boutique hotel

The hubs and I just returned on Sunday from a leader’s weekend out in the middle of nowhere South of Johannesburg. We took the work trip as an opportunity to get away just the two of us for a night. We have our usual Protea Hotel in Pretoria that we love, but we thought, “No, let’s live a little and try something new.”

Boutique Hotel

It sounded like a good idea, especially when aircon, satellite TV, and free WIFI in all rooms was advertised. We didn’t realize that it was in downtown Joburg where it’s advised that you don’t even walk around outside at night (perhaps even during the day for that matter). When asked about the WIFI at check-in, we were told that it wasn’t working. “Ok,” I thought. We don’t HAVE to have Internet. Sometimes it’s good to just be unplugged for a bit.

Upstairs we went to check out our “boutique room.” Once there, a quick sweep around the stuffy room revealed no aircon. Ok, we can handle it. Jeremy turned on the TV to a message that said there was no satellite TV, because the bill wasn’t paid. At this point, you have 2 choices. Get frustrated or laugh. I don’t know that I laughed out loud, but definitely inside I was choosing the latter.

The next morning we decided to go down to the restaurant next door for breakfast. Our way down revealed some kind of massive water leak. Water through the halls and even in the restaurant. Frustration or laughter?

We decided to go ahead and check out of our room and investigate the antiques along Long Rd. We went down to hand in our key, and the door man informed us that the clerk went to the store. Seriously the only thing you can do at this point is laugh. Maybe boutique hotel in S. Africa isn’t such a good idea? Or maybe I shouldn’t stereotype and give it another go. We’ll see. We did eat two fantastic curries while we were in the city. Can’t get that in our neck of the woods!

Moral of the story…it’s still good to live a little and risk. Sometimes it produces a new experience that you want to go back to. Sometimes it produces a memory that all you can do is laugh about.