fire party in my room, guys!

One thing I always look forward to when I travel through Europe is the hotel rooms. In America, a hotel room is a hotel room is a hotel room. They're all pretty much the same size, have the same layout, and the same predictable hotel cable TV. In Europe...you never really know what you're going to get and I love that!

I've stayed in all kinds of price ranges from cheap 8 euro a night hostels to some pricier places that feel, well, quite American. But I usually sleep in some lower-priced budget hotels (40-70 euros a night...except for London where it's a confirmed miracle to find anything under 100 pounds a night!) that usually consist of mix-matchy furniture, towels that came from somebody's mother's linen closet, and sometimes there's a bathroom in the room, sometimes the shower's in the room and the toilet's down the hall, and sometimes you get a sink and the shower and toilet are shared by the floor. Sometimes there's a TV, often there's not, and I don't know that I've ever had an alarm clock included in my room.

Almost always they are housed in some ancient European building with rustic medieval wooden beams or beautiful 19th century ceiling molding and the rooms often have some odd size as a result from creating several rooms from what use to be one large space. I never know how big or small they're going to be...for example, when I took my sister and her husband to Paris last year, they stayed in a room that was at least three times the size of my decently sized single room with a ceiling probably twice as high, but in Amsterdam I had quite a nicely sized bathroom in my stylishly decorated room but with just enough space on either side of my bed that I could place my bottle of water and travel alarm clock between the bed and the wall but I had to crawl over the end of the bed to get in and out...smallest room ever!

But they are always clean and neat, always have very friendly staff (which is often the married couple that own the place), a heavenly, light yet filling European breakfast ("good morning, hot chocolate, baguettes and Nutella!") and I've never had a disappointed stay...if sometimes a surprising one!

My cute little hotel in Bruges was no exception!

Cute, medieval building with mix-matchy furniture including a big cozy bed!



A married couple staff that kept my room clean and served me a simply divine breakfast!



But when I first checked in, I noticed this little box on the wall outside my room...



With this sign written in several different languages...



Three guesses who checked into room number 7 (with the only fire escape on the floor)....!

I laughed so hard when I saw that! Thankfully, I never awoke to the sound of breaking glass and a key fumbling in my door. With or without the smell of smoke!