We don’t get to travel much these days—we’re still busy paying off a cross-country move, and that’s put a rather major ding in our travel budget.  However, my wonderful spouse put in a wowser number of overtime hours a few weeks ago, and we found ourselves with a little spare money.  We put most of it against credit cards (paying one off), but we held back a bit and decided to rent a car and drive up to Philly for sandwiches at Pat’s King of Steaks.  Yes, we own a car, but we don’t really trust it in this heat for that distance.

Our one day jaunt turned to two when we discovered it would be cheaper to rent a car for three days over the weekend than for two days during the week.  We decided to overshoot Philly and head up to Bucks and Lehigh Counties.   Being on an amazingly tight budget in which we wanted FOOD rather than lodging to be the star, we shot for the cheapest game in town-a place called The Executive Inn in Coopersburg.  After reading the reviews of said Executive Inn (junkies and clunkers and police cars, oh, my!), I canceled the reservation and chose the Red Roof Inn in Allentown, instead. 

I’m not sorry I made the change.  The price was low, and the reviews presented it as clean and quiet.  Those things were mostly true.

Upon arriving, we were greeted by repairs in progress.  Not a lot of work going on, but the upstairs walkway (all doors at this two story motel are exterior) was being shored up by a series of 2x4 boards and slabs of plywood. Not reassuring, since getting to our room involved walking across this shored-up walk.  On the bright side, by walking ON the shored-up walkway, we wouldn’t be walking BENEATH it, where the shards of stucco and concrete were falling like rain. 

Checking in was a breeze—the desk staffer was friendly, personable, efficient, welcoming, and not creepy.  We let them know we had a small dog with us, and they were perfectly good with that.  There is no additional charge for traveling with small pets, though the pets must be on leash or in crate when in public areas (there is a grassy area for doggy potty breaks) and cannot be left unattended in the rooms. 

Entering the room brought no surprises—this is a Red Roof Inn, not Sofitel.  We were expecting small, and small is what we got.  We were bowled over by the almost overwhelming scent of air freshener—I’m pretty sure they’ve got some sort of air freshening filter in the a/c unit, and it really does knock your sinuses out of your head when you first walk in.  I do have to say that the beds were surprisingly small, low-slung, and exhausted.  It’s been a long time since I’ve seen a bed with mattress and box springs that thin and un-cushy.  To be fair, they didn’t do the number on my back that I feared.  The bedspreads were typically eyesore-ish, as is to be expected in a place like this, and the sheets were amazingly thin.  Sadly, the sheets on one bed were also not quite clean.  Not nightmarish, but small brown spots that were not stains so much as something smudged/smeared on the sheet.  In other words, these sheets did not appear to have been washed between guests.  That said, the rest of the linens seemed clean, though completely devoid of scent.

The room was furnished with two low-riding full-sized beds, a comfortable but badly stained blue chair, a small, built-into-the-wall desk with rolling desk chair, a few built-in drawers, and an average-sized CRT television with a clunky remote sporting a broken power button (the other buttons worked).  Oh, and the “bedstand” was actually a small shelf mounted to the wall.  It was big enough for the phone and the alarm clock.  You’re out of luck if you have other things you’d like to put there. 

Lighting was adequate, with over bed lights, a wall lamp, and an overhead.

The bathroom was . . . eh.  On the bright side, the tub was sparkling clean and had a nice, rain shower-type shower head.  On the not-so-bright side, the room is VERY small, there was a browning splatter/stain on the wall, the floor was sticky on bare feet, and the toilet took a long, long time to refill.  Outside the bathroom was a small vanity with sink (and very nice-smelling soap), and though our room did have a combination microwave/mini-fridge, the lack of a coffee maker was conspicuous.  The front desk did offer free coffee, and it was solidly average.  For eats, there is a Friendly’s right next door, and a number of other restaurants and stores very close by.  We chose to drive into Perkasie for dinner at The Perk.  The leftovers were enough to make a good breakfast.

The room does sport a small combination safe which we did not use.  It also offers free Wi-Fi, but it was buggy on sign-on, so we stuck with my husband's mobile hotspot gig from Verizon.

Two things really stood out at the Allentown Red Roof Inn.  See, I’ve stayed in a lot of cheap, crappy motels, and they are almost always distinguished by their rude staff and the scary loudness of the neighbors.  Neither of these things was true in this case.  The staff was terrific, and there was no shouting, no partying, no crying/screaming/yelling/banging/thumping.  This was a quiet place where we all got a good night’s sleep.

And that’s that, really.  Nobody’s going to mistake this for luxury accommodations, but we didn’t see any bugs, it didn’t reek of smoke or anything else unpleasant, the staff was friendly, and the place was blessedly quiet.  On a budget?  That’s all you’re looking for.

Recommended: Yes