In another posting someone accused Americans of only wanting luxury accomodations in France. I%26#39;ve not moved up to luxury yet but there%26#39;s one luxury I%26#39;d like to have--a shower curtain! 30 yrs ago on my first trip--stayed in Hotel St. Marie Gallo, left bank--old, very charming, clean about $15/nite. Toilet down the hall, but no sign of bathing capabilities, but OK, I was with a backpack, young and ready for anything. 20 years ago with my wife, I decided to scale up-when we got to our room as desired, it had a toilet and shower stall retro fitted on a high platform beyond a movable partition-but no shower curtain! I thought the maid had forgot. It had taken all my best french to get the room rented (un chambre avec douche) so no way I was going to go back down and try to explain there was no shower curtain. We did our best not to flood the room, luckily the water pressure was barely above zero. We returned to same hotel 10 days later, different room, but again no shower curtain! Then realized it must be de riguor not to have shower curtains. In recent years have stayed at better places--but still a challenge. Citadines--nice bathrooms with tub/shower, but only a small plastic partition that covers 1/3 of side of tub. Back end and side of tub completely open and vulnerable (sort of like hospital gown). Its very challenging to take a shower w/o flooding the bathroom. I try to keep the water pressure down, but the wand is usually hard to control--seems to be positioned to spray straight out the back of the tub, or water ends up rickocheting off my body out into the bathroom. We travel with teenagers used to water heater-depleting showers so you can image we spend a lot of time mopping up the bath room! How to do the French take a shower in these circumstances? or do they only take baths? or? Or is it a sinister, sadistic plot against unsuspecting Americans who think they are getting shower facilities only to find they are disfunctional and half-baked? Is the desk clerk secretly chuckling every time he rents one of the rooms, thinking about unsuspecting Americans trying to take showers w/o spraying down the bathroom? If I move up to luxury such as the Ritz, will I get a shower curtain? (Please no replies that I%26#39;m a stupid, insensitive American who expects everything like home everywhere I travel. I do like all different kinds of stuff and should write a posting lamenting all the neat, charming, archaic stuff that has disappeared over the years. And I have used those Turkish pit toilets w/o complaint. I%26#39;ve been curious about this and just realized there must be loads of folks on the board who can explain this to me!)
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We don%26#39;t stay in hotels.
We take showers in our homes so I really can%26#39;t help you.
There%26#39;s a chance though that it may turn out to be just you? I%26#39;ve only stayed in about 4/5 hotels in France and I can%26#39;t remember what the shower curtain was like.
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Lot less turkish toilets than the last time you were here.
As for the shower curtains... this is not a %26quot;smile, you%26#39;re an American tourist%26quot; plot.
I guess this would fall under the catagorie of cultural differences. To avoid stereotypes and misconceptions I am going to avoid the details here, but suffice to say, you may just have to ask the hotel when making your reservations if they have a rideau (ree-doe) pour les douches.
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Always had shower curtains in hotels (even 2 stars).
Yes it is true Citadines has this plexiglas (not plastic...) sort of door but I managed to keep the water in without flooding the bathroom (and I go to Citadines twice a year minimum for at least 10 days each visit).
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I have seen some with shower curtians. I believe the hotel Mercure Roncerey in the ninth arr, in the passage Jeoffrey had them. But most of the other hotels we%26#39;ve stayed in did not. I wonder also why the don%26#39;t have wash cloths. We rented an apartment last trip and it had shower curtains so I know they are available. The hotels probably find it easier to clean those little glass things. Shower curtians can get pretty nasty so that%26#39;s probably why you don%26#39;t see them much.
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So it sound like I just have a poor statistical sampling and its not a major cross American-French cultural problem (smile!). I love the Citadines and would go back anytime, not withstanding the plastic/plexiglass shower thing. At our last visit in Dec. we had a 2 BR apt booked, but they made a mistake and overbooked the 2BR apts. In place, they gave us two 1BR apartments next to each other w/o extra charge!!. Guess my problem is my trips to France/Paris have been too few and too short to get an accurate sampling of shower facilities!! I know they have been too short to do more than just touch base with everything we want to do. If I was unencumbered and free to go, I%26#39;d leave tomorrow for an extended stay.
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I was more amused than concerned about the lack of a shower curtain in my otherwise very nicely renovated bathroom of my superior room at the two star Hotel Prince.
I figured what water got on the floor would be cleaned up by the maid. I have stayed at some American hotels where the water did not escape the shower, but I wondered when the last time the bathroom floor had felt water. Lack of a shower curtan is one way to keep the floor clean.
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Won%26#39;t someone please explain how the French do it?
Somerset, have a great trip, sleep well on the plane and bring your own shower curtain.
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Which Citadines did you stay in ? Do you remember the price per night? Do you get maid service there? Was there adequate closet space? The pictures I have seen look nice. I%26#39;s trying to decide between that or a private apartment rental.
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I%26#39;ve stayed at 3*, 4*, and 4* luxe hotels. None of them have had shower curtains.
It remains a mystery to me.
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Here is how they did it: Turn on shower and get wet. Turn off shower soap up. Turn shower on and rinse. Usually this was done while sitting in a tub of warm water.
For stand alone showers there is generally a curtain, and a place to hook up the shower head to stay warm while soaping up.
When I first came to France as a high school student I stayed with a wealthy Parisian family that had houses in several different regions and at the country homes we were still bathing in a tub, as in metal, as in no built in bath. France has come far in these last twenty years (hardly ever find a squat toilet these days), but some habits die hard.
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