Beth's Birthday and Our 5-Year Anniversary

Back to the Beach

Before my parents' visit the upcoming week, James and I decided at the last minute to zip over to El Salvador for a Beach Birthday!

Enjoying a nice breakfast buffet at Roca "Reservations Not Honored" Sunzal

March 16: My 26th birthday, James' and my 5-year dating anniversary (a heads-up: May 28 is our 3-year wedding anniversary! :)

We spent the weekend at our new favorite travel-to location, Playa Sunzal. We stayed at Casa Miramar and Roca Sunzal. Miramar was definitely a winner. It had a quiet front deck/lounging area, several hammocks, a cold pool, and cheap yet tasty meals.

While the Roca does have cheap lodgings ($17/night), when we arrived to check in (with a reservation), we were told that our reservation was no longer valid even though we could see our name written down in the reservations book! Why? The guy who was in the room before us decided to stay another night. So yes, they said, "Okay, sure," and bumped us out of our room!

Naturally, we were irate (Beth especially) because they tried to say that they "don't run a small little nothing of a hotel" and they "try to please the customer," but how can this be so if you don't hold the reservations?! They offered to give us a different, more expensive room instead. We told them they were missing the point. We wanted the cheapest room, not a room with a bathroom. They weren't doing us a favor by charging us more money for their crappy customer service.

So, we asked why they didn't just charge the other guy the extra money they were about to stick to us? No good answer. We got them to say they would "try" to get the money, but obviously this wasn't going to happen. After scouting out some other places to stay, nothing at all was available (Semana Santa week and all of Central America is on vacation), so we had to take it. We got one free breakfast the next morning. Gee, thanks.

This reminded us of the Seinfeld episode where Jerry has a problem getting a car he had reserved. I'll type it verbatim-- for our conversation with Roca, inserting "hotel room" where Jerry says "car."

Lady: "I'm sorry, we have no [hotel room] available at the moment."

Jerry: "I don't understand. I made a reservation. Do you have my reservation?"

Lady: "Yes, we do. Unfortunately, we ran out of [hotel rooms]."

Jerry: "But the reservation keeps the [hotel room] here. That's why you have the reservation."

Lady: "I know why we have reservations."

Jerry: "I don't think you do....if you did, I'd have a [hotel room]. See, you know how to take the reservation. You just don't know how to hold the reservation. And that's really the most important part of the reservation. The HOLDING. Anybody can just take 'em....."



So, consider this an addendum post to our earlier accolades Roca Sunzal. Beware of them actually holding your reservation! You may want to call and confirm--and double confirm--your "reservation" with them. I mean, we could SEE our name in the book and they still didn't have it!

But the weekend was still a blast!! We got to see a boogie boarding and suring competition, get plenty of sun and water play, read, play Scrabble, and relax before the big visit from Mom and Dad Kenny. Also, our friends the Carver Family and Borgit & Michael (and baby Oleen) family were there, too!

The alley pupusaria where we got my birthday dinner

We ate pupusas for our birthday/anniversary dinner, and 4 pupusas and 2 beers ran us about $4. Pupusas are thick, hand-made tortillas stuffed with whatever ingredients are around. In our case, we had different pupusas with combinations of cheese, refried beans, guacamole sauce, and meat in James' case.