Picking a Hotel in France

The worst hotel we stayed in was a 2 star hotel in Champagne region which we actually found through an online booking agent. What we were looking for was a hotel with its own restaurant attached and wi-fi in the rooms. Michelin ranked hotels often have a restaurant and chef on hand, but if you're going to be staying in out of the way towns you're probably going to have little option other than to stay in a small family owned 2 star.

Now to be fair, 2 star isn't all that bad if you get a hotel where the owners take pride in offering a great service, but you are going to have to put up with older rooms, possibly a bathroom that is small and poky with its own resident population of mould in the joints.

Returning to my point about hotels with pretensions to grandeur, take it from me, stay well away from these if you don't know the hotel. You can tell they have pretensions to grandeur if their listing in the hotel directories or online booking sites mention lots of romantic notions about their position in town, people who have stayed there, or the prose leads you to believe you'll be staying in something that was once a 5 star way back in the 1920's or 1930's. Generally these places are just old run down building in desperate need of being gutted and rebuilt.

A better option is to pick one of the newer motel style hotels. At least the bed (and mattress) will be relatively new, it will probably have an elevator, and most likely air conditioning and essential services like wi-fi.