i have reached a point in my life at which i no longer feel that i need to find the cheapest accommodation possible. i got my fill of big-city hostels full of snoring germans in my twenties, son; i don't need personal attendants or a levitating bed, but i work hard to find good deals on appealing digs (cf. our private patio at the ace in palm springs, hotel st. paul in montreal) and then save for them. or save after them. pennies are pinched at some point. i happened upon an exceedingly fine rate at reykjavik's hotel borg - a restored art deco joint which hosted both the king of norway and marlene dietrich, presumably on separate lines of the guestbook though one never knows, now does one - and that is where we rested our heads.
appealing digs are also terribly handy when one decides to skip the superexpensive rúntur (a television tuned to some log-splitting contest beckoned to us from a bar on the way home friday night - i am all for log-splitting contests - but shouty late-night weekend pub crawls do not blow our hair back), don a hotel bathrobe, and tuck into one's aged guatemalan rum (thanks, duty-free!). i am perfectly comfortable being the guy who flies to the arctic circle and stays in with "easy lover."
imaginary reading group discussion questions
01 do you think the fates have woven a night in a youth hostel into your future at some point, or are you at the end of that thread?
02 what is with those germans?
03 your most expensive hotel room ever: what was the damage? (not you, johnny depp.)
04 pub crawls: yea or nay?
05 did any of you believe those were my feet up there?
11 comments:
01 I stayed in a hostel once. The floor was wet. Then I inherited some money and that was that. More hostels might have been very, very good for me. In many ways.
02 Not touching that one.
03 Post Ranch Inn. A lot. The Upper Coast House. And a 210 degrees view out over the Pacific Ocean.
04 Haven't. Would.
05 I didn't even realize they were feet. Clearly 'pink zebra' registered way higher on my visual recognition than 'body parts.'
see, now i want a pink zebra, and yet i'm not supposed to purchase any more plastic animals.
01. Probably not a hostel. Probably a pretty cheap hotel, though. My standards are mind blowingly low. I grew up ONLY camping, with one memorable exception when we had to splurge on a Motel 8 because a storm blew in and we couldn't get our tents set up. I transitioned to hostels and very cheap Euro-hotels in college. I've stayed at two very nice hotels in my whole life and both were paid for by D's grandmother (because she is horrified when we choose the hotels).
02. No idea, but it is kind of legendary, right? Every country I've ever been to has issues with German tourists specifically.
03. The most I've every paid personally is $150 per night. In Canada. It was a pretty nice hotel. Room service was so insanely cheap that I considered moving in just so someone would bring me hot tea and toast in bed every morning.
04. Yea, only if they are not overly crowded or loud (so, in practice, almost always nay).
05. I was very surprised, but taken in.
1. besides a killer airfare deal- flitting inbetwixt hostels in southern italy for a month rang in under $600. the hostels had chandelliers, marble floors, & robes. i'm talkin 18 euro/night. there is a time and place for them in the future.
2. strange creatures
3. the polynesian stings around $500/night but i CAN'T. STOP. GOING. BACK.
4. oh yeah
5. ...they belong to the missus?
02: Occasioned by that fact… men without any exceptional talent made manifold, weak, absurd, indeed sometimes crazy attempts to which the now aroused public yet granted its attention and, with great patience such as is to be found only in Germany, lent its ear at length. – Schopenhauer 03: A heavily air-conditioned couple of nights at the illustrious Gaylord Texan for I don’t remember but it was steep. 04: Naw… er, nay. 05: …they belong to Philip Bailey?
01 I hope not. Unless there's a lighthouse involved.
03 I don't actually know, but it was snowing outside. We couldn't sleep, so we just took baths and showers in the fancy bathroom all night long.
04 Provided they occur before nine-thirty at night, yay.
05 Not for a minute.
spiritually, yes; joe's feet. in related news, we're trying to figure out how we could be phil and phil for halloween without a deeply uncool deployment of blackface.
i guess i can't say definitively that i'll NEVER hostel again, but it'd have to be a very special occasion, or a very charming location. my most formative hostel experience was in central amsterdam; the highest compliment i can pay that place is that i was never robbed, and i probably should have been.
01 i often think aboutthe fact that i should have done more travelling before i hit the age where youth hostels became less.... acceptable.
02
03 i couldn't say. the nicest places i have stayed have always been some deal or another. like how my brother in laws best friend owns the huntington in san francisco. i personally tend to spend more on vacation house rentals, though. (@lisa POST RANCH INN! one day....)
04 seeing as i can really only drink a few drinks (2?) in an evening, there isn't much point. but i like the idea otherwise.
05 um yeah
1. too many hostels to count, and so. over. them.
2. ditto with the snoring bavarians.
3. what's more fun: cheapest/most disgusting hotel room ever: bunk room in a whore house, khentii aimag, outter mongolia. 50 tugruk. i got lice.
4. yes in college, no in real life unless you're in glasgow.
5. wondered about that, then considered i haven't worn socks in six months. what with india and all.
the most disgusting hotel room ever was at the nanford in oxford (we got an email from tripadvisor a few months later congratulating us on staying at the 'dirtiest hotel in britain'). we were actually going to tell wedding guests to stay there until we visited it in person on our scouting trip; we slept off jetlag for a few hours and, righteous when we woke up, demanded a refund. when the proprietor of our new hotel found out where we'd just been, he ducked into his bar and reappeared with pints of ale. "it will be alright," he said.
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