Motel 6

 

We have been spending lots of money recently, and we cannot move into our new house until Thursday, so we decided to stay somewhere cheap for a few days. Motel 6 in Bernalillo fits the bill.

I have stayed in Motel 6 before, and I really don't mind. If I am travelling by myself, I am happy to stay at one, because they are cheap. You sleep, you take a shower, you leave.

Another thing, this is definitely not the worst motel ever. That was the Best Western in Bishop, California. Jackie and I managed to go to sleep that night to the sound of crickets chirping, crickets that sounded like they were in the room with us, but I assumed were just outside our door. In the middle of the night, I woke up and started hunting them down, and it turned out they were in fact in the room. I killed about eight of them and took them to the manager, who nonchalantly told me they went into the rooms when it was hot. No big deal.

I did not tell Jackie about the one I found in the bed until we were well down the road. So that motel was the worst.

The one we are in now might take second place to the Bishop Best Western. Where to begin? Well, it is on the northern edge of north Bernalillo, which is a suburb north of Albuquerque. North of here is nothing, so we are on the edge of the wilderness. Freeway on one side, train tracks on the other. Beyond the train tracks, miles of scrub, hills in the distance. No one even uses the road in front of the motel. Arlo and I have taken several walks along the road, and we have seen three trucks and one car pass the motel in three days. Anyone who comes this far stops at the Motel 6, because there is nothing else down this road. In fact, there is nothing else on this road in either direction, except the gas station and attached store next door, but that is shuttered and looks like it has been deteriorating for a long time.

OK, that's not so terrible, what else? There is no place in the bathroom to place any bathroom stuff. I balanced my toothbrush and toothpaste on the back of the sink - no room for anything else. On the back of the toilet is a roll of toilet paper and some drinking cups(!) They brought me a shower curtain after we checked in, and I hung it myself. The handle on the shower that controls the water temperature is missing, but there is a plastic piece that goes behind the handle that I was able to turn. They don't serve breakfast. There are no comfortable chairs, just two wooden ones that might remind you of high school. The key entry to the outside door nearest our room does not work. We don't have enough electrical outlets to charge both phones at once. They are remodeling while we stay here, and as a result, the water was turned off for several hours, then rust poured out when it restarted.

The bed is comfortable enough though, and we will be fine for the next three nights. We got the keys to our house today and set up Internet. We have signed our lease, paid our rent, contacted utilities, arranged for a house cleaning, POD delivery, and moving help. Tomorrow, we will visit the water company.

We are getting close, so close.