Not so long ago I headed down to Perth to catch up with friends and catch a game of cricket between Australia and Sri Lanka.
I arrived late so looked online for a cheap hotel close to the airport to see me through until the morning where I had a meeting in the city before heading off to spend a few nights with some friends out in the suburbs.
Perth has a notorious reputation for overcharging on hotel rooms and giving pretty shoddy service as well so when I found the Red Castle Motel was only $120 (it was on special) I quickly booked a room.
Yes you read that correctly, $120 (3,700 baht) is considered dirt cheap for Perth. For this price I was obviously not expecting anything too flash but what I got even surprised me!
When I arrived there was only one person working. Through her broken English she told me that she had me in room 12 which was not good and not where I was meant to be. I asked her what was wrong with the room. She said nothing was wrong with the room but next door there were six Aboriginal people all sharing a room. (They turned out to be New Zealand Maoris).
Not wanting to be next door to six people no matter what colour or nationality they were I asked what had happened to the room I was supposed to be in. She said it had not been cleaned yet and if I wanted to wait she would clean it for me. No problems I replied and said I would go and find some dinner while she cleaned and would come back later.
When I came back she gave me my key and said everything was done. On first impressions the room looked super old, smelt bad and had shoddy looking furniture but hey, this is Perth and it was only $120 so I was not too fussed.
Here are some photos from when I first walked in. Things looked almost half decent.
This was my view out the front towards reception. No cars in the car park then but plenty at 5am the following morning!
This is the view from my back verandah.
Lucky the view was so bad I did not try and enjoy it on the super airy bench seat they had thoughtfully provided!
Once the reception/cleaner lady had left I started to look at the room a little closer. It was a classic!
The single bed in the room had this wooden thing hanging down where it was stuck tight. Many a sore head or feet would have happened if I had to sleep there.
Thankfully I was by myself so had the double which magically turned from a bed to a boomerang as soon as I lay on it.
Lighting was a bit of a problem when two out of the three lights in the room looked like this!
Not much of a problem when all you were planning on doing was watching a bit of TV before bed. Whoops! Hang on, the TV did not work!
I am sure the microwave would have worked had it been there but alas only the instructions were left behind.
They thoughtfully did provide some glassware. A very nice matching set I must admit.
Another nice touch was the half bottle of ultimate repair and gloss treatment that was on the bench.
The highlight though was the bathroom. The tiling had obviously been done by a one armed Eskimo.
The mirror was, well look for yourself. I don’t even want to think what may have made those stains.
The best bit though was the actual toilet. It didn’t work. Yep that’s correct, no water in the cistern and yes I did check the tap and the valve.
Surprisingly I slept fairly well considering all of the above. Well I did until 5.30 am when the owner of the F150 truck parked outside my door decided it was time to start the day which began with warming up his engine for five minutes. I staggered from my bed with not much on and was halfway to use the toilet that didn’t work when who should burst into my room but the reception/cleaning lady!
Without blinking an eye at my immodesty she yells out loudly “you late! Everyone gone airport. You will miss plane. Hurry must!” I explained that I flew in last night and have no plans to fly out so soon. She apologised and said she thought I was a mine worker starting a new shift up north. I thanked her for her concern and continued on my way to the bathroom wondering all along how I was going to go about completing my morning ablutions.
*UPDATE*
September 11, 2012 at 1pm and the hotel is on fire. This photo is from 10 news. Reports coming in just now say that it is under control and no one was injured.
