to do that on Friday for our activity day.

We dropped my husband off at the church & helped him unload his equipment & then ate lunch at Cracker Barrel. We then went to find our hotel. I had made reservations a few days ago & found out that there was graduation this weekend for Auburn University so everyplace that we would normally stay was filled. The Best Western did have rooms but their rate went up to $125.00 on the last night so I decided to look elsewhere.

We made reservations for the Econolodge. I am not a fan of Econolodge, but they advertised that they had a fridge/microwave in the room which is essential for us. Plus the rate was where we needed it to be at ($70.00 or less per night). So I booked online for a non-smoking room. When we got there however, they did not have a non-smoking room available & my son has problems with smoke so I wasn't real happy. The front desk employees were really nice & said we could check the room if we wanted, so we went up to look at it. Really bad smoke & honestly the hotel is just not kept up properly, so I would not recommend anyone stay there.

We went ahead & paid for the room just to make sure we had a place to stay but it was only about 1:00 their time & I knew we could cancel the reservation by 4pm & not be charged, so we drove to the Best Western. It was in a much nicer area of town & was a higher quality hotel, so I was hoping they would still have rooms available. After talking to the desk clerk he knocked $40.00 off the Internet rate for Friday night plus dropped $10.00 off the other nights so we will end up paying on average less than $69.00 a night (plus tax), & it is non-smoking...yeah!

So we went back to the other hotel, cancelled the reservation & finally settled in at the Best Western. N... is doing school work right now as I work on my blog. At 9:00 tonight I will go & pick up my husband from work, so it turned out to be a more hectic day than I had planned.

I will write more later after I research Opelika & get some first hand information on sites & eats along with some photos.