WARNING - This is a long and erudite whinge
I've been away for a while, but am now returned, and happy to be home. The conference that I went to will be the subject of a later diatribe, but I felt the need to get my feelings about Marcoola Beach Resort off my chest.
If you intend to stay on the Queensland coast in Australia any time in the next few years, you should probably read this so that you know why NOT to stay at Marcoola Beach Resort. It really is the least professional place that I, in my extensive travel expereince, have ever encountered.
If you don't feel like four pages of criticism directed at an incompetent corporation, then feel free to move on. I can't stop myself now...
Marcoola Beach Resort – not a cool holiday destination. At all. Recommended for those who want to remember why it really isn’t so bad at home after all.
As ‘The Great Outdoors’ flashed the number up on the screen, my mother and I both dove for the phone. A holiday in sunny Queensland, staying cheaply in the attractive resort pictured in the shot – who wouldn’t go for that? Sounded like it was just what I needed before leaving my year-long internship and returning to University to become a fully qualified psychologist.
We made a booking for four days, and looked forward to it with the excitement that only an imminent holiday can bring. The resort had four and a half star facilities – pool, spa, tennis and basketball courts, and a beach volleyball pit. The apartment had an ensuite for the master bedroom, a ‘gourmet’ kitchen (whatever that means), and cable, and it was only two minutes walk down to the beach behind it. From all appearances, we were in for a treat.
Little did we know that, although the facilities were four and a half stars, the resort deserved far less, as we wended our way through the countryside to Marcoola Beach. Blissfully unaware, we almost drove right past the resort – a hideous combination of teals, terracottas and butter yellows that almost, but not quite, failed to coordinate with any success. Undaunted, we turned around and drove in. Surely the inside would be just fine.
When we booked in, I noticed something unusual. There was a list on the wall of complimentary items that most hotels provide as part of the room cost – tea, coffee, those little packets of sugar, even toilet paper – and their cost. When pressed about this, Karen behind the desk told us that they provided one day’s worth of goods, and any extra would cost us, well, extra. That’s unusual, I thought, but I didn’t say anything. For the price that we were paying for the rooms, it didn’t seem worth making a fuss about.
Walking into the ground floor apartment, we discovered a pleasant two bedroom facility with two bathrooms and the promised gourmet kitchen, with all of the windows open to let in the breeze that heralded rain. Since Queensland (and most of Australia) has been experiencing severe drought for some years now, we didn’t begrudge them the rain, and it certainly didn’t stop us from enjoying a visit to the local bakery and supermarket for supplies.
When I settled into the kitchen to prepare dinner, however, I discovered that although the kitchen sported a fancy electric frying pan, it had only one pot that was too small to support the steamer. With some effort, I managed to balance it precariously on top. Funny, I thought, gourmet kitchen with only one pot and a steamer that doesn’t fit it. How odd. Plus, it has ‘Occupational Health and Safety Issue’ written all over it. People with children stay here!
Nevertheless, dinner was delicious, and I put the issue out of my mind. After all, we got the room for a steal – we were prepared to make some sacrifices. If that meant keeping an eagle eye on the steamer to ensure that it didn’t take a tumble, well, that’s part of the experience.
That night, I made an unpleasant discovery. Upon shutting the window and drawing the blinds, I noticed that a bright light shone through the curtain. I tried to sleep, but gave up on the room and staggered out into the darkened living room with a blanket and pillow. How silly to put the bedrooms on the side of the well-lit path, I thought. Still, we got the rooms for a good price, we can’t expect the Hilton, I rationalised as I drifted off.
The light shining though the eastern-facing window woke me fairly early the next day, and I toddled to the next room to continue my sleep. When I woke up, a strange yet familiar smell explained to me why the windows had been left open when we arrived.
The room stank of urine. Not just a hint of urine, long cleaned away, but fresh, deposited-the-day-before urine, and human urine at that. The clothes that I had unpacked onto the other single bed in the room smelled of urine. My bag smelled of urine. The room was permeated with the stuff, like it had been pickled in it. Was that an OHS issue too? I wondered. Definitely unhygienic. But I wasn’t sure if I had a right to complain with the price we were paying.
I moved out to the bathroom to take care of my own bladder, and stubbed my foot against the bathroom tiles. When I looked down, I discovered that the floor was uneven – the tiles rose a good centimetre above the carpet, and had I been slightly less fortunate, I might have broken my toe.
‘Definitely an OHS issue,’ I said out loud. This place was starting to look very, very unappealing.
But the beach itself, Marcoola Beach, was beautiful, absolutely perfect. The beach almost made up for the resort, and we lolled and read on the beach in the waning afternoon sun. That night, we ordered takeaway Chinese food and watched TV. Apart from my need to sleep in the living room, it was perfect.
The next day we rose deliberately early and spent three hours doing more reading and lolling on the sand. To be honest, that was the absolute best part of the holiday. Around lunchtime we went back up to the apartment, and the garbage disposal unit (which we hadn’t used, as we didn’t know where the ‘on’ switch was) indicated that it was full by simply allowing water to pool in the bottom of the sink. I hunted around the kitchen and finally found a switch that I had assumed had been for a fan somewhere, and hit it. The ‘Insinkerator’ roared to life.
‘Isn’t that odd?’ I asked my mother when she came out. ‘There isn’t even a sign saying ‘Insinkerator Switch’, and there’s nothing in the information folder. I was just guessing.’
‘Mmm,’ she said. Marcoola Beach Resort was looking less professional by the minute.
We drove up the coast and wandered around Noosa for the afternoon, and came back for dinner. We discovered that mum had gotten sunburnt – which I had not expected, because usually I’m the one that comes home red as a lobster and feeling just as well cooked. I took pity on her sent her off to a cool bath, and made dinner for her. I struggled to prepare pasta and sauce using only one pot, and a small one at that. It was done, however, despite me cursing the resort under my breath as the pasta grew cold in the strainer, waiting for the sauce to warm it up again.
The next day I asked mum how she had slept, and she complained about people sending rubbish down the rubbish shoot in the wee hours of the morning. Her window faced across from the waste disposal area, and each bag was preceded with a noisome ‘Rattlerattlerattle’ before crashing into the empty, echoing bin at the bottom. Interesting, I thought. There are no rules for conduct or respecting other people around here, and in a place this size they really needed some.
Mum hopped in the bath again, and I made scrambled eggs in the electric frying pan. Standing in the kitchen in my pyjamas, with the bathroom door open and mum in the bath, I nearly had heart failure when someone unlocked the door, stuck his head through and called out, ‘Anyone home? It’s maintenance.’
I was unnerved, and answered from the kitchen, ‘Yes, what do you want?’
‘There’s a broken lamp been reported in this room.’
There was a broken lamp in the second bedroom, but I hadn’t reported anything that was wrong with the room so far. I was too chicken. And for the price we were paying…
I emerged from the kitchen, walked past him and shut the bathroom door. I could have used some warning. I turned back to him.
‘Excuse me?’
‘Must have been reported by the people before you.’
Trying to look dignified in my singlet and loose pants, I showed him primly to the second room and let him know what I was less than happy to be pulled away from my eggs (which were sticking to the pan as we spoke), caught in my pyjamas, while my red-skinned, vulnerable mother was reclining in the bath.
Later that morning we received a call from Karen at the desk. Maintenance must have said something.
‘There’s a man coming to replace the pots in the kitchen, it’s a few short,’ she said. ‘Is it okay for him to come by now?’
I had showered and dressed, and appreciated the heads-up. However, I couldn’t help but wonder why they hadn’t replaced the lamp and the pots before we arrived, because we had needed those pots two nights ago, but we were going out that night. It felt like they couldn’t be bothered getting the apartment ready for us, but they were preparing it for the people who would come after. It might sound funny, but I felt a little disrespected. I did not say anything, however. Coward.
It was Friday night, and the people in the apartments around us were shouting, talking and playing music past 11.30. We had a plane to catch the next day, so we had to be up and away fairly early. Again, no rules for living in such close proximity to other people. If I hadn’t had my earplugs, I would have called the police. Earplugs – I never travel without them.
That night I bought something that didn’t appear to fit me when I tried it on that night, and the next morning, before we rushed off to catch our plane, I tried and tried to call the store. There was a branch on the way to the airport, and I wanted to know if I could stop there, but unbeknownst to me, they opened at ten in the morning, not nine. I kept getting the fax machine, and gave up.
Mum used the phone after me, because we hadn’t arranged transport home from the airport. She called directory assistance to ask for the shuttle service number, but her call was fruitless too.
When we booked out, we discovered how costly those calls had been. At 50c each, my useless calls totalled $5, despite me not having been able to speak to a human being.
But the directory assistance was the killer. If the resort had advertised their phone rates, we would both have used our mobile phones.
‘Five dollars to call directory assistance!’ she shrieked. ‘In Adelaide it’s a free service! This is highway robbery!’
‘Hotel rates, I’m afraid,’ Karen said, looking apathetic.
That was the last straw for my mother, who had really been quite stoic throughout the whole ordeal, and we cursed the day we ever heard of the Marcoola Beach Resort.
I really don’t feel that the holiday was worth the pain and expense. For the price we paid for the apartment, we sure paid a high price on our comfort. If you’re determined to go to QLD, save that little bit harder and go to Noosa.
When we touched down on home soil at last, I bored my mother by waxing lyrical and poetic with an ode to Adelaide. Oh town of tree-lined streets, suburban café culture and eloquent speech, of fresh air, dry heat and friendly locals…
And then the cab fare home was $71.