When you go on vacation as your reward after a few months or longer of hard work, you should have certain expectations. You are vacationing to avoid stress, to get away from the rigors of modern life and you want everything to be just perfect. So where do you go to find such a place, what should you be looking for and how much will all this luxury cost you?
It should be obvious what a top class hotel will provide you with, but individuals have different tastes so one person’s palace is another’s motel. Clearly, the best hotels have a staff to customer ratio of 1:1 which guarantees the best possible service. The staff of such places as five star The Kulm Hotel in St. Moritz for example are trained to pamper their customers. For someone who dreams of such luxury, this is absolutely perfect and precisely what they are looking for. Yet for others, having staff that hover over you like a swarm of bees can feel suffocating. They get the feeling that they are being observed at all times, which is partially true and are unable to enjoy their stay.
So what is the definition of a five star hotel? It varies from country to country. In Switzerland for example, a five star hotel must have a staff member for every four guests and 90% of rooms must have a bath as well as a shower. Four star hotels only have to have baths in half the rooms. In Ireland, five star accommodation should have 24 hour access to food and drink but this is not always applied. Indeed, it seems to be at the discretion of the manager on duty.
There is five star and then there is absolute decadence and the Royal Penthouse Suite in the President Wilson Hotel in Geneva holds the distinction of being the most expensive room in the world. It will set you back approximately $53,000 a night but is actually an entire floor rather than a mere room. You don’t even have to mingle with their other guests as there is a private elevator that will take you up. You have the choice of four bedrooms and six bathrooms and can view the breathing scenery of the beautiful city of Geneva including the famous lake and the highest mountain in Europe, Mount Blanc. There is a cocktail lounge and billiards table and the whole area can fit up to 40 people. If you’re wondering who would rent such an exclusive room, think of all the A-list celebrities in Hollywood. Then of course, someone like President Obama may utilize the facilities as the hotel is next door to the headquarters of the United Nations.
At the end of the day however, not many people can afford such luxury and will settle for clean sheets and possibly internet access. In terms of hotels that provide customers with the best value for money in the world, Tokyo actually comes out on top which is a major surprise considering its reputation for being an expensive city. Worryingly for American hotels, only Washington made it into the top 20 for value for money hotels which shows that U.S establishments need to get their act together to compete with international locations.
