Discovery Inn

The rooms themselves weren’t bad, and I thought we’d have a good stay. But the night desk clerk and another staff member turned it into one of the worst experiences of our lives. We had two rooms upstairs and were gathered in one of them when a tornado warning came in. It was around 10:25 at night, things were flying around, and someone’s car had been hit by debris. We called the desk because we had kids with us and asked if we could wait in the lobby. The clerk first said the lobby closed at 11, then confirmed it was still open, so we brought the children down. A second warning came while we were there. After about 15 minutes, things settled and we started heading back upstairs. My daughter has severe panic attacks, and my aunt is handicapped and can barely walk. They asked my sister to pick them up at the front desk so they wouldn’t have to walk back. As we were making our way to the room, the clerk said she was locking the lobby and left them waiting outside. One room door wouldn’t open, so we called my aunt, but the clerk was already driving off. My daughter had to stop her to get a new key. Before my mom could even come down for it, the clerk had left. The new key didn’t work because the whole lock had failed. We had no car keys, no milk for my baby, and no phone chargers, and our phones were dying. My daughter and aunt had to walk back upstairs to the one room while we tried to figure out what to do. Nobody told us the lobby would close or who to contact if a key didn’t work. With four adults and four kids stuck in one room around 11:30, we called the police because we didn’t know what else to do. My sister went down and found a lobby sign with two numbers to call or rooms to knock on. Neither number answered. My mom knocked on one room and got no answer. At the other, someone asked why she was knocking. They came up, couldn’t open the door, and got maintenance. While maintenance came upstairs to replace something, the clerk complained about us knocking on her door. They finally got the door working around midnight. It was a huge headache. I wouldn’t recommend this hotel during tornadoes, especially with small children. The night clerk seemed to care only about being out by 11, not whether we could get into our room. Thank goodness we had two rooms, or my kids could have been stuck outside. We didn’t even have the keys to our vehicles.