Since nothing much is up here at the library (at least not on my watch), I thought I'd share my stressful vacation. I booked 2 nights at an inn/spa on one of the local islands. I'd come across their website a few years ago and had thought it looked so nice that I'd been wanting to visit ever since. Little did I know.
The place is nicely decorated, right on the water, and they clearly tried hard when they remodelled it a few years ago. It could be quite charming, really. But the service and competence of the staff, combined with what you get compared to what you pay for made it very disappointing. Here's the rundown:
- After sorting out my reservations over a couple of days via e-mail (after I sent them my Visa number, they didn't respond - turns out their Internet had been down but still, if I hadn't e-mailed them to check, they might never have gotten back to me), I tried e-mailing the spa - the main purpose for my visit. No reply. I phoned a couple of days later, got the person I later learned was a not very experienced/helpful/bright young desk clerk who argued with me over wanting to book a 7:30pm appointment on the grounds that it wasn't convenient for the spa staff (even though the site clearly states they're open til 9pm). After trying to fob me off with several other times, she discovered I was a hotel guest (which made more important than any old schlub with $110 to spend, I guess) and that the times she'd suggested were booked anyway, so she allowed me book my 7:30 massage (how kind of her, eh?). The day before I left on my trip, I got an e-mail from the spa telling me that that treatment I'd chosen is no longer available. Great. I figured I'd sort it out when I got there. Turns out they phoned me after I'd already left the next day, which is a laugh because they thought I was coming on an even earlier ferry than I was on.
- When I e-mailed to ask what the best way was to the Inn from the ferry since I was arriving without a car, Desk Clerk told me it was a 5 minute walk and gave me directions. Now, the site does say it's walking distance, and I'd thought that's what I'd do, but it also says pickup can be arranged. Apparently you have to explicitly request it, it won't be offered to you. Given her attitude about the spa, I doubt she would've arranged it even if I had asked specifically. For all she knew, I was a senior citizen with a cane. At the very least, since I'm coming to a hotel, I clearly have luggage to carry, which might make walking difficult. But at least I knew which direction to turn when I got off the ferry, so I decided to hoof it, bag and all.
- When I arrive at the Inn, I wander into the first available door, only to find that the rooms are separate from the rest of the hotel. I grab a spa brochure from the little sitting area there before wandering around trying to find the front desk. There's no-one there when I walk in. But soon Bonnie the owner and Desk Clerk arrive. I check in without too much hassle and am shown my room which, to my dismay, has no air conditioning and no TV, unlike just about every other hotel I've ever been in, most of which charge much less. When I ask about AC, Clerk says "That's something they haven't told me about. But you could open the window." Great, thanks, the bugs, chatter from the dining patio and ferry horn won't be any sort of nuisance. Thankfully, she did manage to get a functioning if rickety fan for me when I asked for one.
- The in-room directory stated they had room service, Clerk told me they do not.
- After finally getting hold of the spa a couple of hours before my appointment, I chose an okay-sounding treatment (neither the "spa menu" I picked up nor the one in my room listed any of the cool-sounding treatments on the web site, but this didn't surprise me, given the one I wanted that was listed was now discontinued). Then the spa woman tells me that "what they'd like to do" is have me come in at 10:00 the next morning! Basically, unless I'd put up a huge fight, the spa refused to honour my 7:30 appointment. And since I didn't want to get a massage from a surly employee and was so battered by disappointment by this point, I gave up and agreed to come in the morning. She then had the gall to tell me that if I'd phoned the spa, they'd have told me the treatment wasn't available. Well, I phoned the number listed on the spa's page and I got Clerk, who assured me she could make the booking. Maybe you need to invest in a separate phone line if you can't communicate with the hotel staff.
- So, there I was - I was by myself with no car in a place where everything shuts down at night, anyway. I'd carefully made evening plans to avoid being bored in the evening, but these were yanked out from under me. And I didn't even have a TV to give me something to do all night. Now yes, I'd brought books, but I hadn't planned on doing nothing but read for 4+ hours each night. (I discovered the next day that there's a TV lounge in the other building, in a corner near the dining room where you'd have to crank up the volume over the dinner music, cutlery, and conversation - not fun for the viewer or the diners. I didn't think they'd appreciate me blaring Family Guy at them.)
- The next day the spa did give me a free hourlong treatment (in addition to the one I eventually booked and shelled out for) and it was a good experience, although it was my own fault that I always forget that massages make me insanely sore. It's kind of like what they say about childbirth - I always swear I won't get another one, but I always do. Of course, if I'd just speak up and say OW! it probably wouldn't happen so much. But that's my fault, not the spa lady's. So, if you can get them to agree to let you make an appointment, the spa is nice.
- Breakfast sounded really good and was presented nicely, but actually tasted pretty bland. Service wasn't great, especially the 2nd morning when 2 waiters couldn't cope with the 3 tables (5 people total) in the dining room. When one man asked for toast, you'd have thought he'd asked for a Molotov Cocktail. Waiter 1 said no, they couldn't do toast but he'd bring round the muffin basket (which he didn't - Waiter 2 eventually did about 10 minutes later and and didn't manage to supply jam/butter). And I'm 99% sure they had the same muffins/croissants both days. They were nice and hot and plentiful the first day (when Bonnie the owner was waiting tables). The 2nd day, there were croissants but only 2 of 3 types of muffins left and they weren't hot. And every time Waiter 2 offered them to someone, the choice got smaller until there was one muffin and a couple of croissants. So either they only had a small number of muffins to last the weekend or the waiters just didn't bother to replenish the supply. A little thing, yes, but yet another example of far from good service for the price.
- I do have to admit that lunch in the patio restaurant was excellent, probably the highlight of my trip.
- I always judge a hotel by its bathrooms and this one was nice - soaker tub and separate shower. I was delighted to have the tub, because it gave me something to do in the evenings. But the hand soap, shampoo, lotion, etc were all in pump jars rather than individual bottles and the prettily tiled shower was marred by a 3-in-one dispenser like they had at a gym I used to go to. Just again, a small detail that marred the costly effect.
- Housekeeping left a tub full of dirty glasses in the hall all day and didn't replace the facecloths they took away the second day. There were also 2 lengthy notices about using the 2 marked bins in your room to recycle, but there were just 2 unmarked wastebaskets in the bathroom, so I decided they could sort my pop bottles themselves.
- On the last day I couldn't keep my disappointment in any longer and complained to Bonnie about the spa treatments not being available as advertised online. It turns out there's an INSERT into the spa brochure that was in neither of the brochures I had. They're apparently being reprinted soon, but in the meantime the inserts tend to fall out, she said. As far as I can tell, the only place the inserts were actually available was on an easily overlooked table in the lobby. She was polite and very sympathetic, but that was it (although she did ask if the spa had offered me anything).
Perhaps it's an island living thing and they just can't get enough (competent) staff. I went to a little diner up the road for dinner the second night and heard from the kitchen "What do you mean we're out of plates?!!" :)
To top it all off (this isn't the hotel's fault, of course) - the ferry was delayed an hour, the transit authority has decided to take away the direct ferry bus and now dumps you in the middle of nowhere with 45 minutes to wait for the connection, and I put my purse down in gum. Terrible, horrible, no-good, very bad.
PLUS, I just got an e-mail from the hotel today. When I saw it was from them, I was expecting a letter of apology or something. But no, it said they'd missed a couple of charges when I was checking out, so they've billed me a further $33. Not a big deal, but just another nail in the coffin of me ever going back there again.