Priceline Hotel: 3* Baltimore South (Hanover-Fort Meade) Aloft Arundel Mills

[trflyer]

Bidding through this site, with only one day in advance, first bid higher than usual, $50, for Columbia, MD North (a new PRICELINE zone for Columbia, MD) and was rejected! Ok, since time was short and I really needed a win, I expanded my bid to include BWI Airport but I lowered it to $48 and won the Aloft at Arundel Mills -a hotel totally unknown to me.

After looking it up online, it said Aloft was a fun new Starwood chain. Before bidding I never knew of this place. I had always thought that 3 stars meant a restaurant on the premises---hmmm apparently PRICELINE has changed that requirement to include "on site dining" which does not mean a restaurant and does mean a vending area somewhere on the premises. This must be a concession to include ever crappier hotels in ever higher rankings.

In my view, this facility is an unmitigated disaster of a hotel and total dump. Sheraton must have been out of their minds creating a chain of hotels with the lobby being a loud, public disco with a filthy concrete floor, nonstop annoying disco music, garish lights and colors and stinking spray scent throughout the hotel 24/7 (yes, the music and lighting and stink was nonstop even 8am Sunday morning). Every night the parking lot was full with public clubbers -- the lobby was an inner city rap club-just the place you want to relax and rest at after 8 hours flying transatlantic and jetlagged, let alone come with your wife and kids. The room itself was actually not bad but it was overshadowed by everything else.

Googling "Aloft Arundel Mills shooting" will inform that people were shot and stabbed in this hotel's lobby earlier this year. I am appalled that PRICELINE would put me in such a place.

[thereuare]

Thank you for sharing your results with the board.

Sorry to hear you didn't enjoy your stay and this chain's theme didn't meet your needs for this stay.

Please use the PRICELINE and HOTWIRE links on the board to begin your travel purchases.

Hope your future stays are more to your liking.