There's been a tremendous amount of talk lately among various travel outlets about hotel rooms. Not the rooms themselves, mind you (though that's always important), but the views out the windows.
Ostensibly, all the chatter is linked to the arrival of Room77.com, a California-based Web site that purports to show you what you'll be looking at from the window in your accommodations, thus helping you choose a specific floor or even a room when you book. You put in your specs and the site creates a virtual shot of the view. There's also an iPhone app that lets you know on the spot (read: at check-in) what to expect when you open the door, thus allowing you to request an immediate room change and negating that annoying trip back to the front desk.
It's all very cool, and very much in the nascent stages. Only three-star hotels and above will be offered, and only 16 cities are represented so far (though that translates to a rather impressive 425,000 rooms). You can't book directly on the site yet, but that's reportedly going to change soon. All in all, it has the potential to be a powerful force once it catches on — and it's great fun playing around on the site to see how it measures up at hotels where you've already stayed (I, for one, am mightily impressed by its accuracy).
For its part, USA Today conducted a recent poll asking readers if they cared to see the view from their hotel room prior to arrival. A whopping 88 percent indicated that they would.
I wonder: What's up with the 12 percent who don't?
A huge fan of hotels, I'm always a bit anxious at check-in, as much over the quality of the room as the scene on the other side of the glass. My strategy to avoid disappointment? I always ask for a room on an upper floor. Even if the hotel is three stories, it'll keep me from being at eye level with the Winnebago in the parking lot or the kids racing around the pool. I also routinely request a "quiet" spot, which means nowhere near the ice machine or elevator bank, and away from the main drag.
That backfires on occasion, inasmuch as the dumpster is usually out back, leading to a fair (unfair?) share of garbage-filled vistas. And there's no accounting for construction eyesores (which even Room 77 may not be able to avert). Once in Las Vegas, I was psyched to get a suite near the peak of the Venetian, a soaring monolith on the Strip. But when I got to the room and opened up the curtains, a giant crane was swinging a girder bound for the Palazzo, the sister resort under construction next door.
Room 77 wouldn't have done much to help ward off the worst view I've ever had, at a bed and breakfast in Chincoteague, Va. Promising a "waterfront location," the inn was actually plunked in the parking lot of a neighboring marina. A huge truck for storing fish — with a bellowing refrigeration unit that ran 24/7 — sat about 10 feet outside my window. When I asked to move, the only other choice was ... the other side of the truck. I stayed put and kept the shades drawn.