Reserve Your Judgement Rachel

I didn't even want to go. Not to be ungrateful but a weekend to Manchester with 3 boys isn't exactly the way I would choose to spend my time. Alex and his 2 friends had planned this trip a while back and as great as they are, I didn't really want to be the only girl. Alex sorted the accommodation, checked the train times and planned an area of Manchester to go drinking. All I had to do was book Pippin into the cattery and pack a bag. I love Manchester. I love spending time there and I love the people. We took the train on Saturday and then hopped on the tram to the area where we would be staying. I knew it wasn't going to be 5 star material from the fact that we paid £34 each but it was described on Air B&B as a 'Victorian welcoming warm comfortable home'. I decided to reserve judgement until I saw it in person. Walking up the path there was an upturned mop bucket and mop head and 3 doormats, all different and one on each step leading up to the 'paint-peeled' front door. Reserve your judgement Rachel. Alex knocked and a pale student opened the door and in complete silence gestured for us to go up the stairs. I stepped across 5 more doormats in the dark hallway and followed the guys up the creaky stairs past square canvases of various cats and kittens with tutus and feather boas. Reserve your judgement Rachel. The owner greeted us from the doorway to a untidy room and made a point of saying, 'Oh so there is a female, gosh how are you going to manage these 3?' *shocked face* Reserve your judgement Rachel. She showed us to a bedroom at the end of the landing which contained 2 single beds and in the centre a double bed. I looked at Alex with horror. We were sharing? Wait...WHAT? That was it. My judgement went out of the rooms unclean, smeared window!

There was 2 grandma armchairs side by side, a university student desk with a fruit bowl on top (all the fruit was dusty and had gone soft), a skinny table with crochet table cloth, a bedding box with an assortment of towels on top, a fireplace complete with blue bathroom pedal bin, some strange paintings above the beds and a wardrobe which you couldn't get to because of where the beds were. The fire had been tiled over with gaudy green and blue tiles and I am convinced the curtains where actually plastic shower curtains. The beds where made up in a mix of children's bedding and granny chic.

The bathroom and toilet were separate and there is no wonder they were not photographed for Air B&B. The shower was over a grimy bath with a thin plastic curtain across it. I assume that the bathroom was shared between the ground floor guests, us and the second floor guests. I will be honest I don't know how many people were staying in the house or how high the stairs went but I assume it didn't get any cleaner the higher you went. There were half empty bath products across each surface coupled with long black hairs, spilt toothpaste and rust. My feet stuck to the floor as I tried to seek refuge to have some kind of privacy from the guys. 

It was horrible. The whole thing was horrible. Grimy, unclean, dirty and just gross. 'Warm comfortable home my arse!' I felt unclean just standing still in the bedroom. The sooner we could leave the better. So I got dolled up and attempted to put a smile on my face so I didn't ruin the trip.

The night out was great. We went to a burger bar for tea which was delicious...and clean. We then went to an Irish bar where there was live music and whiskeys aplenty...and it was clean. We ventured to the Northern Quarter and visited a bar called Tusk and Walrus....which was relatively clean. We then went to a geeky place called Fab where I danced bare foot in my jumpsuit to Rainbow and even on those floors... it felt clean. But at 3 in the morning, heading back to the house Kim and Agi must have missed sobered me up completely. I got into my pajamas ensuring my pants were tucked into my socks and crawled into the double bed which Alex had checked for hairs, fluff, dirt and spiders. I had a little cry and then fell asleep with sore feet, a headache and nerves over what the next day would bring.

The next day couldn't come quickly enough and unfortunately I couldn't avoid the shower. It was the worst and stepping out over the side of the bath tub onto the pink shag pile bathmat gave me goosebumps. I got ready as quickly as possible in order to escape. I could take no more and it was even worse when hungover with an empty stomach. Safe to say the whole experience was not worth the £132.03 Alex paid. In fact I am shocked and if I was in charge I would have asked for a full refund, hopped back on the tram to the nearest Premier Inn and started the weekend over. Needless to say Alex has has been banned from booking any and all accommodation when we both go away, unless he discusses it with me first.

To make the whole weekend worse we had to catch a coach back home because none of the trains were running. One of the worst weekends for a while.

Love

Blue Sky

You get what you pay for

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