I stayed 4 nights at the downtown Hilton in Salt Lake City …

You know the quotation I always attribute to Conrad: “The rich deserve to be fleeced for their arrogance and vanity.” It’s true. He built an empire on it.

(Too bad my message from Conrad was not passed forward to his great-granddaughter.)

Leaving the Hilton, I was looking forward to better accommodation.

Having stayed in hostels in over 30 countries worldwide, the Lazy Lizard sounded great:

At the Lazy Lizard we take pride in being not only one of the cheapest hostels anywhere, but one of the best as well.

People ask us how we do it. (almost as often as they ask us where there is a good place to eat.) We tell them that we manage to keep costs low by eliminating profit. Most people buy this answer because, well, how else could we do it?

Lazy Lizard

I do wonder how they do it.

Moab, Utah is an expensive town. Accommodation is often booked out everywhere on weekends including the Lazy Lizard.

I stayed several nights in May 2007. I found it disorganized, dirty and facilities badly in need of repair.

In fact, the only good points about this hostel are the hot showers and hot coffee.

I would have moved on and forgotten this place except for one thing — I had things stolen from “left luggage”.

When I departed to camp 2-nights in Arches National Park I asked to leave a plastic bag until my return. The desk clerk replied, “Leave it in the laundry room. It will be there when you get back.”

On my return the bag had been ripped open, several things taken, and the rest soaked with water.

Bad luck perhaps. But this is a bad hostel. One I recommend everyone avoid.

I’ll forward my experience to the major guidebook companies, tourist information Moab and a number of other organizations.

Scott from the hostel replied:,

I am very sorry that you had your things stolen from our laundry room. It is true that over the years we have had many people leave things there while they are away and to my knowledge you are the first one to have had things taken. Again I am sorry about this. It is not something that we can always control .

We have also been a bit understaffed lately. We have had one cleaning person and a maintenance person quit. Since May is our busiest month of the year it has been difficult to keep up. I did manage to hire one new person just yesterday.

I do know from my dealings with the guests at the hostel that the vast majority of them have a positive experience. If is very common for guests to extend their stays and stay longer than they had originally planned. Many come back year after year.

It is too bad that you had an unpleasant experience with your belongings but unfortunately sometimes things do happen which are out of our control.

I hope your loss didn’t ruin the rest of your trip.

Thanks Scott. I appreciate it. I will be back, soon, to check on improvements. In the meantime, watch for my stolen t-shirt.

UPDATE: Scott wrote saying, “one of the staff people said that he found your T shirt mixed up in his laundry. ” How about that.

He’s mailing it to me. Now, we’re looking for my missing electric razor.