Red Carpet Inn, Hershey

...place, a motel in the Red Carpet Inn chain. Hershey has a mix of posh theme park hotels a la Disney, and cheaper, tattier chains such as Days Inn. They are all pretty much the same price, so I chose the one I did because I’d not encountered the chain before, and thought I’d try my luck.

I arrived around 10pm having been to work that day and Greyhounded in in the evening. Despite the late hour, the reception was manned by a terrible ...
...threadbare in places. It wasn’t red as I’d hoped, but then it finally twigged that they meant red-carpet as in Hollywood premier style – they metaphorically lay it down for you, the important guests, to walk over.

The room’s en suite contained a tiled shower and dodgy shower curtain, an oddly shaped sink (which you couldn’t put anything on – so toothpaste etc ended up sitting on the floor) and a loo with temperamental flush. Though ... more

To spend a decent length of time travelling in the USA you either need to be loaded or be willing to stay in cheap, potentially grotty little motels on occasion. When I went to Hershey I stayed in one such place, a motel in the Red Carpet Inn chain. Hershey has a mix of posh theme park hotels a la Disney, and cheaper, tattier chains such as Days Inn. They are all pretty much the same price, so I chose the one I did because I’d not encountered the chain before, and thought I’d try my luck.

I arrived around 10pm having been to work that day and Greyhounded in in the evening. Despite the late hour, the reception was manned by a terrible English speaker with a kind smile. She found my reservation quickly, accepted the credit card I offered up, and dished out a room key. The branch I was at was a 2-story affair which edged round the main car park on 3 sides, and my room was a ground floor one. They key fit the lock but it still took some coaxing and a slight kick to get it to open. First impressions were that the room was boiling, so I quickly switched on the archaic, deafening air conditioning unit. There are 3 things I hate in hotels: warm rooms, dodgy bedspreads and dubious carpets, and as you’ll soon discover, this boasted all three.

The room was basic, and though it could have put up 2 people, I seemed to fill the space quite easily. The main focus of the room was the bed – just a double here rather than the usual Queen, and bedecked with a lovely patented vinyl/polyester throw which I quickly threw onto the floor. That aside the bedding was perfectly acceptable – no dodgy stains on the white sheets, no visible rips or fraying at the edges. The room itself was clean enough, just a but chipped and peeling around the edges. Aside from the bed, had a huge antique TV with 50 odd channels, a gigantic fridge which I put my moisturizer and water bottle in just because it was there, and a tiny table and two chairs set up squashed up in one corner making one of the chairs totally inaccessible. It probably didn’t matter though as the chairs were minute and would barely have accommodated my arse, let alone some huge American’s. The motel room also boasted a beautiful carpet, so well loved it was even threadbare in places. It wasn’t red as I’d hoped, but then it finally twigged that they meant red-carpet as in Hollywood premier style – they metaphorically lay it down for you, the important guests, to walk over.

The room’s en suite contained a tiled shower and dodgy shower curtain, an oddly shaped sink (which you couldn’t put anything on – so toothpaste etc ended up sitting on the floor) and a loo with temperamental flush. Though the bathroom came with cheap soap and shampoo (sachets, not bottles), it didn’t come with hot water resulting in a rather rude awakening for me on the Saturday morning when I was trying to wash my hair in the advert break of Saved by the Bell.

Outside the room was a little veranda, shared with the room next door. Beyond that was the car park as each room had a designated space, even those balconied ones on the 2nd floor. The hotel was well located for local attractions, but was surrounded by other hotels and a pharmacy rather than anything useful like a restaurant or grocery store.

The staff I spoke to were polite if a bit dim:

“Is Hershey walking distance?”
“Good God no, it’d be almost 30 mins to walk there.
“Um, ok” (thinking….doesn’t the accent give a way the fact that I’m not local and therefore am capable of walking the odd mile or two, especially when the destination is chocolate themed?)

I checked in and out with ease, and the two transactions together took less than 5 minutes. The reception area was home to a coffee machine providing free cups of coffee for residents and various free brochures and maps, useful for travellers on the go. The motel has nothing apart from rooms, a reception and some vending machines, so no restaurant, bar, pool, gym… I imagine it is typical of others in the chain, but as somewhere to rest your head on route to somewhere exciting, it’s not that bad. I paid about £30 for the night, and this would have been the same if I’d been travelling with someone else, so it’s not bad in the slightest.

I stayed here in August, but can write this now for two reasons – one, I keep a travel journal with mentions of all the hotels I frequent, and two I have a habit of taking a photo of each room I sleep in, just because I like to. That way I can flip through photo albums and relive the good and not-so-good nights in this country and abroad. This means I can also compare hotel rooms throughout the world. My latest conclusion is that someone, somewhere is manufacturing dodgy, flowered bedspreads and flogging them to the hotel industry. My hotel rooms in Atlanta, North Carolina, Chicago, Washington D.C. and the Bahamas all had remarkably similar ones to the one I had hear, and though it means no nasty surprises for you, the traveller, it’s really not something to be proud of.

For some less polite reviews and links to book online if you're still not put off,

http://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g52819-d240623-r2581439-Red_Carpet_Inn_Hershey-Hershey_Pennsylvania.html
 

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