Walking. Gossip. Travel.

Tag: Travelodge

  • Leicester – Travelodge Leicester City Centre

    Leicester – Travelodge Leicester City Centre

    This is from my stay in early September 2021, the nearly new Leicester City Centre Travelodge. I’ve been deeply impressed this year by much of what Travelodge are doing, but as far as I could see this hotel was ineptly managed. Firstly, it took me the best part of half an hour to get in, as there is no working intercom at the front door. The shopping centre entrance was closed when I visited, so the only way in was via the car park entrance. That required me to press the buzzer to the car park, which is privately operated, who let me in so that I could walk around to the hotel.

    I got to reception and there were no staff, just a queue of other annoyed guests. The staff member seemed perplexed that the buzzer wasn’t working, although it transpired it had been broken for some days, it hadn’t occurred to them to put a sign up. The staff member mentioned I could have phoned the local number on the sign at reception, but I wasn’t entirely sure how she thought I was going to have seen that, and the phone number in the booking was a premium rate one. The reason I must admit to being annoyed at the management is that guests the next day still couldn’t get in, so I wasn’t convinced they were in the slightest bit interested.

    The hotel was clean and organised, although I was already pre-annoyed at the whole set-up by this point.

    This whole set-up is odd, the exit is on the ground floor, but can only be accessed via the first floor. Anyone with disabilities needs to use stair lifts to get from the entrance to the first floor lift, or use the shopping centre when it’s open. This isn’t Travelodge being awkward, it’s a former office block being converted into hotel use, but it means a clunky set-up to get in. It all felt slightly too unsafe for my liking, especially given the indifference of the management here.

    The conversion from an office block has meant that the rooms are larger than usual size and they look really quite barren. I don’t use the television in hotel rooms, but it looked a little ridiculous that tiny thing on the wall. The windows are sealed and the air quality in the room is poor, with loud and clunky air conditioning. The whole arrangement was way too sterile for me, although the hotel room was very clean, perhaps inevitable given how new everything was.

    I wouldn’t stay at this hotel again, partly because I wouldn’t be comfortable that I could actually get in, but also because of the sterile rooms and the poor air quality. There is another Travelodge in the centre of Leicester, more on which shortly, which was older but which I much preferred. This hotel was very reasonably priced, but perhaps this whole set-up would have been better turned into residential accommodation.

  • Huddersfield – Travelodge

    Huddersfield – Travelodge

    My luxury abode for the few days that I was in Huddersfield was the Travelodge which was located around a ten minute walk away from the town centre. What it lacked in convenience it more than made up for by being reasonably priced. Friendly staff as well, although I rarely have any issues in that regard with Travelodge (or indeed with any hotel company to be fair).

    The room, which looks like more other Travelodge rooms around the country. They’ve taken out the sofa from the room, which was evident as there’s a mark on the carpet where it once was. It was all sufficiently clean and comfortable though, no issues there.

    The beautiful view of the sweeping plains and dales of Huddersfield. What’s a little harder to see is that there’s a railway line on that embankment, although there didn’t seem to be many trains on it.

    Although I need to add that my wide angle phone has distorted this, it’s not the biggest bath that I’ve ever seen (and it is a bath and not a shower tray).

    The hotel is pretty well reviewed on-line, although as something outside of their control, I did have some problems with my Vodafone signal and there’s no free wi-fi in the room (or not beyond the free thirty minutes per day), so that wasn’t ideal. There’s no cafe bar at this Travelodge, they just offer the silly little breakfast box which is £5.25 and comes with a small cornflakes, milk, a muffin, flapjack and pain au chocolat. I’ve never had one (well, other than the ones they’ve given me free on a few stays) and they pick up a fair few negative reviews about them. I’m surprised that they’ve persisted with them. Anyway, I digress.

    As a hotel, this was a perfectly good stay, very little internal or external noise and the staff topped up the teas and coffees every day and changed the towels every day, although that’s the limit to what they’re doing at the moment. All very acceptable.

  • Paisley – Travelodge Glasgow Airport Hotel

    Paisley – Travelodge Glasgow Airport Hotel

    Having stayed at the Premier Inn hotel at Glasgow airport last week, I thought I’d try the Travelodge this week. As an aside, it seemed an odd way to build a hotel on prime real estate, with such a large footprint but only having two floors, but everything seemed modern and functional. There isn’t much to do in the immediate area, but it’s possible to walk to the airport in about ten minutes (although the options there are more expensive) or walk into Paisley in about twenty minutes for all the action that anyone could possibly want. What was useful was the clear walking instructions that the airport has installed so that it was easy to get from the hotel to the terminal.

    One day after my muttering about the potential problem (which fortunately didn’t become a problem) of connecting doors between rooms, this hotel had them as well, the first time that I’ve seen them in a Travelodge. They were firmly constructed and so noise intrusion wasn’t a huge problem, but I do hate the things and I notice that they’ve had a number of negative reviews about them.

    I slept well and didn’t encounter any noise internally or externally, with the hotel being clean and comfortable. The staff member at reception was helpful and friendly, so I felt welcome, with the check-in process being efficient. There were plenty of plug sockets in the room, although none near the bed, although I’m sure that this will be fixed at a future refurbishment. However, given how much I dislike connecting doors, I wouldn’t stay here again and would instead book the Premier Inn or IHG options.

  • London – Newham (Borough of) – Travelodge London City Airport

    London – Newham (Borough of) – Travelodge London City Airport

    I used to live down the road from this large Travelodge hotel, so it was rather lovely to be able to use Pontoon Dock DLR station again all week. It was a reminder of just how many steps there are to get to the platform level and I’m sure I used to get up them quicker than I do now. Such is ageing….

    This hotel usually benefits from being nearby to London ExCeL (I have to look that up every time to remember which letters need capitals and it annoys me very slightly every time) and London City Airport. Neither are quite the draw that they were a couple of years ago, meaning that this hotel has become just a little desperate to get customers in. I paid £21 per night, which was lower than usual as Travelodge have a “buy four nights, get one free” deal in London at the moment. That was a bargain as far as I was concerned, just over £100 for five nights.

    For those interested in the history of this area, if we went back 100 years there were terraced houses lined up here rather than a chain hotel. Today, there’s little residential here, primarily as it’s nearly underneath the flight path of London City Airport. That has been evident from the thundering noise of aircraft from the airport all week, although I find it quite soothing. I accept that a lot of people don’t find aircraft noise as soothing, but there we go.

    The room is on a business floor, which seems to solely mean that they’ve taken out the sofa beds from the rooms. It’s quite a spacious room and entirely functional, although the carpet probably needs replacing. Everything worked as it should and the windows open. I like it when the windows open and I might have mentioned that several times in recent weeks. There was a radiator and fan to give me choices, although it has been a little hot in London this week. I say a little, it has been far too bloody hot.

    The hotel isn’t cleaning rooms on a daily basis, instead giving guests these. The one on the left is a bit pointless, as the default is now to do nothing anyway. The one on the right means that coffee is restocked, towels are replaced, the bins are cleaned and the bed is ignored. I put the one one on the right out on three days and they did do as they promised.

    As one of my irrelevant asides, I’ve noticed on Facebook that people seem genuinely furious, livid and shocked that hotels charge more for the same room at different times of the year. I’m amused that Travelodge ruined a family’s hotel plans as they wanted to pay £29 per night for a week in Blackpool. I’m slightly puzzled that people think hotels charge the same amount every night, although perhaps I shouldn’t be shouldn’t be surprised by these things. It did mean I had a little look at the hotel reviews to see what palatial accommodation some people had been expecting.

    George (surname unknown) annoyed this customer:

    “Extremely bad customer service specially from a member of management called george wast very determine on giving his last name but just to be precise he where’s glasses and has curley hair very bad manner and extremely poor customer service skills and should definitely be removed from site as he is giving and providing a bad reputation for travelodge very unhappy and will be reporting with audio and camera proof of such bad customer services from the BBC”

    Unfortunately, I can’t find any footage on the BBC…… Another guest wanted to punish the chain for their incompetence:

    “Terrible hotel! Manager was so rude and unhelpful. Ended up booking another travel lodge it was that bad”

    Hmmm, I’m not sure that Travelodge lost out here. There is another Travelodge handily located about a three minute walk away though….

    I did quite like the brutal nature of this review of the hotel’s SuperRooms though:

    “Spent a little more for a super room and found it was the same as a normal room but had a coffee maker in which made really bad coffee”

    I’m not actually sure they’re far wrong, but as I know from my friend Richard’s experiences, you do get a free Kit Kat. Another customer really battled the elements:

    “Despite the dust hanging from the lamp on our bedside table, we went to sleep.”

    So brave…..

    I hope that Travelodge don’t mind if I say that they’re something of an earthy hotel chain, although perhaps not in the literal sense. They’re down to earth, generally affordable, honest and clean. They don’t pledge anything they’re not, so I continue to be entirely pleased with my stays. Accor and myself have fallen out with each other (although technically I think I’ve fallen out with them, they probably just think I’m an idiot), which is awkward when I’ve got an entire section on this blog about them. I can’t see myself falling out with Travelodge and what better praise could they want than that…..

  • London – Barking and Dagenham (Borough of) – Travelodge Barking

    London – Barking and Dagenham (Borough of) – Travelodge Barking

    The cheapest accommodation option (or at least the cheapest that I considered safe) in London was the Travelodge Barking, a hotel that I’ve never stayed at before. The frontage is certainly colourful and it’s above a Tesco Express store for anyone who wants some snacks or the like. I arrived just before 23:00, which is never really an ideal time to arrive at a hotel on a Saturday night, but all was well. Other than I managed to get behind some other customer’s crisis at reception, but that was soon resolved. I always have to try and stand in a way that makes me not look annoyed whilst I have to wait for staff to deal with crisis matters like this (as it’s not their fault), despite being slightly annoyed that I am having to wait.

    The room, all clean and tidy. Travelodge are consistently decent in terms of their accommodation, there was nothing here for me to be disappointed by. The only limitation for me is how far the plugs are away from the bed, but Travelodge seem to be fixing that when they modernise the rooms.

    I can’t recall having an electric window in a hotel room before, but because it was recessed some way back there was a little switch to open and shut it. I like having an open window, although it meant listening to some rather drunken conversations outside which kept me awake because I was insistent on listening in and not missing out on anything interesting. The temperature in the room was fine and there was a fan available for anyone who was too hot.

    One of the harder to read fire escape plans that I’ve seen, but I decided not to let this bother me. The reviews for the hotel aren’t exactly ideal, although by far the lowest rating on Google is for the location. I’m not sure what the hotel is meant to do about that given that it’s two minutes away from Barking railway and underground station, but there we go.

    One guest stayed at the hotel before her wedding and was disappointed that there was no air conditioning, car parking or intercoms in the room (I assume that’s a phone). I can sense the disappointment for anyone staying in a Travelodge as a pre-wedding night treat…… There was another guest annoyed that they had to wait five minutes for a receptionist who told them to wait until the check-in time when they arrived early, but that definitely comes with the territory of a Travelodge for those who don’t want to pay for an early check-in.

    Anyway, I liked this hotel, the room was just over £30 for the night and everything was quiet, clean and organised, with the staff member being friendly (although she looked exhausted trying to do everything herself). The hotel could do with something of a refurbishment of the public areas, but it was all still serviceable. If the Ibis down the road is a bit expensive, I’ll likely stay here instead in future.

  • London – Newham (Borough of) – Stratford – Travelodge

    London – Newham (Borough of) – Stratford – Travelodge

    Travelodge are doing a promotion at the moment where if you book four nights in London (and I think it’s been extended to Edinburgh and a couple of other locations), then you get the fifth night free. That meant that I had a five night stay last week in Stratford for just over £100, which I think is pretty decent value for money. This all means that I’m not spending as much time at Accor and IHG hotels, but variety is the spice of life (and Greggs).

    The room, which looks like most other Travelodges in the country, was clean and too hot. There’s not much that they can do about that given the lack of air conditioning, and there was a fan available in the room. That fan was on the entire time that I was in the room, as it was too hot (London was far too hot last week). They’d put the duvet into the bag in the corner as they said nearly all guests were content with just a sheet, and their judgement seemed sensible to me.

    The view from the room, over the delights of Stratford, the Las Vegas of London……

    I really quite liked this hotel, although I dreaded getting in it every day as the staff have to open the automatic doors (so they’re not very automatic) and so I had to stand looking confused outside. There is a doorbell, but I felt guilty pressing that (even though that’s the point of it), but the staff always seemed keen to help and said hello when I walked by.

    The amount of cleaning I saw here was also impressive, there seemed to be a staff member spending their time nearly entirely cleaning surfaces, the lifts, the floors and the like. There needs to be a bit of maintenance on the carpets in the hotel from Travelodge, but I can’t deny that the staff were making huge efforts to keep everything clean.

    As a hotel stay, I was entirely content with the value offered here, and it’s nearly opposite Stratford High Street DLR station, or just a relatively short walk from Stratford railway/underground station. For those going into an area near Liverpool Street, TFL Rail run regular services there as part of what will become the Crossrail service when the thing finally opens.

    The reviews of the hotel aren’t entirely ideal (but are much better than some others in the chain), but the problem for Travelodge is that I think it’s great value for the £20 or so per night that I paid, but I’d be less pleased if I’d paid something like £60 per night, which many have done.

    There’s a long review on Google about how someone was furious that they’d “booked a room for 3 people” and the hotel wouldn’t let them have four people in the room. I’m not entirely sure how they were planning to fit four people into a room, and seemingly, nor did the hotel. The end result of this exciting saga was that the four people were kicked out, slept in their car and remained very angry at the hotel manager. The hotel do make very clear everywhere that they never accept more than three adults in the room, it was a very brave guest that risked sneaking more in….. Sounds an exciting drama though for anyone watching events unfold.

    And there’s the review from a furious daughter that her father was smoking in the hotel and she was most upset that security asked him to leave. Not really a surprise.

    Anyway, I didn’t have breakfast or evening meals at the hotel, as adding breakfast would have increased the room price by 50% and it never looks that appealing to me anyway. But, I’d merrily stay here again, I thought it was all comfortable albeit it rather too hot. Thank goodness for the fan.

  • London – Greenwich (Borough of) – Travelodge Greenwich High Road

    London – Greenwich (Borough of) – Travelodge Greenwich High Road

    It was too hot when earlier in the week I visited the Travelodge on Greenwich High Road, a hotel which is likely usually busy with tourists at this time of year, but is currently selling rooms at under £25. When I arrived the helpful man at reception seemed quite hot, which coincided with how hot I was as well. He was satisfactorily agreeable about how hot it was, so I liked him.

    Travelodge have two hotels relatively near to each other, this one at Greenwich High Road which is next to the railway station, and another simply known as Greenwich, which is next to Deptford Bridge railway station. I suppose tourists find the name of Deptford Bridge as being perhaps not quite as appealing. When I told the receptionist my name, he couldn’t find the booking, and I knew what was coming, he was going to politely tell me that I was at the wrong hotel. Fortunately, Google had already alerted me to there being two hotels, and I was at the right one. All was well. And another thanks to the receptionist for giving me paper so that I could handwrite the witness statement for some Norfolk and Suffolk LDWA group members. Actually, now I’ve written that, it sounds wrong. They weren’t in court, it was evidence that they had finished the LDWA 100. Anyway, I digress.

    The receptionist, who I felt I had built up a rapport with as we didn’t like the heat, gave me an ideal room right at the end of a corridor which he said would be quiet. He was absolutely right, I heard pretty much nothing from within the hotel, although I think it was fairly busy. I was pleased to discover that there was a fan in the room, so that stayed on the entire night. It was also clean, comfortable and sufficiently well maintained for me to be entirely pleased.

    I usually use the stairs in a hotel (unless I’m on the top floor or something tiring) but I never worked out where they were (and I didn’t take much care to look) so I used the lift. Which gave an interesting (well, not very interesting, but I’ll mention it) lift etiquette issue. With this virus, hotels ask for guests not to share lifts. So I go down in the lift, which stops at the floor below. That irritated me slightly as we were now on the first floor, and I thought that I was pushing it not finding the stairs to go down from the second floor. Anyway, a moderately drunken man who seemed very friendly asked politely if he could get in the lift. I think the words were “am I alright to get in with you mate, I’ve got no virus”. I wasn’t, to be honest, much concerned of the pandemic risk and it also prevented an awkward social encounter where I told him to wait for another lift. But, being British and avoiding conflict (I mean in a Very British Problems way, not making reference to the nation’s empire building in the nineteenth century), I wonder how many guests would have politely told the man to wait. I’ve digressed again.

    A view from the hotel room window and there’s a DLR train at the station in the centre of the photo. And, yes, I did stand there waiting for a train to arrive to take that photo. I really do need to get out more…..

    I very much liked this hotel as it was clean, cheap, comfortable and the staff member didn’t like the hot weather. Frankly, I’d be willing to stay at a hotel far more willingly if I knew that they had a staff member complaining about the hot weather at reception, that’s something I’d find very beneficial for my stay. The hotel did have a bar and restaurant, and was also offering breakfasts, but I didn’t partake on this occasion. It’s a convenient hotel to get to though as it’s next to the station, which also has regular trains which go straight into the city centre. All very lovely.

  • London – Hammersmith and Fulham (Borough of) – Fulham Travelodge

    London – Hammersmith and Fulham (Borough of) – Fulham Travelodge

    At the moment, I switch hotels to whichever seems to be the cheapest in London for the evening, with that exciting accolade going to Travelodge Fulham yesterday with their room for under £25 for the night. Easily accessible from the nearby Fulham Broadway underground station, it’s a convenient option for those coming from central London.

    It’s not exactly the most decadent choice, but it’s a serviceable hotel option and the staff members at the front desk were helpful and engaging. The public areas seemed clean, if not entirely well maintained, and one of the lifts had a missing button to get to one of the floors and that wasn’t entirely ideal.

    My room and this is the first time I’ve experienced a hotel in the UK that doesn’t have a duvet on the bed, just sheets. There was a reason for this, which was that the room was very hot and the building hasn’t been blessed with air conditioning. The duvet was though there in the room, in that blue bag in the corner, for anyone who wanted it.

    Richard was staying in the same hotel, and he looks for decadence and expense in everything, so he upgraded himself to a Super Room. In the interests of showing the difference, this is his room. I didn’t allow him in it until I had taken photographs of it, although fortunately he didn’t complain at that situation. It does have a nicer feel to it.

    The Super Room costs £5 per night more than the standard rate and for that the guest gets a coffee machine, a Kit Kat, nicer curtains, a nicer framed picture on the wall, a more comfortable (but less practical) chair and, well, that’s it. In some hotels, the guest would enjoy free air conditioning as well, but that wasn’t offered here. Richard did though get a fan that I didn’t get (although they’ve available at reception for us less decadent guests), so I think he felt his £5 was well spent. Incidentally, and I won’t go on about it, but Richard broke the coffee machine, but fortunately, I was there to ensure that the machine worked again. Sometimes you just need someone practical…..

    Although the hotel was quite hot, it is the case that London is quite hot at the moment, so that could perhaps be forgiven. Given the prices currently being charged, I thought that the value was really rather good, especially as there were no noise disturbances either externally or internally. The kettle in my room needed replacing, but I didn’t let that bother me, as I was busy collecting my free decadent coffee machine drinks from Richard’s room.

    The hotel is reasonably well reviewed, although on that review front, I did have a little browse through what guests had put on TripAdvisor. One reviewer had the title “teriminlly ill guest thrown out of hotel for having one ciggerate in room by manager” [sic] which is as it sounds, the guest decided to smoke in his room and was furious that the hotel was annoyed at this situation. The hotel unsurprisingly remained furious and stood by their decision.

    A few guests also noted that there was lovely air conditioning in reception and by the lifts, so they suggested moving bedding and sleeping there. To be fair, the reception area was kept beautifully cool, so that wouldn’t be the worst idea in the world, although I’d be interested to see what the staff thought about it if anyone tried. Another guest, also annoyed at the lack of air conditioning, posted a review titled “the oven of hell”, which summed up his experiences. He suggested, and this is a good strategy:

    “We had a fan on in the room, the curtains closed, window open, but the only way to sleep was to soak the towels in cold water and drape them over us whilst we slept!”

    He’s probably right though that it might have been better to put some form of air conditioning in rather than spend years fielding complaints from guests. The review about someone who left their phone charger is well worth a read, I can see why the staff soon got fed up with hearing about this phone charger.

    Anyway, I thought it was all clean and organised, so I’d happily stay here again, although only at a lower point. I note some guests paid over £100 for their rooms, and I can imagine why they were annoyed at the temperature issues.

  • London – Tower Hamlets (Borough of) – Travelodge Docklands

    London – Tower Hamlets (Borough of) – Travelodge Docklands

    Judging from the price of hotels in the city, there is still not a huge enthusiasm to travel to London at the moment, not least with the obvious lack of international tourists and business travellers. This was the keenly priced Travelodge Docklands, which is a shortish walk from Canary Wharf that came to a total price of £24.99. Staffing here was minimal, but friendly, which suffices me when paying £24.99.

    I’m not sure that Travelodge rooms vary much, and they haven’t departed from the standard here. All clean and well presented, and most importantly perhaps (to me) they have windows that actually open so that the room isn’t hermetically sealed. There were no noise issues either internally or externally, I suspect partly as there weren’t that many people actually in the hotel. But either way, that made for a peaceful night. Although I’d add that it’s quite a hike to get back to reception if you’ve placed in a room right in the far corner of the hotel. But if I can walk 100 miles (have I mentioned that before?) then I can get back to reception I suppose.

    The view from the room, with Canary Wharf over on the left-hand side. For those who like taking their cars everywhere, there’s a large car park on site although I suspect they might charge a hefty sum for that. I wasn’t burdened by such issues though, the DLR stop is a three minute walk away.

    The most exciting element for me was the history behind this whole site, as until 100 years ago, this was East India Docks. The Travelodge sits towards the top of East India Import Dock, but all of this is now gone, with the exception of the East India Dock Basin which is still there. The streets in the area around the Travelodge are named after products which were once imported into these docks, such as Coriander Avenue, Rosemary Drive, Saffron Avenue, Nutmeg Lane, Sorrel Lane and Clove Crescent.

    My room was somewhere about where that boat is in the centre at the front, so it’s fair to say that quite a lot has changed here since this illustration was made around 200 years ago.

    Anyway, for £24.99 I thought it was all excellent value for money. I suspect it’s usually a lot more than that and so perhaps less exciting value for what is quite a basic hotel. I didn’t need their wi-fi, but that’s a chargeable service (there’s 30 minutes free) and the whole arrangement is all more functional rather than luxurious.

    I had a little look on TripAdvisor and the hotel isn’t badly reviewed, although there are of course some angry customers. The hotel’s lack of mattress protectors is incredibly brave of them, since they’ll end up chucking mattresses away at quite a pace (or picking up negative reviews about that). I liked the “upon arrival in the room there was no Kit Kat chocolate bar”, which reminds me of an episode of The Hotel with Mark Jenkins.

    And the customer who was “shocked” at:

    “The room cleaning service women was from Eastern Europe which is not an issue but the issue I had with her was she didn’t speak or understand a word of English”.

    Odds are they did understand quite a lot of words of English (but studiously ignored the guest), but I’m not sure why a guest really needs an in-depth conversation with the room cleaning staff anyway, who are probably distracted with cleaning rooms. There was another angry guest that check-in is “very late”, despite it being 3pm which is hardly unusual.

    And another guest who noted:

    “To top it off there were people running around in their underwear in reception.”

    I suppose readers have to picture the scene as they feel appropriate, as no more details were given. But my favourite of all was:

    “We requested a wake up call and taxi for the following morning but nobody woke us up”.

    The hotel reminded the customer that Travelodge don’t offer wake up calls, but I’d like to hear more about what the staff members had promised. A mischievous evening staff member perhaps…..

     

  • London – Hackney (Borough of) – Hackney – Travelodge

    London – Hackney (Borough of) – Hackney – Travelodge

    The Travelodge in Hackney is on the left-hand side of this photo (in the building, not the railway station platform as even Travelodge haven’t got rooms that basic), easy to reach from the city centre by bus or London Overground. In terms of noise, I like the sound of trains overnight, but then again, I’ve long since decided that I like urban sounds (I mean in relation to the background noise of a city, not a type of music) such as this to feel the most rested. My tolerance of noise is less liked by some others though judging from their reviews about being kept awake.

    There is a shared door with Kip Hotels to get into the building, a slightly unusual set-up of two rival hotels with one entrance.

    Anyway, let me at least try to paint some kind of picture of the scene on arrival. I entered the reception area and an alarm was going off throughout the building. The receptionist looked stressed, she now had two waiting guests and she didn’t know why the alarm was going off. She ran out of reception looking quite harassed by the situation and went to investigate why her hotel wasn’t working properly. It’s not an ideal welcome to be honest.

    Then a man with his two sons (or I assume they were his) came into reception and it’s fair to say that these children were not the quietest that I’ve ever encountered. The receptionist comes back at this point and apologises for the wait, but she says she needs to keep investigating as she can’t work out why an alarm is going off. At this point, the man explains that his two kids might have been the cause of the alarm due to a tripping incident near the lift. This was a relief for the receptionist, she now knew why her hotel was broken. She disappeared off to try and turn the alarm off, but she seemed pleased that she understood what had happened.

    Another staff member appeared, who was a sea of calm in a reception where two children were running around screaming and an alarm was going off. She dealt with the customer in front of me and ensured he was content, before trying to assist the man with his two children. I had by this point moved out of the queueing arrangement to stand near the wall, which stopped the two loud children running around me. The man kindly mentioned that I had been first, but I’m a helpful sort of person and I let him go ahead as he needed a new keycard. This altruistic behaviour of mine was, if I’m being honest, also useful to discover what part of the hotel the kids were located in so that I wasn’t near to them. I have a feeling that the receptionist guessed this, I was placed on the ground floor which was as far as possible to have been placed away from the kids.

    I’d add that the children weren’t bad, but they seemed to be quite loud and I like the noise of trains and traffic, I’m less good with the sound of exuberant children. Anyway, I digress.

    The bedroom was fine, it’s not the largest Travelodge room that I’ve had, but it met my requirements. It had a door, a window that opened, a ceiling, walls, a bathroom, a carpet that didn’t stick, clean bedsheets, a desk, a bin, a kettle, towels and a light. There are quite a few requirements there, but I think that some of them are quite basic needs. And, I heard no more noise either internally or externally until I checked out, although I’m unsure how many guests there actually were in the rest of the building.

    I didn’t see any staff members when checking out and if it wasn’t for the excitement of check-in, I feel I might have found the whole experience just a little unnotable. This room cost under £20 for the night, which is ridiculous for a London hotel the week before Christmas. But, we live in interesting times….