Four Points by Sheraton Historic District Hotel Williamsburg - Reviews - Williamsburg

Trials of Staying Connected on the Road: Icarus Digitus

Operating a small computer software company, with only 2 full-time employees, taking a vacation with my wife and 3 year old son becomes a welcome necessity and a two week challenge of keeping up with client needs and continuing to move projects forward while spending much needed family time.

While achieving the status of 'digital road warrior' is easier than ever before, it seems like the more we do, the more we aspire to. It is only inevitable that when we reach higher, the obstacles that fall in our paths, no matter how small, can take us down to earth more abruptly than we like. It is at times like these that we need to appreciate and focus on how we, and others, handle situations with grace more than on outcomes that are going to reach their conclusions regardless of our efforts.

With this, I will share some experiences in the hopes of helping smooth out the bumps for the next guy.

My family and I chose to visit Williamsburg, Virginia, about an 1100 mile drive from our South Florida home. I have visited Williamsburg before, but never as a 'working vacation' where internet and cell access are a must. It's really a great destination with more to see and do than you could possibly cover in a week. The colonial village, Yorktown and Jamestown are all noteworthy. My son particularly enjoyed the local kids dressed up as minutemen and marching with pipe and drum. Street skits re-enacting colonial life are a regular event during the day as well. As if the history weren't enough, Busch Gardens Europe is just 5 miles or so away, and D.C. just a couple of hours. Also, if you happen to visit towards the end of July, there is an amazing festival on the Eastern Shore about 90 minutes away where wild ponies swim across the bay and are run through town (I guess our version of the running of the bulls in Spain).

Anyway, calling my cell provider, I was assured that the area had coverage. Next I verified with each hotel en-route that high speed internet was available in the rooms. Finally, I purchased and tested software that would allow me to use my TREO 700w as a modem, so that I would have a backup for internet access.

I was ready, with internet at each stop and cell coverage along the way, or so I thought.

Day 1 leaving Florida, en route to Ridgeland SC was great. Good weather, great reception on the road and the wireless connection in my room was 5 bars. This was fairly moot though, since I had been connected to the internet, and able to work for most of the 10 hour drive. It was upon arriving in Williamsburg at the Sheraton 4 Points on York Street that problems began.

On our arrival, I noticed that my cell service was degraded to 0-1 bars, barely enough signal to make an outbound call, and, as it turns out not enough for an internet connection at all. Not to worry, I thought, we are at our destination and I can stay connected in the suite. But no luck. When inquiring at the front desk, in person, I was told that the internet access was available in the main hotel only, and not in the suites. My inquiry of why this was not explained when I asked while making reservations was met with a shrug.

The room, while more run down than I would expect for a Sheraton, seemed at first comfortable enough. The main door lock, securing the stairwell was broken, leaving the door ajar, but after all the suite door locked well enough. I got a fuller appreciation for our accommodations after walking barefoot in the room for an hour or two, and noticing that the soles of my feet were dirty. My son actually pointed it out (YUK! Dad). Shoes became an immediate requirement, and toys were immediately moved to the table.

Then it began. Sometime after 9:30pm, the guests in the suite above us, and on the staircase between the 4 suites in the building, began moving around. Slowly at first, and then with the enthusiasm of a soccer game. The commotion was so pronounced, and the ceiling shaking to such an extent, that I poked my head out the door to see what was up. I did not see any guests, but there were 5-6 hotel staff lingering at the top and base of the stairs, in uniform, but clearly not working. For the next 2-3 hours, there was a virtually constant procession running up and down the stairs, opening and letting the front door slam shut as they came and went. The broken lock was appearing to make sense...

Despite 3 calls to the front desk to see if anything could be done about the noise, and assurances from the night manager that security would be sent out to request what they insisted was noise from another guest be toned down, it went unanswered until the following day. The next morning, I went to the office with the intention of checking out. After some apology, and knowing that I did not have any reservations elsewhere, I agreed to stay on a provisional basis, and was assured by their employee responding to my request for a manager, Cathy D, that if I had any additional problems, the room would not be charged and she would assist me with finding an alternate hotel.
It seemed like a reasonable arrangement, but I should probably have recalled the assurances that high-speed internet was available in all of their rooms. (I guess suites aren't rooms?)
And, the maintenance guy was on his way just then to replace the broken lock on the stairway.

Now the next stumble...

After 2 days without staff running up and down the stairs, and beginning to unwind into our vacation, we walked out to our nearly new Toyota minivan to find the rear hatch smashed. Not a small dent mind you, but smashed as if struck with an axe by a lumberjack, and then kicked by a soccer team. I had been out to the car a couple of hours prior and it was fine; this didn't happen late at night, but rather parked in a crowded parking lot where hotel staff had been sitting curbside regularly throughout the entire extent of our stay. Two things struck me as odd:

1) No one appeared to have seen anything, despite asking each staff person if they personally witnessed the incident, and if they could ask their co-workers if they saw anything.
2) Despite the extensive damage to the hatch, the rear bumper was untouched

After contacting the police to report the incident for insurance, and being assured by yet another manager (Cathy W) that a departing guest must be responsible, another observation began to bother me. There was no chance a car struck the minivan without bumper damage; and despite that is was the middle of the day when housekeeping is normally buzzing around in golf carts, there were currently no golf carts visible. Staff appeared to have arrived the old fashioned way, on foot.
After some insistence on my part, and with the cooperation of a lone helpful employee (who later confided that he had been hit himself by one of the golf carts while walking on the property as a guest) I requested that one of the carts be pulled around to see if the height matched the damage. Indeed, it did. But, by some greater coincidence, the numerous flecks of white paint newly chiseled into the battering ram hanging on the back of this very golf cart matched the paint recently aggressively removed from my minivan. This heavy gauge steel cage was no doubt used to shuttle soccer players and staff to and from their changing room between games at night and for more routine housekeeping and maintenance by day.

Slightly (as in seconds) before the police officer, recently on the scene, could connect the flecks of white paint on the cart to the missing flecks on the minivan, a smallish eastern European worker, who had during this entire exchange not offered a word, came forward and spoke in hushed tones the only audible being 'I did it'.

Armenian in the parking lot with a golf cart. Mystery solved.
But why the mystery to begin with, I asked myself. The hotel knew the car was damaged by their staff. They knew, or at least could easily determine whose car had been damaged, but nonetheless, the culprit remained in the shadows until responsibility was virtually certain and provable.

But certainly they would offer an apology... Nope, not one, not once. It was all Cathy W. could do to begin to conceal her annoyance. I guess I'll have to wonder if she was annoyed that the culprit came forward so late, or maybe just at all. After all, she was quick to point out that if there were no witnesses, there is no liability. And none of the 7 or 8 maids, maintenance workers and general staff within 150 feet of the scene saw anything. Not even the other occupant of the golf cart knew anything about what happened.

As I was leaving, I noticed with new perspective the sign disclaiming 'The Hotel will not be responsible for theft or damage to vehicles' or something close to that. I would add, 'or stragglers and slow walkers offering tempting targets' based on what I was told.

Oh yeah, the front door lock was broken again...must be game night?

So the bump in this trip was the Sheraton Four Points of Williamsburg. So just drive by, drive around, or otherwise avoid this poorly managed establishment when visiting what is otherwise one of the best family vacation destinations in the U.S. The alternatives are numerous. We continued our stay in the Williamsburg Lodge, closer to the commons in colonial town, and extended a few days to attempt to erase the previous experience from our memories. The facility was elegant, immaculate, and comfortable complete with high-speed access in all of their rooms (including suites) and a strong wireless signal on the entire site. And, the apologies we never once heard from the Sheraton Four Points on York Street were offered with graciousness as we were checked into and out of the Williamsburg Lodge.