JPG Magazine: Stories: Feature Story: Visiting Oma or the Adventures of the Girk Family while Travelling

Feature Story

Visiting Oma or the Adventures of the Girk Family while Travelling

The question is, did he get what he wanted?

By Klaus Girk

11 July 2008

It had been at least four years since my daughter saw her Oma, so my wife and I proposed to her that when she got home from college for the summer we take a short vacation to visit Oma in Tacoma, Washington. Kara agreed and told her boss that she would not be available until a later date in May and all was ready except what to do with two cats.

Minka the monster cat, who would take her? Sebastian the older of the two would stay with grandma and grandpa on the Western Slope. As the time to leave was nearing, no takers came forth to take Minka. Do we take her with us and have her escape from the cat carrier during the day while driving in the car, not an option even with tranquilizers she probably would not have done it, and what about the overnight stay on the way out and on the way home. She certainly could not stay with Oma as she has a dog that chases cats out of the yard. Who owes us enough to take the cat. Finally my niece stepped up to the plate and said that she would take her the ten days that we would be gone.

The trip is on and we head out to spend a night in Fruita, Colorado to drop off Sebastian with my in laws. We had made arrangements ahead of time that my daughter would stay at my Mom's house and my wife and I would get a handicap room at a nearby motel. We made the reservations and checked a couple of times to make sure that we would have a handicap room at our disposal.

Weather driving out was great except for a couple of thunderstorms and a bit of snow travelling over Snoqualmie Pass and then the rain came as we got close to Tacoma. As we drive up to the motel to check into our room we are informed they only have one handicap room and it is already taken and would not be available for a couple of days. Now I am normally pretty even tempered, but this really ticked me off especially since we had just again checked an confirmed that we had this room reserved and it was handicapped since my wife has special needs for this type of room. Now I have been in a car all day driving from Boise, Idaho and am in no mood to listen to this clerk tell me that they don't have the promised room for me. I tell them in no uncertain terms that this is totally unacceptable and that I had better not see any charge to my credit card for a service that could not be provided by a national chain hotel. Back to the car I go and give my wife the bad news. We drive a couple of miles further and I find an extended stay we had stayed at before and check and see if they had a handicap room available, they did and at a cheaper rate. We were a little concerned about this one as we did not like our previous stay, but we were assured that this was under new management and everything would be fine. So we check in go to our room and shortly after there is a knock on the door. Seems that the desk forgot to tell the painters that our room had been rented and that they had just painted the outside door which my daughter quickly found out as she had opened the door and had red paint on her hand.

Vacation is great and we get lots of photos around Tacoma and they have record temperatures for the season as normally my wife and daughter get cold up there due to the humidity. Only one day of rain after arrival, the rest of the time the weather is sunny and in the eighties which is really not normal in May.

Photos are a bit hazy around the waterfront and the ones of Rainier are skeptical due to the weather conditions. That was fine however, as other photos turned out great.

We had a nice visit with family members and it was nearing time to head home. On the last day my daughter started complaining about one of her eyes bothering her with itching and she tries a variety of eye drops to cure the problem, no help. Then takes out her contacts and uses her regular glasses, still no relief. So from the middle of the bridge as we are crossing the Columbia River my wife calls her eye doctor for a suggestion of what to do. The suggestion is that if the condition does not improve, stop by a local emergency room to see what is going on. Anyway as the day progresses things get a bit better as Kara sleeps most of the time in the car until it is time to stop again in Boise.

This was an interesting stop as we stay at the same motel for the night as we had stayed on the trip out and the room is fifty dollars higher than before and the clerk is not sure that they have a handicap room. I explain to him exactly which room we stayed in the week before and voila it is a handicap room and I can have for fifty dollars more. So my question to him was why am I paying fifty dollars more during the week when I stayed there a week before on the weekend and the cost was less. Well his explanation was that the rooms were higher during the week and it would also be an additional twenty dollars for the third person in the room which I was not charged before. To make a long story short I did weasel them down to an AARP rate which was acceptable.

So back to the eye thing. We woke up the next morning and headed out for Colorado and again Kara's eye is bothering her but she said that she can deal with it until we get to grandma's house in Fruita. Travel is pretty much uneventful until we get to Spanish Fork, Utah and decide on a late lunch at a fast food joint. We have our lunch and as we are about forty miles out of Spanish Fork my wife relates to me that she had used the restroom facilities in this fast food place and it was a good thing that Kara had been in with her as the toilet seat was loose and not connected to the floor. Now I can just imagine in my mind what would have happened if Kara had not been there. Anyway we continue on to Fruita and sure enough we end up going to the emergency room in a Grand Junction hospital and it is determined that Kara has a sty in the eye and it was good that we came in for treatment with anti biotics.

We pick up our cat and get home and everything is fine until Kara goes to pick up her cat at her cousins. Cat seem traumatized for having stayed with someone else, and the bottom line is she will never stay there again as we hear that the cat had destroyed the cousins home (not really true) but it makes for good telling.

The bottom line after all this rambling is make sure that you have proper reservations and that things work out they way they should as they don't for us anymore without some kind of adventure. Sometime down the road I will tell you about our adventure to Monument Valley, Grand Canyon, Lake Powell, and Bryce Canyon, but that is for another time.

I did contact the fast food chain restaurant and got an instant reply to my concern but no follow up. Also contacted the hotel chain and did not get any reply from them. I guess my message here is, do not be afraid to take them on as they are the ones wanting you to stay or eat with them and you are spending your hard earned dollars and should be able to expect acceptable service.

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