I travel the US with my dog assessing dog parks for DogParksUSA (http://www.DogParksUSA.org), and stay in dog-friendly, affordable lodging with her. The Motel 6 chain always allows dogs, and is almost always the cheapest cost choice in every city, but after this stay ad all my other stays in Motel 6's this year, I am starting to think I am just going to have to pay more. I am pretty burned out on Motel 6 now.

This Motel 6 is located right off of I-35 in Austin, Texas, along with lots of other motels and hotels that line the frontage roads of I-35. I reserved a single full-bed non-smoking room, and the front desk clerk efficiently checked me in. The room itself has a style that, if you remember that Woody Allen movie from years and years ago "Sleeper" made me think of it -- kind of retro mod (you'll see what I mean in the pictures). Someone else described it me as Ikea style. You can judge for yourself in the photos. It's not ugly; all those rounded corners would come in handy if you have a problem with intoxication and bumping into things -- I think many guests in this hotel might have that problem, so it is considerate of Motel 6 to protect them from injury. No fridge or microwave in these rooms. The flatscreen television is about 32 inches in size. It has 21 channels (including the channel guide): there is one spanish channel, and two HBO channels. The hotel is two stories, and there is no elevator. The frontage roads are very busy and it is not easy to get around from one side of the highway to the other frontage road on the other side; everyone rushing off the highway is coming into the lanes you need to get into to make U-turns under the highway to get to the other frontage roads. Make sure your car has pep and doesn't stall, so you can accelerate like crazy in these places. There are no food establishments near this hotel or within even a walking distance that I, who likes to walk and save gasoline, would do. About a mile away is a Burger King and Denny's on the same frontage road side as the Motel 6; across I-35 on the other frontage road is a WalMart with a surpermarket, a Little Caesars, a McDonald's within the WalMart, a Subway, maybe one other fast food place. The gas station next to the WalMart (not part of WalMart, though) has some of the cheapest gas prices around. There is a Goodwill store, too, if you enjoy thrift shopping. An IHOP is on the WalMart side of I-35, too. The hotel has an in-ground swimming pool.

I experienced a problem while here. I stayed for two nights. The night of check-in, even though I am traveling with my dog, another guest with a dog created problems. These hotels do not permit guests to leave their dogs unattended in the rooms. They give you a break if you are running out to pick up some food and can't leave your dog in the car in the hot Texas summer heat while you run in to get it, but we're talking no more than 20 minutes. Hours alone are definitely not permitted, especially if the dog is an anxious one that is alarmed by every sound outside the room or just afraid because they are in a strange place and their human is not here. You can't leave your dog in the room while you go out to get drunk or to work at a club, or whatever. The guest in the room behind me (bathroom wall to bathroom wall) started whining when I returned to the room at 6:30PM; at 7:15PM, I asked the front desk if they could locate the dog's owner, because the dog's whining and barking was anxious and miserable sounding. The clerk started trying to reach the owner. The miserable-sounding whining continued, and at 9:45PM, I knew I was not going to be able to sleep if I had to continue to listen to it. I returned to the front desk and said the dog had not stopped; the clerk told me they had not been able to reach the owner; I told him he needed to go into the room and remove the dog and bring it into the lobby with him (the lobby locks at 8PM, by the way; after 8PM, you have to deal with the clerk at a bank drive-up style window, which makes me think robberies are a problem in this area), leave a note for the owner as to the whereabouts of the dog, and I could go to sleep. No can do; clerk said he could not remove anything from the room, even if it where a dog left there alone in violation of the hotel policies. I told him I had to move to another room, no smoking and on the ground floor. He readily gave me a new door key. I moved my belongings into the new room, which, even though it had a "no smoking" sticker on the door, smelled so strongly of smoke, it was cloying. The hotel was full, and this was the only room I could move to. I had some Febreze in my car because wet dogs can be stinky dogs, and sprayed all of it in the room, especially on the popcorn ceiling that holds stinky odors. It helped enough for me to bear the room for the night. The next day, when I left for breakfast and returned later in the afternoon after the room had been serviced, the cloying smoke smell was back (and I had used up my Febreze supply). I sought out housekeeping, and they gave me a bottle of something called "No Smoke Liquid Deodorant" (good name) to borrow, and I saturated the place with it, walls, ceiling, furniture, linens, curtains, air conditioner vents. So far, that product seems to be doing the trick. I do not have any complaints about the staff. But clearly, at Motel 6, you get what you pay for. I will most likely never stay at another Motel 6 again, and definitely not this one. There are tons of other hotels along the frontage roads of I-35 that travelers, including those with dogs, can stay at. La Quinta, which allows dogs but costs about $15 more per night, is just a block away; I wish I had stayed and paid there.