“What you don’t know about your hotel can kill you.”
Not really (most of the time). I’m just riffing off those old scare pieces from the network nightly news. But seriously folks, hotels can be zones of false safety. They’re “home” while we’re away, a place where we feel like we can let down our guard.
And we can let down our guard, but if we take a few steps we can let down our guard more safely…which means better rest for us, and safer days on our trip.
I learned a lot of his in two books very much worth checking out. These are How to Be Your Own Bodyguard by Nick Hughes, and Choose Adventure: Safe Travel in Dangerous Places by Greg Ellifiritz. They’re densely packed with good information, much of which matches my own experience traveling in places like Guatemala, Cambodia, and India. Both are available on Amazon.
We can be safer in hotels by dividing our work into three stages: what to do at home, what to do when we check in, and what to do while we’re there.
At Home:
Don’t skimp on the hotel price. Get a good hotel in a decent neighborhood, preferably one with a pool and an in-room kitchen.
Ask for a room on the 3rd to 8th floor. Lower is a target for burglary. Higher is out of reach for most fire ladders.
Use Google Maps (satellite view) to check out the neighborhood around the hotel. You can see a lot of red and green flags by doing this.
Checking In:
Confirm that they gave you a room on the floors you requested.
Identify a manager by name, and introduce them to your kids. Make sure your children know to go to or ask for this person if they need help and can’t find you.
If the receptionist says your room number out loud, ask for a new room.
While You’re There:
Shortly after settling in to your room, walk as a group through the fire escape route. Learn it, and confirm the way isn’t blocked or locked.
Set up your emergency equipment someplace you can reach it easily.
In any country where you don’t feel 100% safe, bring a 3-dollar rubber door stop. Kick it into the door when you lock in for the night.
Avoid sending any sensitive information on the hotel wi-fi. It is almost never secure.
Greg’s Blog is a great source of safety information of all stripes, written by a smart and experienced human being doing good things in the world. Check it out here.
A related habit I’ve found works very well is what I call the two-day travel day. Get up early, before it’s hot, and go do a thing in your destination. Come “home” to the hotel in the early afternoon and rest for 2-4 hours. Nap, use the pool, let the kids play video games, whatever. Then go out in the afternoon to evening for a second round of travel experiences. Have dinner, come back to the hotel, and go to bed. It really is the better way to travel, and travel safely.