As I exited Highway 385 and onto the highway leading to Alliance, Nebraska, I knew my usual preference would not be available.
Along this trek north from the U.S.-Mexico border toward Alaska, I’ve stayed in motoring inns, bed-and-breakfasts, family hotels, and occasionally an old motoring trail that looked like it was built before Eisenhower signed the interstate bill. They were not modern. Some bowed slightly. Check out cxv6. Some had rugs that had been through history. But they were clean. The showers worked. The owners were present. The arithmetic was simple: modest price, functional service.
The Alliance, at least as I faced it that afternoon, did not present that option.
Instead, on the other side of the street were two hotel chains facing each other.
On the left was the renowned brand. Bright lighting. Safe landscaping. The kind of exterior maintenance that suggests routine inspections and consistent payroll. I didn’t need to ask about the fee. I could see it shining on the sign.
On the right was the budget alternative. Less lit. Less cured. The type of establishment that signals economy before you enter the lobby.
As a hiker, I distinguish between want and need. I don’t need marble counters. I need hot water and a horizontal surface. Every dollar kept for lodging is a dollar available for food, fuel, or morale.
So I chose the budget hotel.
It seemed sensible.
It wasn’t.
I approached the most obvious door, framed in neon, only to find a taped-up sign directing me to use the other door.
The alternate entry featured hardware secured by multiple layers of tape where screws had apparently become loose. Inside, the door refused to close without anyone prompting it. The lobby was unattended. A sign on the counter said they were not there and to call a number for help.
I called. After several minutes, hurried footsteps emerged from somewhere beyond the visible facility. A man appeared and informed me, without being asked, that his rates were lower than the hotel across the street. We negotiate. A two-night discount was secured. I congratulated myself on fiscal prudence.
A solid economic policy.
Upstairs, the key card didn’t work. I went down, called the number again, it was reactivated, I went up again.
The door opened.
The first thing I did was turn on the light switch.
Nothing happened.
Promising start.
The blinds were closed and the room remained in darkness. It was unclear whether the light bulbs were burned out, the lamps unplugged or if something else in the electrical chain had failed. However, no light was immediately available.
As my eyes adjusted, I began to notice dark shapes along the perimeter of the room, where the wall met the floor.
Flies.
Don’t fly. Without moving. Lining the edges.
Dead.
As he walked towards the window, their number increased. When I opened the blinds, the scale became unmistakable.
My sister has had horses for years. I have seen what abandonment looks like in a barn if the traps are not changed. This rivaled that. The floor along the walls did not appear to have been included in the last cleaning cycle.
An entomological exposition, apparently complementary.
I stood there for a moment.
But he had negotiated a rate. I sleep in the wind. I filter water. Surely I could handle a budget hotel.
I turned toward the shower, which I had anticipated for days.
The good news: it was hot.
The bad news: it was exclusively hot.
Turning the lever toward cold only produced a more assertive form of scalding. The dial did not regulate the temperature.
I developed a technique: apply shampoo, remove, quickly submerge myself under the almost scalding stream, remove, repeat.
While performing this tactical operation, I noticed that the bathroom fan above me was emitting a constant hum: the sound of mechanical ambition without mechanical performance. It vibrated but never activated. Looking up, I saw what can only be described as a civilization of fluff. The vent looked like the lint trap on a dorm dryer that hasn’t been cleaned since freshman orientation. It is suspected that the fan motor has long since stopped working.
The towels, once white, had matured into a historic cream color.
The sink produced several seconds of hollow air before the water arrived: the sound of pipes returning to duty.
The toilet required approximately twenty seconds of sustained leverage before agreeing to flush. It was less plumbing than resistance training.
I turned on the heating and cooling unit. The fan responded by blowing dust lint onto my freshly cleaned person. It was an efficient reversal of the shower.
The refrigerator, where I intended to store milk purchased at the nearby dollar store for a bowl of Lucky Charms the next morning, was unplugged. The freezer had defrosted and was dripping silently onto the bottom shelf. I plugged it in and hoped the milk would survive the experiment.
Lucky Charms deserved better odds.
Finally, I lay down on the bed, grabbed the remote control, and turned on the TV.
No signal.
Naturally.
I later found out that the cable was cut in all the rooms. This information had not been disclosed at the time of check-in. Guests were expected to discover it independently.
As I lay there reconsidering my life choices, I noticed movement on the ground: a respectable-sized beetle, very much alive. I made a private decision: one more question and I would visit the secretary again.
Seconds later, a larger beetle appeared.
The ledger was balanced.
I went down and calmly but unequivocally outlined the flies, the ventilation, the cooling span, the plumbing negotiations and the residence of the insects. It must be admitted that he offered me another room next to the one I had just occupied.
When he handed me the new key card, he asked me if I needed anything else.
My first impulse was to order a vacuum cleaner and a pair of latex gloves. And possibly a containment unit.
Instead, I thanked him.
I briefly considered that if conditions warranted it, I could always go back to the dollar store and buy a broom and dustpan.
So I packed my bags again.
There is something uniquely humiliating about relocating the entire house twelve feet high.
Room two improved statistically. The fly population decreased from thousands to hundreds. The shower recognized both hot and cold water. The bathroom finally obeyed. One lamp had a burned out bulb. Another operated only when the cable was not crushed under the bed frame.
It was better.
Not much better.
Incremental progress.
I examined the coffee maker and decided not to use it. The packages next to him looked like something the dollar store might have rejected. The microwave invited a similar precaution.
So I did what I had done for months in the wilderness: I turned on my isobutane stove and made coffee in a titanium pot, inside the hotel room.
In my store I have never encountered such entomological enthusiasm. On the outside, my systems had been predictable. Here, inside, I found myself employing off-piste protocols: isolating surfaces, managing risks, creating a clean zone.
When it was time for bed, I inserted my sleeping bag between the fitted sheet and the duvet and slept inside it, having no desire to become a future health department article on the nightly news about bed bugs.
Preventive measures seemed prudent.
Every piece of backpacking gear found a renewed purpose inside.
The hotel across the street had asked for more money.
He had asked for less and then silently charged in other currencies: time, comfort, hygiene, patience.
Economics distinguishes between price and cost. The price is what you pay at the counter. The cost is what accrues afterward.
Thomas Sowell once wrote in his column «Hotels and Inconveniences»: «Nothing elegant is worth the inconvenience.»
In this case there were no luxuries.
There was only the inconvenience.
And just before turning off the light, I noticed an envelope on the nightstand that said: “Thank you for staying with us.”
Inside was a polite request to leave a tip for the housekeeper who had worked diligently to make my stay pleasant. The housekeeper’s name line was blank. good call. The envelope showed a prominent tea stain and fragility from repeated use.
The invitation seemed ambitious.
Hikers, then, would do well to remember that price and cost are not synonymous, and to reconsider accommodation when the price seems unusually good.
-Inside
