I’ve spent a lot of nights at hotels over the years. For a couple of years when I was younger, I even lived in hotels full time. So I have a lot of memorable experiences — some good, some bad, and some just plain strange. In this post, I thought it would be fun to…
Continue reading: My 6 Weirdest Hotel Experiences Ever, From The Funny To The Freaky
Share your questions, experiences, and thoughts below.
@Ben, have you ever considered searching for a similar sweater to see if it brings you some unexpected extra cash again? 😉
I have some tales to tell, but I'll limit it to massage stories.
1) At an "eco-lodge" in the mountains of Panama the price of the room included a spa treatment. My wife and I thought how about the mud bath which we'd never had before (or since) and asked if we could do it together. Well, somehow there wasn't a bath, but a mud massage. And there was only one proper mud massage table room with a fire hose or whatever to get the mud off afterward which my wife was led into. I was led to a regular massage table in the hallway where a man smeared mud all over me. This mud was extra viscous and difficult to remove when I was sent to a regular shower. Well, without notice, the man got in the shower with me to scrape the mud off. There was no other option, except, you know, to use the proper high power mudroom hose, but it was too late to communicate that with my limited Spanish.
Another "free" couples massage we had was in a hotel in Beijing. They gave us wax paper underwear to put on and two women came to massage us in our room. I didn't know where they would put the massage tables but there weren't any. The women jumped into bed with us for the massage. It was very uncomfortable.
I think I'm done with any "free" massages.
January 2002, just after 9/11 i traveled to Marysville, Washington....north of Seattle. My dad was dying and this was not a pleasure trip. I was staying at a brand new Holiday Inn Express ( only game in town) I opened my door intending to go to the ice machine one evening and there was a man standing there staring at me who looked for all the world to be Osama bin Laden. Dead eyes and obviously homeless. I called the front desk and the young lady's response was " Oh is he back ? "
I called the sheriff office next. Scared the crap out of me.
1990, how many Ryanair flights have you taken asked Aero. Are you ever going to answer?
1,000 HKD for that fashion faux pas sweater! You robbed him Ben. Maybe he wanted it as part of a fancy dress costume - cat burglar would work.
2017 my niece turned 21 and wanted her uncle to take her to NYC but ended up going to Amsterdam instead, booked 3 nights at the Double Tree Amsterdam Centraal Station, we were in the rooftop bar and restaurant enjoying a sundowner looking over the city, noticed a lot of half naked men and women entering the bar area, brushed it off and thought it was a stag or hen party, turned out it was the first Only Fans event bringing content creators together! It goes without saying that my brother teases me to this day that I planned it and my niece thinks that’s what happens every weekend in Amsterdam, the fans were naked in the private area of the rooftop but spilled over into the more public areas but management were very relaxed. Still cringe to this day!
I would summarise the Cape Town experience as:
- 80% probability he wanted to get in your room to rob you
-20% probability he wanted to get in your room to "enjoy some intimate time together"
A wise decision to decline, either way!
Hands down I never believed in ghosts until a spent a few days with my wife at the Don Cesar Hotel in St. Petersburg, Florida. I would need a lot more space to list out all the weird things that happened but the main one was that there was a hallway from the bedroom to the bathroom (this was a suite with a full living room outside the bedroom) and in that hallway, out of nowhere all the ceiling tiles started to dance up and down in that hallway (drop ceiling) and when I pulled them down it was ice cold up there and the room was not cold! Truly I had no idea, which I later found out, that this is one of the top 10 haunted hotels in America!
Ben is waaaay too nice. 5 of these incidents could have been resolved quickly with a “Fcuk off!”
Would be interesting to get your opinion on the Lufthansa /Swiss crew hotel disaster in Miami.
My absolutely strangest experience was last year at Mercure Warsaw Ursus Station. I left my room around 5 PM and returned shortly after midnight only to discover that a mattress was missing from the bed in my room. I went to the reception desk and the receptionist told me that it’s been collected by the bailiff (British meaning, a government official who enforces repossessions) as a result of the ongoing war in court between the owner and the people who bought in through the condo system. The receptionist assigned me a different room and an extra welcome drink as an apology, I transferred and that was pretty much the end of it. The day after I called Accor’s Voyageur hotline. I explained the situation and the consultant admitted that she’s heard about issues with the hotel and it’s being taken care of.
And sure enough, about two weeks later the hotel became unavailable to book through Accor’s website. It still operates in some capacity and still under Mercure brand (as there was at least one conference, with a room bookings possible, hosted there).
I think your "free" got lost in translation into "four".
Foursome is what you get.
Wasn't a weird hotel per se but at the Radisson Wilkes-Barre, PA I finished my room service dinner and was about to hop in the shower so I went to quickly put the tray outside my door and it managed to slam behind me, leaving me in the hallway buck naked. Had to go down to Reception (with a long check in line) covering my bits with my hands begging for a replacement key. Probably more memorable for the other guests than for me!
Ben, you might like to consider a very gentle ‘put-down’, whenever you receive unsolicited ’offers’ from those who try to “Upsell” services or favours …. I simply respond by saying ….
“I do not think that you can afford me darlink”.
It has worked for me many times, in numerous countries, over the years.
Do try to be serious Ronnie, that sort of response is not sufficiently sophisticated for Ben …. 🙂
Ooooo! Is that likely to mean that you are Ben’s, 1990?
Whatever, you still fail to offer the readers to courtesy of an answer, yes?
Obviously nothing so spicy as the others. The ancient but lovely Victoria Falls Hotel (with a doorman who must be older than the hotel) has a walk to the falls directly through the "bush". On one trip to the falls I was approached by someone who wanted to buy my cheap trainers. They might have been Nike. Offered a great deal more than I paid but since I had only one pair of shoes I wasn't interested. No pressure. They must have been very valuable in Zambia.
That sweater pattern looks similar to a dress that became popular years later where people would think it's a different color depending on the lighting. You were ahead of your time.
Unrelated to the original post. But on the etiquette of leaving the food tray outside the door- is this common. I am personally uncomfortable seeing this. I usually leave it in a table inside for housekeeping the next day.
Third possibility - a way too adoring reader had figured out where he was staying. I believe something like that happened once or twice too.
I checked into the Copthorne in Hokianga, New Zealand late one afternoon. I desperately had to pee, so I entered the room & quikly used the toilet. When I came out of the bathroom, I noticed that there was an open suitcase in the room, with 2 wine glasses & an open bottle. They had given me someone else's room (thank God no one was there at the time). I also had the converse happen in Orlando. I was sitting up in bed only wearing my underwear when the person who had been behind me in the check-in line unlocked the door & walked in with his suitcase!
At the Hyatt Regency LAX I locked myself out of the room with just my boxers.
The hotel staff that helped me said I was his first but he had heard worse from lther colleagues. Still super embarasing.
There's nothing that makes these experiences weird or unique. Most are just not common.