Author:
Date of purchase: 10 june 2011 Written: 07 july 2011 |
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Travel agency: Гал-Круиз (Lviv) Service type: отель, оформление визы |
The polite and pleasant voice of a young man, who was heard in the telephone receiver, warmly recommended to me the TopHotel 4 *, for accommodation in which (5 nights, a room for 2 people) I paid 395 euros. The last argument in favor of the arguments of a pleasant voice was the photo of the room on the hotel website.
On 23.06 at the airport I was met by a representative of the tour operator and taken to the long-awaited hotel…
Here the most interesting began. At the reception, they sent me to a strange annex with a booth and gave me the key to the room on the 7th floor. Entering the elevator with me, my inner voice encountered shabby panels and a strange stench, after which he began to whisper softly that there was no smell. But wild fatigue and photographs in the booklet warmed in me hope for long-awaited comfort.
Having opened the number and combed my hair on my head, I don’t like it when they stand on end, I realized what the word means - to become stupefied. From what he saw, the attempt to put his hair in order lost all meaning. My hair bristled like a frightened cat, and my inner voice choked in mid-sentence.
Three mattresses on wooden legs, which look like they were neglected even by bedbugs, were randomly placed under the walls. A chair, something that looked like a table (or maybe it was a shelf with legs), and tulle with curtains from my grandmother's time made up the rest of this simple furniture of the "allegedly 4 * hotel."
This epic still life was completed by cracked plaster on the wall and rags 40x20 cm, which proudly pretended to be towels. Listening to myself, I realized that my hair had already begun to move, and my inner voice, in wild indignation, choked on the phrase: “I told you so!”
I may seem like a masochist to you, but a feeling of morbid curiosity pushed me into the bathroom. Since the inner voice was still in shock, he could not stop me ... In the bathroom there were: a rotten shower curtain, a cabinet, a toilet bowl and an unpleasant smell, and an unpleasant smell was the basis of the composition.
At that moment, I felt the hair on my head want to do what should have been done back in the elevator - RUN!
"Horror, nightmare, what a disgusting thing!" – shouted my indignant inner voice. Within a minute, my trembling fingers were picking up the Ukrainian “pleasant voice” of Gal-Kruiz. After 2.5 hours, an already absolutely cold, metallic voice offered me to spend the night in this room until they come up with something (I forgot to say that I had a romantic trip, and I didn’t buy a room in a 4 * hotel in vain). I did not respond to the “offer”, in principle.
According to the representative of Gal-Cruise, the reason for such a misunderstanding with the number lay in the failure of the electronic booking. Although at the reception, an employee of this "allegedly 4 * hotel" secretly told me that some woman who came here a day before my arrival had paid for my room in cash.
This means that there could be no accident in the failure of the reservation, as they tried to explain to me later.
At this time… We are still at the Top Hotel, where there were no available rooms at all. My inner voice, which had lost the power of speech, surrendered its last frontiers and was doomedly silent in the depths of me.
After a long debate with the Czech and Ukrainian sides, I moved to the Julis Hotel on Wenceslas Square, in the very heart of Prague. It was a fabulous night.
Second day. At 9 am, a taxi was waiting for us and transported us to the already hated TopHotel. It was ordered to leave things at the reception and go for a walk in the city until 14.00. Since the rooms are being cleaned, and they cannot accommodate us. Also, I was strongly asked to sign a handwritten A4 paper that the number I was given was 4 * (well, I knew).
The room was provided with a hole in the bathroom door, two beds, two bedside tables with broken lamps and a TV. After one such romantic night, my companion could not stand it. He asked for finally a normal number.
To which he was immediately informed that if we pay extra 85 euros for the remaining 3 nights, we will be transferred to the “superiumroom” and we will “live” like a king!
They say that in any barrel of honey, there will definitely be a fly in the ointment. So, in our Prague barrel, there was a spoonful of nasty Ukrainian tar with the name "Gal Cruise".
Moral: Traveling with a Gal-Cruise is like paying for a new Toyota and getting a battered Cossack.
If you ever travel to Prague avoid the Gal Cruise office at all costs and you won't have to regret your money and the precious time you could spend in this ancient city.