Here is a helpful tip. It has nothing to do with Abbotsford, so let me tell you this first. A Rough Guide author I met at a party told me that the Abbotsford Inn (now the City Edge Motel) in Langridge St, far too close to Hoddle St and our only non-pub accommodation as far as I know, was one of the worst hotels he had ever stayed in. He had just finished a guide on a South East Asian country. The internet, where he got onto the accommodation, suggests they charge $145 a night on weekends.
Ah the hazards of choosing hotels from afar. You go with the place that sounds brilliant in the 18 month old Lonely Planet only to find them resting heavily on their laurels, or to find that you are at a squat with a check-in desk also named the Original Old Yogi Inn which pays the rickshaw twice the commission of the original Original Old Yogi Inn: the Lonely Planet Effect. So you turn to the internet in search of that overlooked little gem.What the internet has been sadly lacking is a way to bypass the thousands of hotel booking sites all of which seem just as dodgy as each other, and take advice from a trustworthy international source. Tripadvisor is getting there and its readers send in photos of rooms they’ve stayed in which is handy, Expedia is comprehensive at least, and Lonely Planet’s Thorntree bulletin board is good, though it takes a bit of effort for the uninitiated. The Guardian‘s website’s nascent “Been There” is already great (it got me to this wonderful place).
But now Lonely Planet’s website’s Worldguide has accommodation listings for selected tourist centres. Small and crumblingly colonial hotels are featured, some of which fly under the radar of the internet. I love it.
There are three books about hotels I plan to publish. The first, aimed at the Arabian Gulf market will be called Sheik Chic. The second will be a glossy coffee table book dedicated to charming tiny little family run hotels without televisions. The third would be the world’s worst hotels; what a joy that would be.
The photo is of one of 4 rooms at Cilik’s Beach Garden on Bali’s North Coast, stolen from I’ve Been to Bali Too.