Travel Tricks 3: Hunger Pangs

I’ve shared a few hotel experiences in my last post, but I did not mention that I have a few times arrived at hotel after midnight to find no restaurant open and no vending machines on my floor. Many times, I have been lucky enough to stay in hotels with good restaurants or with chains I like within walking distance. I’ve also been at ones where I had to go several miles to “downtown” to get something to eat or settle for stale looking options in vending machines. I really like ones where they provide some sort of breakfast as this saves me having to spend time before an engagement looking for a place to eat. I have also been in a few hotels where the summer heat resulted in ice machines that contained water or were empty.

Have you ever gotten any of those airport food vouchers when having unexpected layovers? I have a few times and it’s better than no food at all! I’ve been in a few airports so small they had no café or public vending machines. Those are the times I was grateful I went ahead and took the offered snack of airline pretzels or nuts.

What did I learn? Always carry at least 2 energy bars (1 for trip to and another for return). And always buy a bottle of water or drink at airport once past security. Yes, it cost more than at the local station or 7/11, but you can’t bring those through security anymore plus it will be a lot less than what the bottles in most hotel rooms will cost when you arrive at your destination.

I have never had anyone other than airline personnel offer me food when I was hungry. However I have had other passengers show me kindness in other ways. I’ll let you know more about that in my next post.