Research — Places to Stay

Adventure is a State of Mind

For me, figuring out where to stay is equally fun and overwhelming. The options seem endless! This is where I usually get practical and serious with the budget, if for no other reason than to narrow down the options some.

Budget

Lodging and transportation are the areas where you can save the most if you are a budget traveler, so if you know your travel budget is limited or you’re trying to stretch your dollars/euros/pesos/dinars/etc into as many days as possible, consider the most bare bones accommodations. For example, hostels used to be associated only with college-aged youngsters on a gap year, but now there are hostels that are family friendly and welcoming of us, ahem, more mature travelers. If a hostel seems a little too social for your taste, there are plenty of budget hotels or couch-surfing options.

Mid-Range to Luxurious

I tend to prefer to stay in places that are considered mid-range as far as the expense, but some of these places have been truly luxurious! Some rentals through websites like Airbnb and VRBO are in homes I could never afford to buy, but I can definitely afford to rent them for a few days and pretend that it’s my own home.

By the Numbers

I’ve had friends ask how I decide whether I want to stay in a home rental versus a traditional bed and breakfast versus a hotel. A lot of this decision is dictated by how many friends or family I’m traveling with — a home rental may be far more affordable per person if there are six of you traveling together, whereas a hotel might be a better bargain if there are just one or two of you.

Also consider how much time you will be spending in the place where you are staying. If you’re only going to return to your room to sleep, why spend more than the minimum needed to make sure you get a good night’s rest. On the other hand, if you hope your vacation includes buying fresh food at local markets that you are then going to prepare with friends and spend leisurely hours eating while visiting over a bottle of wine, you’re going to want to stay in a nice home with a well-equipped kitchen and a beautiful dining room or patio.

Exploring the Options

Obviously, if you have a favorite source of lodging, such as a hotel chain or one of the home rental companies, you can start on their website to see whether they have places in the area where you want to stay. If you don’t have a company you want to use to start or if they do not have anything where you are looking, you can move on to a general internet search. Type in the type of lodging you are looking for (such as “hotel” or “bed and breakfast”) along with the name of the city and country where you are looking. Sometimes, there may be a specific word for the type of lodging you are looking for, and it can be helpful to use that word in your search. For example, an “auberge” in France is similar to a “bed and breakfast” in Scotland. So using the word “auberge” if searching for a place to stay in France can often result in more options from your search results than just using “bed and breakfast.”

At this point, if there is an overwhelming number of options, there are several ways to start to shrink the list to a more manageable number. First of all, decide what your price range is and if there are any characteristics of the place that are deal breakers for you. For example, will you have a car and need parking? Will you be using public transportation and want to make sure that you’re no further than a 15-minute walk from a metro stop? Do you need/want a restaurant on site? Or a pool? If this information is not readily available on the lodging’s website, you can figure out some of the information (such as distance from a metro stop) by using an online tool like Google Maps or Streetview to take a virtual walk around the neighborhood.

An alternative or addition to an internet search is considering the recommendations made in your favorite guidebook or by your favorite bloggers. Sometimes I’ve stayed in the specific place they recommend. At other times, I’ve stayed near the place they recommended but not in the specific location because there was something about their recommendation that did not fit what I was looking for but their description regarding the area was appealing.

Considering the Details

Once you’ve decreased your options to a more manageable list, it’s time to read the descriptions to make sure that it sounds like the sort of lodging you want. Here is where it is important to pay attention to details. For example, since Covid, there are more places where you can stay without ever interacting face-to-face with a human being thanks to innovations such as keyless entry and passcodes sent to your smart phone. Sometimes this can be very convenient, but during a recent trip with a family member to Germany, he left his room code behind in his room when we went to dinner. We returned after the staff had left the very cute hotel where we were staying, and for some reason, no one answered the emergency phone number that was supposed to be staffed 24-hours. To make a long story short, our relative ended up spending the night on the floor in our room. If you know you’re someone prone to losing codes or keycards, you may prefer to stay somewhere more traditional where there is someone at the front desk around the clock.

Wherever you go becomes a part of you somehow.

Anita Desai

If available, photos are also helpful in sorting through your many options. Although photos on a website are often (although, surprisingly, not always) taken from an angle to make a room appear as spacious and attractive as possible, a picture is still worth a thousand words. From pictures, you can often get a sense of how comfortable you will feel in a room. It can also help clarify some things about the lodging. For example, the beds may be described as spacious, but if you can tell they are smaller than you are used to by comparing the size of the bed in the photo with other furniture in room, you may want to move on to a different option.

The Opinions of Others

When I am considering someplace new, I always read the reviews. A general rule to remember about reviews is that what is important to one person may not be important to someone else. So always pay attention to what the praise or complaints are about, not just that there is praise or complaints, and take into consideration whether those are important factors for you.

Do you you have a preference as to where you like to stay when you are away from home? If so, what is it and why? Are there times that you would prefer to try something different?