Home sweet home

After being home for two days I can only say that there is nothing like my own bed and I do love my flat.

I really don't mind travelling for business, but staying in three different hotels in four nights can wear out even the most hardcore business traveller. You unpack, sleep and pack again. The first two nights I stayed at The Royal Marine Hotel in Dun Laogahire and I loved every minute of it. As a company we have a special corporate rate there and if it's possible we usually get upgraded to a Executive Room, which was just fabulous. I even had my own balcony.

In Belfast my colleague and I had been booked in at the Templepatrick Hotel and Country Club staying in Deluxe Rooms with view over the golf course. I have to admit I had rather high hopes on the room, especially after my fabulous stay at the Royal Marine. Unfortunately this wasn't the case. The view over the golf course and mountains was beautiful, but other than that my my room was old and worn down. I was also very surprised to the see housekeeping cleaning out the rooms when we arrived a bit after 7 pm. That should have been done in the morning. I do not like to navigate between piles of old sheets and towels. When I a bit disappointed described my room to my colleague she looked quite puzzled. Her room was a real suite with two rooms, separate sitting area, two TV-sets etc. Since we both were paying for a deluxe room we decided to ask the receptionist, and it turned out my colleague was staying in the bridal suite since the hotel was overbooked. So she definitely got her money worth, while I'm not so sure I did. At least not for only one night. There was absolutely nothing wrong with the room. Clean, big bed, fluffy towels and so on, but the picture on the website gave me the impression of something else.

My last night on the road I stayed at at a Holiday Inn just outside Heathrow and by the time I finally got there (about midnight) I was just happy to have a bed. Due to an error in a flight control system at an airport in the Netherlands all air traffic in western Europe was halted for an hour meaning that I didn't get out of Belfast until 10 pm. Finally at Heathrow an hour later I managed to pick a taxi with one of the rudest drivers I have ever met. His first question to me was not where I was going instead he wondered if I had any money to pay with. Excuse me, but I usually don't get into a taxi without money. The question might have been more relevant if I had turned up with a backpack, half dirty and worn out. Not as now wearing a business suit. Stupid man!

The room was OK with a view over the M4. A typical airport hotel where one sleep and that's it. The pillows where very flat and having slept with very fluffy and comfy pillows the other nights it felt like I had no pillows at all.

What have amazed me most during this trip and the one to Poland the week before, and actually the last business trips before that, is that I have slept like a log every night. I never sleep well the first night in a hotel. When I started sleeping well at the hotel in London I just thought it was because that place is so familiar to me by now, but both in Poland and Ireland as well. Maybe I'm becoming one of those (Women) Road Warriors that can sleep everywhere?! But with that said, home sweet home is still my favourite place in the world to stay at.