The Weekend Vacation – Part 4, The Nightmare Apartment

After our cheap selves got of the tuk-tuk, we entered the Mangro hotel where we had booked an apartment (or so we thought). We all took a few seconds to appreciate the awesome view that welcomed us. It was the perfect picture of what I thought Diani looked like. Here is a picture. Forgive the poor quality, I was too busy being happy to stop to take a decent picture.

The Front View Mangro Hotel

There was also a swimming pool next to the path. It already seemed to be the start of a good weekend.

The front view swimming pool

We walked to reception happily. We couldn’t wait to get to the awesome apartment we had booked. Little did we know that we were about to get the shock of our lives.

I greeted the pretty lady at the reception and this is how that conversation went.

Me: Hi, My name is <puts official name here>

Me: I booked an apartment here, we should check in today.

Receptionist: Are you sure?

Me: Yes (I say confidently, quickly getting my phone to check the details)

Receptionist: Did you book Mangro Hotel or H&M Mangro?

Me: H&M

Receptionist: Well that is not us (She says pointing to a door to her right). The ones you are looking for are over there.

Receptionist: Did you talk to a guy called James?

Me: Yes

At this point I began to realise we may have been misled, the only consolation was that we had not paid upfront. In fact, the receptionist went ahead to tell me that the apartment I had booked is not part of the property. I called James who told me that a lady would come to show us to our apartment. We were tired and we needed to sit and the said apartments did not have a reception desk. I politely asked the receptionist I had been talking to if it was okay to sit in their lobby. Since she was a polite person, so she let us wait there.

Me being the self-conscious person I am at times, I started to feel awkward. So I told my pals that we should just go wait outside the apartments so that we could look less like aliens.

As we were walking towards the apartment, the receptionist called me and told me that they had one available apartment. She said we could check it out and see if we prefer that one. I told her that we would wait for the lady to show us the one we had booked. Completely out of courtesy. She told me that we could look and compare once we see both. So that’s what we did. The apartment was awesome and the price range was the same as the one we booked.

When she asked if we would take it we told her that we would tell her our decision once we saw the other one.

When we went back, the lady who was supposed to show us the booked apartment had arrived. After exchanging greetings, she took us to the apartment. To say that we were shocked would be an understatement of the century.

The apartment was just two adjacent rooms with a bed each, one bathroom and kitchen was outside. The bedrooms were small. Additionally, there was no living room as advertised. The TV might have been smaller than my laptop. Needless to say, there was no comparing the two.

It was clear that the owner greatly exaggerated the property on booking.com. As a matter of fact, the swimming pool he had mentioned was owned by the hotel and we would have to pay to access it.

I told the lady that we would not take it. At this point she tried to get me to check out their other property at God knows where. I also spoke to James and told him that we would not be checking in.

At that point, we walked back to the Mangro Hotel reception desk to book the awesome apartment we have seen earlier. We got lucky that it was low season. Otherwise, we would have had to stay in the nightmare apartment or start hunting for any other available hotel.

This is the fourth part of the weekend vacation series. Previous – The Weekend Vacation – Part 3, Moving From Mombasa to Diani. Next – The Weekend Vacation – Part 5, The Awesome Apartment