Emily J.
Yelp
Two words: quel bummer.
I had a work conference in Philadelphia and all of the hotels were booked at the special conference rate. I'm a huge fan of B&Bs and try to stay in them when possible, mostly because I love a good breakfast and you always learn some fun fact from the owners and other guests.
I reserved my room through their website. I had very little choice since the city was quickly filling to the brim with librarians, so I selected the "La Chateau" room based on the fact it was available, slightly less expensive than the other rooms, and the picture and description on the reservation page made it look cute and comfy. Perhaps if I had more thoroughly searched their website I would have learned that I had to share the bathroom, but this valuable piece of information was omitted from the reservations page description.
I arrive at La Reserve around 7pm. After paying the full amount up front, I'm asked to sign up for breakfast for the following morning. Well, all the early times are taken, since nearly all the guests are here for the same conference as me, and so I guess I couldn't have breakfast. The woman at the desk never told me that I could have signed up for an earlier time, despite the fact that the sign-up sheet explicitly said that only four names may be signed up for any time, and you may not write in the margins. So, that's how I miss my first breakfast.
I try again to sign up for the next morning and voila! There is space early enough so I can still make it to my meeting. However, I find myself sitting at the breakfast table with three other guests at 7:45am, and there's no hotel staff to be found. Apparently the B&B forgot about the second B (I later found out that the cook had previously called in to say she would not be there, but that information failed to reach the appropriate ears). So, day two of no breakfast.
Ahh, my final morning and final try to get a taste of the most important meal of the day! Alas, no breakfast times were early enough to accommodate my early meeting. No breakfast number three for me. Again, I found out upon checkout that I could have requested an earlier time, and that others were doing it because they, too, had early meetings. Why was I not privy to this valuable knowledge?
As for the shared bathroom, I'm not a total prude and have shared bathrooms before, but given the price of the room and the fact that this detail was missing from the description I read, it was a super duper bummer to have to smell a stranger's poo first thing in the morning. How do you distinguish soaps in one soap dish? What if your "bathroom buddy" is a believer of "if it's yellow let it mellow" like mine was?
My final and perhaps most worrisome comment: every time I came back to my room the door was unlocked. Instead of keys there are keypads, and I quickly learned that mine unlocked just fine using the code, but would not lock using it, it had to be locked manually from the inside. Somehow the cleaning staff didn't know this. I felt very safe in the hotel, and the outer door to the street was locked, but I really would have preferred to come back to a locked room.
Almost done ranting :o) I told another staff member at checkout about my concerns/disappointments, and she apologized and told me everything I "should" have known, but that was it. She did suggest that I could probably get a credit the next time I visited.
If you know the "rules" of la Reserve, then you'll be good to go. The house was built in the 1850's and has great architecture and the interior design is lovely and not over the top. Couldn't tell you what the food tasted like, though.
Oh, and did I mention the rooms do not have televisions or phones? Again, I "should" have known there was a shared TV room, as well as 24 hour access to coffee, tea, etc., but how was I supposed to know?
No love for La Reserve, but it is centrally located!
***UPDATE***
I just received a letter from the owner expressing her apologies for the concerns I had during my stay, and she offered me a credit toward a future stay.
Thank you, La Reserve, and the general manager. I appreciate your letter and offer very much!
