I left a book behind - 1215 - The Year Of Magna Carta. They charged me more on postage than replacing the book would have cost. I figured the postage price gouging was a stupid tax.
I would have simply bought another copy of the book, but the bookmark was one I’d hand embroidered in my teens and I wanted it back.
I left a very nice Mountain Hard Wear Gore-tex windbreaker on the back of a kitchen chair in Griesalp Switzerland, realized this in the middle of a fog heading up to Hothurli, and phoned back from Kandersteg to have it forwarded to my hotel in Geneva, where I would be three days from then. It was there, waiting for me. Hoo-rah, I loved that coat (since replaced by the manufacturer after having blown a pocket, bless 'em). It was pricey, too, and worth getting back.
I left a bag with two credit cards and $800 in cash in the room safe at a hotel in Argentina. I realized it when I was at the airport, but there was no way I could go back and retrieve the items and still make my flight. I eventually got the credit cards and most of the money back (they kept some to pay for their costs in getting it to me), but I never saw the bag again.
A few years ago, 3-year-old son left his beloved blanket in a hotel room in Fenwick Island, and we didn’t realize it until we got home. We called the hotel, and yep, they had the blanket, and the manager overnighted it to us.
I thought it was sweet, that housekeeping and management understood how much a little blanket means to a little kid.
So do car rental companies. I went back to get my car charger from the rental company. They showed me a huge box and said that if I didn’t see my exact one to just take one that would work with my phone.
And what is your system?
My dad left a bag containing most of our trip souvenirs behind in a hotel in Vienna, Austria. They shipped it back to Washington, DC for us. We’d bought a whole bunch of those painted eggshell ornaments at a market and surprisingly almost all of them came back unbroken.
When my son was 6 he gave me a hair brush for my birthday. It wasn’t fancy, just a pink, plastic hair brush. The rubber grip on the handle was torn, and I’m sure it was full of hair. Nasty for a stranger to have to handle, at best.
A year after his death, I left it in a hotel in Hawaii. I was beside myself. My husband made some calls, and it was on my dresser two days later. The hotel had, not just sent it free of charge, but sent it overnight.
I left a pair of socks in a hotel in Tehran and a plexiglass paperweight in a hotel in Seoul. Never saw them again.
My wife left her earrings in our room at the Hyatt in San Francisco. We called them the next day and they said the maid had found them and put them aside for safekeeping. We got them back when we next went into the city, about a week later.
My wife and I went to the Caribbean for our honeymoon. We flew out the day after our wedding. Somehow we managed to leave the envelope with our birth certificates in the hotel room where we spent our wedding night. (We needed the birth certificates to get back in the country at the end of our trip.)
The funny thing is, neither one of us remembered taking the envelope out of our suitcase, and when we couldn’t find it when we got to our destination, we just assumed that we had somehow forgotten to pack it. When we got home after the honeymoon the envelope was waiting for us in the mail - the hotel had mailed them back to us.
The campervan rental company wouldn’t take payment for returning my kid’s copy of Split Enz, Frenzy, they said they’d had too much fun bopping around the office when they played it, before packing it up like a fragile treasure and overnighting it back to us.
Left my keys in our room at the Minneapolis Hilton a few years ago and didn’t realize it until we’d landed at Philadelphia Airport and retrieved our bags. They overnight-shipped them to the house but that meant taking the train home, then after getting the keys, taking the train BACK to Philly so I could get the car (minus an extra day’s long-term parking fee) and drive it back home.
Grr I used to work in a hotel. We had a notice saying “check the room well before you leave, and remember to check plugs for appliances, because we won’t send anything if you forget it”. This was, of course, just to scare people, because we were sending people their stuff everyday. Obviously, I would send something back if someone asked. But it’s really annoying and some people want you to send stupid stuff to the other side of the world, like chargers. Just get a new one, pfff.
I have been asked to send a bottle of shampoo to Germany (ETA: I didn’t do that). I’ve kept several wedding rings for people picking them up later (never sent one though, would’ve been tempted to address it "Mrs. So-and-so instead of Mr.) We had cardboard boxes of chargers, glasses and “other”. The books went in the bookcase. We’ve also been accused of “finding” left-behind stuff and not giving it back. One time apparently a bright yellow tie. As if, who would want to steal that?!
I accidentally left my binoculars in a hotel in Madison Wisconsin. I called the hotel and was able to get them back. They were very nice about it. I usually do a double check of the room before I leave to make sure everything is packed and stowed. I was in a hurry that morning, though. We had driven about an hour away before I remembered they were missing.
I also left a book in a hotel in Vegas. I don’t remember how long it was before I even noticed. Long enough that I didn’t bother trying to call the hotel, I just bought a new (paperback) copy.
I once forgot an electric shaver and a plastic mug I was using for brushing my teeth. I didn’t make any particular effort to get them back, and I like the new shaver I got to replace it better anyway.
My best friend in Thailand, a fellow American, lives up in the Northeast and regulary travels around the region. One time, he borrowed my book 1776, by David McCullough and about the events of the American Revolution in that year, and left it in a hotel. He called there from another city days later, and they had it. It was several months before he was able to make it to that same hotel again, maybe almost a year, but they kept it for him. That was very good, especially since I can guarantee none of the staff had been reading it.
Continuing the teddy bear/blanket theme. When our daughter was three we stayed at a very nice resort hotel. She carried a little stuffed dog around with her everywhere she went (still does at age 6 actually). She managed to lose the dog somewhere on the property. Unfortunately that was the day we had explored the entire sprawling resort. Within 15 minutes of us tearfully reporting the lost dog (with picture) to the front desk at about 8pm, the place was crawling with every available staffer looking for the dog. Housekeeping, landscaping, security, bell boys, valet parking attendants, kitchen staff.
They found the dog very quickly, and my daughter was sleeping happily by 9.
Apparently they use this procedure for looking for a lost child, which apparently happens more often than you would imagine. Given the number of swimming pools that the resort had, having a small child wandering around unattended would be a disaster waiting to happen.
I was in Germany at a hotel that (unknown to me) had a shared balcony
On my third day there, I sat at the table on the balcony to eat & noticed a bag in the corner. It contained two bottles of German sparkling wine & a bottle of California wine, next to a filled ashtray & a lighter. Since I thought it was accidentally left by a previous guest in my room (It was outside & not in sight of the window, so I could see how housekeeping staff would not have seen it.) I took one of the bottles with me.
I offered the other two bottles to a friend of mine as I was flying out the next day. Much to my surprise, the bottles were gone, & so was the lighter; however, the ashtray full of butts remained. Looking around, I quickly came to the realization that the maid didn’t clean up (the cig butts were still there) but that this was a shared balcony & the bottles belonged to the guest(s) in the next room! When I confirmed my suspicion with the front desk they told me there was a new guest in the next room; the previous people had checked out.
The people in the next room are probably still trying to figure out where they “left” that bottle.
According to my friend, the bottle I took was a famous brand of (former) East German sparkling wine, not that expensive, but impressive.
Quite a few years ago I forgot to take a limited edition Bilal wristwatch with me when I checked out of a Holiday Inn at Vancouver.
Went back later the same day and described exactly where I had left it, but it was gone…
I still have the box and the signed accreditation about somewhere.
(I see there are a couple of more recent watches by him about but not this one; it had a very distinctively shaped minute hand)