My husband and I drove to Atlanta to camp at Stone Mountain and visit the Georgia Aquarium and the IKEA store. When we arrived at Stone Mountain, we weren't allowed to check in because the campground had been hit by a tornado. It was getting late and we had only budgeted for the campsite, so we stopped at the first cheap-looking hotel we saw - a Motel 6 off Highway 78.

The people who checked us in were polite and the cost of the room was just $55, but at that rate it is overpriced. The room itself was pretty nasty - old and run-down and not very clean. We had asked for a non-smoking room, but there was an ashtray on the table and a marijuana stem floating in the toilet. There was also a huge, unattractive stain on the carpet.

But the worst part was the bed. The dingy, stained mattress was covered only by a thin sheet that had lost its elastic and kept coming off the corners. With no mattress cover or anything else between me and the mattress, I was pretty... more