Class Act

From our high-priced, classy balcony at the Hilton Waikoloa.

I need to travel for a while with someone who has some class. No offense to the wonderful people I've been traveling with, but mostly we're rural hicks. (Brent claims he's not rural, he's a suburban hick.)

This is not an issue for the kind of traveling I usually do . . . driving around seeing the sights and enjoying it all. But we had an experience with the Hilton Waikoloa yesterday that was really stressful.

This is how it happened: By Friday we had seen all the sights in Hilo. We still had a day left at Kipa Hou Mai, but we decided we'd hit the road and do something different for Saturday night. On Friday afternoon I got online and found the Hilton Waikoloa, which promised to be an enriching Disneylandish experience. I filled out the information for a reservation online, clumsily typing on my laptop which was perched on a high kitchen counter. When I received a confirmation email 5 minutes later I saw a mistake. I had typed in 14 instead of 13 for the date.

No problem, I thought. I promptly dialed the number for the reservation desk.

I was on hold for 25 minutes. Even the happy Hawaiian tunes were starting to get irritating.

So I hung up and dialed the hotel operator instead. She connected me to a real person right away. This person, who had a very thick accent that was not Hawaiian, told me her name was "Jane." I told Jane what the problem was. She said, "I can give you a reservation for the 13th, but you'll have to pay for the 14th also."

Huh? What? I said, "I'm sorry, I misunderstood you. Could you please repeat what you just said?"

She repeated the story. The reason, she said, is that Hilton has a policy of no changes within 72 hours of the reservation date. Since my original reservation was only 48 hours away, I'd have to pay for it in addition to the amended reservation.

I said, "Well, that's totally unacceptable. Can you recommend someone else I can talk to?"

Nope, no deal, there was no getting around the gatekeeper. So I told her to make the reservation for the 13th and that perhaps the person at the check-in desk would have a better grasp of reality. And then I started practicing my story. It was easy because it was the truth and I was enflamed with self-righteous indignation,

A classy, savvy traveler with a Hilton Honors Gold Card would not have worried all night about this. I did.

When we got to the hotel a fellow met us in front of the door. "Do you want a valet to park your car?" he asked. "Uh. I dunno. Do I? What do you recommend?" He recommended that I should give him the keys and let him hide the car away from us so when we got hungry later that night and were put off by the high food prices at the hotel we wouldn't be able to just jump in the car and drive to McDonalds.

No, he really didn't SAY that, but that's what actually happened.

In the back of the car, in the teeny cargo area, was all our luggage. On top of that, loosely tossed in, were several bags full of the stuff we'd bought to stock our rentals: toilet paper, laundry soap, groceries, things like that. When the valet opened the back door to help us remove our luggage (so he could get tipped for his helpfulness, I think) the bags started falling out all over the fancy driveway. I was so embarrassed I walked off to the check-in desk with the car keys still in my pocket. The valet had to hunt for me. I gave him the keys. He gave me a claim ticket. I promptly lost the claim ticket as I stood in line, practicing my check-in story. But I didn't realize that yet,

The lovely lady who checked us in said there was no problem, we had a reservation for one night only and she'd be happy to upgrade it to a very expensive suite for only $99. We did that, in a move reminiscent of The Beverly Hillbillies.

We traveled on a hotel tram for many miles. Well, maybe only a half mile, but the tram was slow. When we finally found the room, I was so happy to just be in the right place I didn't leave it all night. The boys, of course, got our money's worth out of the facilities. They swam in every pool, used all the equipment, went bar-hopping, and came in very late. We had bed space for everyone but Bob made himself comfortable on a lounge out on the balcony. Alex pulled his rollaway bed halfway onto the balcony. Luckily there was a solid wall around it so our classy neighbors could not see the camping arrangements.

The next morning I got up early to find the vaunted breakfast buffet. Had to ride the tram again to get there. That early in the morning, it was full of Japanese tourists. I love them. Everyone is more polite when there are a lot of Japanese tourists around.

I embarrassed myself at breakfast. At the entrance everyone was going down a huge staircase and around a corner. There was an elevator nearby, and to avoid tripping down the stairs and possibly wiping out several petite Japanese on the way, I took it instead. When I got out of the elevator, I was right in front of the buffet table. I grabbed a plate and filled it up. Then I noticed that there were waitresses seating other people BEFORE they got their plates. Uh oh. I walked around the corner with my plate and there were easily 100 people in line, waiting to be seated.

I put in my name. I stood in line 30 minutes to get a table. By then I'd eaten all my bacon and pineapple (in front of the other people) with my fingers. I didn't need a table, I just needed a bill. To their credit, all the employees were very kind to me. They treated me as you would a demented aunt, perhaps.

When the bill came, I found that I'd paid $25 for 4 slices of bacon and 2 slices of fresh pineapple. An experienced customer of luxury hotels would have known all this and not been shocked.

We checked out later in the morning. I went up to the valet parking desk and pulled out a piece of paper and handed it to the attendant. She looked puzzled. "That's a tag for your luggage," she said. "I need your valet parking receipt." Uh oh. Again. I tipped the valet generously when he finally found our car and brought it to us.

When we finally got out of there, we stopped at the first Denny's we found. All 4 guys ate breakfast there for about the same as I had paid at the wondrous Hilton Waikoloa. The bathrooms were dirty. The waitress forgot half the order. Ah yes! We were back in familiar territory.