5378: Hotel recommended (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Affuller@aol.com

Dear Corbetteers:

I've got a hotel to recommend to adventurous or impecunious travelers to 
Haiti: It's the Business Bar Hotel on Grand' Rue between Rue d'Ennery and Rue 
Champs de Mars.  Address: #495 Blvd. J.J. Dessalines.  It reminded me of the 
simple, cheap hotels I stayed in as a student traveling around Europe years 
ago.

Now staying on Grand Rue means stepping out into dirt and noise and 
night-time danger, but with a little caution, some people will find the 
compensation adequate.

Business Bar opened earlier this year.  It is clean and the staff are very 
helpful.  Right now, a room with a private bath, running cold water all the 
time, is $60 Haitian.  That's less than US$15 at the current exchange rates.  
A room with a shared bath is $45.   The hotel used to have a working Delco 
but it is out of order, which puts a visitor at the mercy of EDH.  Last week 
this meant about 10 hours of electricity a day, mostly during daylight hours, 
which left us with only candle light all evening long.  Each room has a 
first-class ceiling fan, which keeps one very comfortable when EDH 
accommodates.  The hotel has no telephone but if you have a cell-phone, and 
one can be rented at the airport for about the same daily price as this 
hotel, this is no obstacle.  Also, there is no place to park a car in 
security and no one in their right minds leaves a car out overnight on Grand 
Rue.

You can purchase your morning coffee from a street vendor down the block and 
eat at the fairly decent L'Union Restaurant a couple of blocks away.  
Business Bar has beers, juices, and soft drinks, and will provide treated 
iced drinking water.  The friendly and obliging manager of the hotel is 
Georges Belair and I promised him that I would do some advertising. Good luck!

Anne Fuller