I stayed one night here after having a bad experience at another motel. What a difference!

I could see that employees were busy trying to make the place better. The lobby was clean and smelled good, as did the room. This place isn't perfect, but it's nice and the staff treats you like you're welcomed and appreciated. I will be back and forth on business over the next few weeks and will stay here. In fact, I will stay here anytime I have business in this area.

I stayed at the Econo Lodge in Visalia for World Ag Expo in February, 2012. Our company's travel manager screwed up and this was the last hotel available in town. There's a good reason everyone else avoided this place. The single word to describe the property is "dump". The hotel is a motel with individual entry doors for each room. My room was surrounded with old lamps and toilets from rooms being renovated.

The room itself was old and worn. The bed linens were scratchy and I think I could actually see through the towels. The lights in the bathroom and sink (they're separate areas) have these funky auto-on features. Supposedly, they should save energy by turning off when nobody is in the room. The thing was, if you moved sufficiently, the lights would turn on. I got up in the middle of the night and inadvertently turned all the lights on in the room. Crazy.

The breakfast is an offering of fat-laden danish or cold cereal. You can choose from Frosted Flakes or Fruit Loops. Sometimes they had yogurt, but get there early. They only put a few out and when they were gone, they're gone. The only healthy breakfast food was fruit.

Service was OK - the front desk help also took care of the breakfast area, but they generally kept to themselves. My room card failed about 2 days into my stay and the front desk attendant changed it without problems. I didn't interact with them otherwise.

The property is located in a rough area of town. A gun shop is across the street and most of the properties in the areas sport bars across the windows and doors. Not the most welcoming area.

If I had to, I'd stay at the Econo Lodge again. But only if I HAD to.

On my recent trip to the West, I visited Kings Canyon/Sequoia National Park. Since I travel on an extremely limited budget, I look for places in the $70-$80 range. I had to drive to Visalia, a good sized town about an hour away from Kings Canyon, to find accomodations that fit the bill. I decided on Econo Lodge because of their reputation, and ease of finding it in the town. When I checked in, the front desk person was very nice and helpful. The room was large and clean, and the bed was comfortable. There is a small pool on the premises that several families were using. There are restaurants nearby, if you wish to eat out, but I travel with a cooler and food. The only problem that I had was that I asked for, and got a ground floor room; however, the family above me had a small child that constantly was jumping and banging. I tried to go to bed at about 10pm, but the thumping and banging continued until 11pm when I called the manager to ask that she get the people to settle the child down. She didn't seem anxious to comply with my request, but said that she would; however, the banging and thumping continued until well after midnight, and started up again before 6am. Needless to say, I didn't get a good night's sleep. The "breakfast" the next morning was not what I wanted, so moved along to someplace else.

This was a cheap motel in a remote area. The weather forced us to have the AC the whole time they unplugged it both days so the room was hot at night. We didn't try the pool, which was surrounded by barbelled wires so the neighbors wouldn't get in. The breakfest (waffles) was good but minimal. I guess you get what you pay for.
Like I said, In and Out!