Tag: Best Western

Merry Christmas from Cave City, KY!

Christmas has brought us joy and cheer, beautiful scenery, and now free wifi and a non-smoking room before the final leg of the late 2013 great Florida adventure. Aside from the disappointment of landing in a dry county on Christmas night, the Best Western in Cave City is surprisingly choice when compared to the layover lodgings on the way down. I warned you there was a story about the Ramada in Nashville… here are the cliff notes, based on the qualities I look for in a one-night hotel stay:

Wifi:

BW – Yes.

Ramada – Yes.

Clean linens and no visible sign of bed bugs:

BW – Yes.

Ramada – Yes.

Fitness Center:

BW – No.

Ramada – One treadmill and one recumbent bike count as a fitness center, right?

A clean bathtub:

BW – Yes.

Ramada – We were booked in the only handicapable room despite having a reservation, so no soak in the tub for me.

Parking:

BW – In front of the room; included.

Ramada – Parking lot in front of the hotel; the staff attempted to charge us $40 for overnight parking due to a football game across the street at the stadium at 3pm. Check out was at 11am. After copious threatening tweets we arose in the morning and asked to speak with the manager. Parking was ultimately $10 + a headache.

Presence of a famous indoor guitar-shaped swimming pool:

BW – No.

Ramada – Yes. But there’s no water in it and it smells like feet.

Cost:

BW – $65 + tax.

Ramada – $89 + tax + the $40 parking debacle.

Ok, so it might be slightly unfair to compare price between Cave City and Nashville, but Hotwire called this a downtown hotel, which was neither accurate nor fair.

Lessoned learned are the following:

1) Don’t book hotels on Hotwire.

2) I should lower my expectations of Ramada.

3) Guitar-shaped pools are overrated.