SUPERBOWL XLIII (part 1)

This is the sexy mermaid statue outside our "hotel"

First, let me start by telling about the luxurious accommodations we were so privileged to be given upon arrival in Florida. Words cannot describe the luxury and class of our experience that first night.
Thursday started out perfectly. The flights were uneventful, and I didn't feel motion sickness at all, nor did I completely lose my appetite. The other couple traveling with us didn't lose their car keys in the Denver airport, and the airline didn't lose one of their bags in Denver, either.
Upon arrival in Tampa, we thought it would be more cost effective to use public transportation around town, and opted not to get a rental car. Apparently, for the other couple, the Randells, $500 was just too much to spend for transportation. So we paid $80 for the airport shuttle to drive us to our hotel.
Ah, this lovely hotel. The Oasis Palms Resort. Just across the street from St. Pete beach, situated deep in the heart of the lovely Treasure Island, which is about a 30 minutes drive from downtown Tampa.

Don't be fooled by the "open" sign. As you can in the window it is completely dark, no one is inside.

The shuttle drove us out of town, towards St. Petersburg, and over the bridge (across the bay) to Treasure Island. I just knew we were going to be staying in the lap of luxury. As we were escorted further into town, the street lined with hotels kept getting darker and dirtier. The hotels slowly shrunk into motels. When finally, at around 9:00 p.m., we stopped in front of this tiny dirty dingy yellow motel, with the blinking neon sign saying "Oasis Palms Resort." I thought this can't be it.
We got our bags, walked to the office door, which was locked. No life inside. The sign on the door said "Office hours M-F 12:00 p.m. to 6:00 p.m." It was after 9 p.m. Then we saw a sign next to a germ infested courtesy phone saying to call if arriving after hours and someone will come check you in. We called that number probably 20 times, and got nothing but a voicemail. After leaving a dozen messages, we decided to walk up the street to find some shelter and food (since it was pouring rain). We were stranded outside our hotel with all of our luggage for an hour and a half. The ONLY restaurant open was the Waffle house, about a mile down the rode from the motel. A tiny empty sorry excuse of a diner, that happened to be out of everything, except waffles. After eating day old waffles, we trekked back to the motel, and found someone in the office. We checked in, were directed to our rooms and this is what we found.

The room was no bigger than a small child's bedroom. Including the bathroom. The double bed took up most of the space with its wicker headboard and dingy faded dolphin bedspread.

I was standing against the opposite wall/entry door while taking this picture.

The child-sized shower was so small we had to walk in sideways to fit through the doorway. The shower head was installed about chest level on me, so even lower for C. Dust and mold populated the corners of the tiny shower.

There were no extra plugs in the room. We had to unplug lamps and clocks to charge our phones and dry our hair. And there was No phone in the room. I was afraid to take my socks off in the room. That's how dirty it was. I was afraid to sleep under the sheets because I was sure they weren't changed or washed after the last guest. The dish towels they gave us to shower with were stained with brown streaked that I can only guess was one thing. And on the wall opposite the bed was hung and brand new fancy 36" plasma TV, complete with DVD player. It appears that the stories are true, that "certain types of people" will spend a fortune on electronics, and nothing on housekeeping.
After C got out of the shower, he walked the 2 feet from the shower to the bed and sat down to get dressed, and noticed that his feet were completely black. I'm glad I didn't take off my socks.
I lay awake in the bed comparing this place to the Bates motel, and just waiting for some psycho killer to barge into the flimsy door and stab us to death.

Oh, and if you look up this hotel's website, you will find a photo of the slightly less disgusting hotel on the opposite side of the street.

Needless to say, we called the company that booked us into that shit hole (sorry, but there is just no other way to describe the place, and forever thereafter during the trip the place was dubbed "the shit hole") and complained. We were upgraded to a much nicer hotel, and the rest of the stay went somewhat splendidly.

Consider the fact that we have no rental car, and have now established that there are no businesses for miles on this street other than cheap crack-whore motels, and of course, the Waffle house.

More stories to come.......