I had planned the trip so carefully.

Upon receiving a long awaited refund for an erroneous charge that had greatly interfered with a previous trip in the fall, I immediately bought an Amtrak rail pass, the one that lasts for thirty day and allows for ten separate segments to go where you want, when you want, and if you still want, provided that within the thirty days from your first train to your last yu end up home.

The plan was to go to Oklahoma City for the event at the University, visit with good friends, and see what changes had come to the city as a whole and the Gay Community specifically since the last time I was there, and use the remaining days and rail segments to see places where I had previously lived, taught, and advocated for teachers and Gay rights.

Using my tax return to open a credit union account and adding money over the next sixty days making my account the basis of a loan, and with the timing of my retirement check and social security check, one received at the beginning of the month, the other in the middle, there would be a constantly replenishing of my bank accounts so I could enjoy the trip worry free.

I got on a reputable hotel reservation site which had been recommended by people that I know and who have used it and made reservations at the first hotel with a payment due date the same as my departure date. I received multiple emails with verifications from the booking site and what I assumed was the hotel from all the letterheads and the usual included promotions.

Keeping to a strict budget before the trip, by the time I stepped on the first train it was to be a simple matter of getting where I was going, deciding how long I would stay, booking the next leg of the trip and the next hotel before leaving town, and repeating this in Los Angeles and then San Francisco before heading home. With debit cards from both my bank and my credit union, my Social Security check having been automatically deposited into my checking account the morning I left, I had no concern about money as everything had been budgeted and divided so one debit card was for hotels and necessities and the other for fun and friends, I was never to be without easy access to cash. 

Considering there would be at least six nights sleeping on trains, the cost of housing was not as high as it otherwise could have been.

I arrive. I enjoy. I move on. No concerns.

I arrived at the first hotel, the one in which I had lived for the first five years I taught in Oklahoma City and to which I now returned as an appreciated person, prepared to give my name and fill out the forms needed to get the room key, only to be told that the hotel which had new owners was no longer affiliated with the third party booking site so my room was canceled. I could, however, rebook the room, not at the price I had been quoted and which had been taken out of my bank account on the day of my departure as arranged, but at a rate one hundred dollars higher. This would put a dent in my budget, and, thinking I would just have to pay the difference, was a little shocked that I had to pay close to the four hundred dollar price of the room while it would be up to me to get the booking site to refund what they withdrew from my account meaning, budget-wise, until I got the refund, I had basically paid for the one room twice.

The hotel was reluctant to help. 

My first suggestion, to just let me have the  for the night and in the morning we could all get together and ron things out with any funds being forwarded to whoever was supposed to get what  withy me paying the difference so the room would be covered, was just ignored by the clerk at the desk. I thought the whole process could be easily and swiftly dealt with if they were to call the company whose contact info I was sure they had on file, and start the process, as the hotel could supply, on the spot, any numbers needed regarding hotel accounts etc. and I coud supply any number needed from the email verifications I had downloaded to my phone and three different sized android devices. Rather, the clerk at the desk, seeing someone more interesting to the eye, did not have the time to deal with me and suggested I try phoning the booking site who would most likely take only about two days once the refund was established.  

In the meantime, I could book the room for the number of nights I would need it at the higher price

The next Morning I sat in the lobby on my phone with the booking site. There were numbers I needed that the hotel had but the person at the counter seemed a little put out by my bothering him for them. When I informed the clerk that the booking site would be calling for some sort of verification and returned to my roost in the lobby, he quietly went into the office, returning with bathroom cleaning supplies, and went to clean the lobby bathroom when the Schrodinger phone rang. Was it a general hotel inquiry or was it the booking site?

The process eventually took two hours, but once the last step was completed, I could expect the refund in seven to ten business days, meaning, the hotel money for the next stay would be reduced until the refund could be added back, or I would have to stay for less time as, while waiting for the refund, I could replace the cost of the hotel room by spending a night on the train to the next destination.

As I was to find out a few days later when I called the booking site for an update, the hotel had as yet not submitted their codes to the site so the refund was still pending. A voice on one such call, Dave, went through a number of actions that got me to a supervisor who, being upset with the image the hotel was creating of the company, did what was needed to get the refund by the end of the day I called, but many days after I had left that hotel.

So Little Lord Fontleroy who was just going to waltz on and off trains like my footmen were running ahead of me making all the arrangements was the one doing that on the fly knowing that within days my first of the month check or the refund would come in together or separately.

In the meantime, so as not to get ahead of myself financially and needing to cut the whole trip short only to have everything fall in place, ironically, when I was on the train home, I had to count pennies.

I would have gladly accepted the room I found in Long Beach because of the price and location, but I only found it while the refund was in limbo and I had to conserve by finding the cheapest place possible. It was a classic Southern California drive-in courtyard motel. No Frills. A room, a bed, a TV, and a bathroom. Who needs fancy lights and fake expensive looking art on the walls if when you are in the room the lights are out and you can’t see it.

Skip the frills.

The motel at Cherry and the Pacific Coast Highway fell into a familiar mold where the husband took care of business, the wife was the chambermaid, and a son was the grounds keeper and handy-man. There were no frills. Housekeeping was you making your own bed, or not, and room service was you walking around the corner to the Jack in the Box. Rooms got cleaned between guests.

The final place that I stayed, not counting the final night when the Amtrak station closed at 10:00 pm and I had to deal with the mean streets of Jack London Square in Oakland until my 7:30 am train, was a delightful surprise.

On my way to San Francisco I had searched for hostels on the internet and found a few located near each other, and a quick internet search showed the area was decent. For some odd reason going from Los Angeles to San Francisco, the train ends in Santa Barbara with the rest of the trip via bus, and this left me a little further from my destination, the hostel area, than I would have liked. 

Hoping to avoid a long walk, I did the search thing on my phone, saw that I was a mere block or two from a hostel with a good rate, walked toward it, turned onto Sacramento Street, passed its nondescript facade enough times to frustrate me, and finally found and rang the bell. The disembodied voice on the intercom said they did not accept walk ups but required reservations, so I asked what their preferred booking site was and if they were on good terms, walked back outside, made reservations for a cheaper price, waited an hour or two, and went back inside with my reservation.

I had been encountering a series of coincidences and odd connections between things that should not be connected, and this hostel was one. Once inside, I found it had a nautical air about it with pictures of ships and nautical objects decorating the place, and the narwhal painted on the wall of the flight of stairs leading to the Buccaneer Bay, the four bunk bed room to which I was assigned, made a connection to the Whaling Museum.

Each floor had two large rooms with four bunk beds in each, good sized and equipped restrooms, and there was a common kitchen shared by all floors on the top floor. Breakfast was supplied to the degree that the makings for a good egg and fruit based breakfast were there for you to prepare to your liking. For long term hostel guests, there was a full size refrigerator and cabinets to store personal food items to prepare meals later in the day.

Residents were from all over the world, some on long, once in a lifetime trips, others as part of a multi-year plan to see as much of the world as time and reality allows, and some who came from the states, like myself, who just wanted a cheap place to stay in an expensive city.

With its location in the Business District next to ChinaTown, it was close to things I wanted to see and close enough to the various types of public transportation to get me to them.

The place was clean and no frills unless you count meeting people of all ages and backgrounds from many countries as a life extra.

I would have liked to have stayed one more night, but, knowing the fluidity of hostel guests, I was sure someone was looking forward to the bed I had reserved for three nights, and I could easily move on. 

Which I did.

The connection between the nautical trappings of the Tradewinds Hostel when combined with my having seen the remains of the rudder of the whale ship Niantic out of New Bedford that was dug out of the dirt during waterfront restoration 100 years after it burned to the water line having become another whale ship abandoned by its crew for the promise of the Gold Rush at the San Francisco Maritime Museum, a ship I had read about as a transcriber at the New Bedford Whaling Museum, and the friendliness of the staff and guests at the hostel did not completely, but to a degree did lessen the bleak welcome at the hotel I once called home.

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