WORLD TRAVEL MARKET, BEST BUDGET HOTELS & IBIS

Budget Hotels - IBIS EXPRESS and more
The Charms of the East London Edexcel Location

The World Travel Market moves with the times and years ago it was at Kensington Olympia but it is now held at Edexcel on the Docklands Light Railway. It looks new and exciting.

East London is great if you are travelling into the City Airport, although not for me. East London was probably cheaper at first for the organisers, it's bringing heart-warming life to an area which needed redeveloping and big signs show Arab countries investment but the location still seems worryingly inconvenient to travel agents and the travel writing press like me travelling from West or North West London in the Heathrow direction.

The show used to have major events for the press all week but now the big day is the opening day starting with breakfast at 9 am. How do you avoid the stress and risk of a late arrival after travelling 2 hours with waits and delays at three or more train interchanges?

My policy as a travel writer, tourist and Anxious Angela is always to arrive the night before - as I do on site at my Writers' Holiday in Caerleon, Wales. Airports often have a hotel attached. Every conference centre should have an attached hotel, or two or three, like shopping malls in South Africa.

For WTM I want a budget hotel nearby 'my' WTM.

So what are the overnight options? The hotels increase their prices if they are alongside a conference centre during a conference and are also fully booked. I was quoted more than £200 a night. (without breakfast and wifi which is £10 a day and you have to organise it yourself with the whole hassle of passwords and not getting a connection for half an hour of the one hour you want to use it. I was considering Sunday to THURSDAY.  For that money I could have paid for a taxi home to cart my clobber.

IBIS and Budget hotels

So I looked into the value for money IBIS hotels. I logged onto the WTM site and the IBIS hotel next to the conference centre had a room. I left my computer for a minute to discuss my budget 'one night or three?' But by the time I got back the room had gone!
The rooms were available and not available, like traffic lights. That's because you, the customer can book and cancel if you change your mind or change your plans. Until 2 pm on the day of arrival.

The advertised rate of a modest £49 on the website had shot up to £99 for a hotel some distance away. I booked three nights.

Then I phoned to check the hotel's nearness to the station. Nowhere near walking distance to the conference centre. You need a cab. I hate relying on cabs.

When my father phoned to say my mother was dying in hospital in 2005 it was raining and I tried to book a cab. I called six companies. Eventually I booked a cab. But it arrived 20 minutes later than it promised, firstly because of bad weather - and secondly it had diverted to fill up with petrol.
By the time I reached hospital mother was unconscious, my woebegone father gasping, 'Why are you so late?'

Now I'd rather have the second option of walking to the station. My London base is near the station. I chose to live near a station. When mother died I had to cancel a press trip to Nottingham. Now I read that they are planning a huge Robin Hood attraction opening 2015. But that's far in the future. What's in my mind? Don't rely on a cab.

Planning is all. One reason why people are late is that they are over-optimistic about travel times. Canny interviewees check journeys. Drive to your job interview destination the night before. Some people drive to check the venue of Harrovians Speakers Club of which I am president. I know Edexcel but not the Ibis hotel.

We drive to my chosen Ibis hotel the week before. I imagined East Barking would be a run-down high street dodging drunks and down and outs. No way. It is on a motorway, with a pavement beside the noise and pollution, in a cluster of three or four budget hotels, two branches of the IBIS and the one I pull into is the IBIS Express.

A very helpful front desk man tells me the cab is only £5 and you don't need to tip. I am almost tempted to switch to this place. However, no way can I walk from here.

He is able to find me a hotel nearer Excel conference centre, the City Airport. We drive there.

Quiet location of industrial estates and high rise offices and modern apartments. Not exactly a bustling shopping centre with cafes and pubs and shop windows  displaying quirky goods. But next door to a Costa which stocks my favourite almond bake slice. Long walk to the DLR but easy to find your way under the DLR to the the station. One interchange on the DLR. I book one night.

The smiling receptionist warns that people stay a night and want to stay on but the hotel is booked. I ask here to cancel my other booking but she can't. No way am I booking a second hotel in the same group when I am committed to more than £300 for another and her hotel can't sort it out.

I email the cancellation but get no reply. I shall phone them.

Then I'm off to 'my' new IBIS. What shall I pack? Not too much. No room for a nightdress. They won't have a bathrobe at a budget hotel. Costa next door supplies breakfast if I'm up before the press breakfast or can't wait until I get to the press centre.

What about breakfast in the room. A tin of prunes? Must be self opening. Try Morrisons. Oh, forget that. Since my IBIS Express hotel visit I now have the IBIS booklet showing all their hotels. Happy reading.

If you've any suggestions, please contact me
annalondon8@gmail.com

http://www.wtmlondon.com/ (Home page of World Travel Market 2012 at Edexcel lists all the events)