Strangely perhaps it requires but a common – though far from ordinary – feature to distinguish a fine hotel from one that is passable. That distinction is the family touch – that feeling you get when you’re home again, reduced to the elemental but highly functional ingredients of practiced familiarity.

As I suspect is the case with most people, upon our arrival at the hotel we were physically and emotionally drained from travel and hadn’t any especial expectations or predictions concerning the commercial triumphs of the hotel. Immediately upon entering the room, and after unraveling my luggage to retrieve my shaving kit and accessories, I discovered in the bathroom a small cosmetic bench under the counter. That, I speedily reasoned, would enable me in my unenviable state of decomposition painlessly to complete my morning ablutions! I should add too that the front desk manager had already arranged to install a bench for me in the shower. And – by further demonstration of the exclusivity of this hotel – what had delayed us from the room during that particular domestic activity was plugging an electric charger into our car at a prearranged reserved space in the hotel parking lot (the cost of which power was free).

Nor were these details the only astonishment upon our arrival. As i was completing the arrangement of my toiletries on the counter I saw a glass. There were two of them. They were not plastic cups in plastic sleeves. They were real glass – and of proportionately diminished size for summary usage in a bathroom.

The remainder of the day was marked by the convenience of a family restaurant immediately across the street. The staff there were exceedingly kind and buoyant, reflecting the generosity and warmth of the hotel’s front desk manager. We did not make use of the hotel spa but we were invited to do so. Instead we languished satisfactorily in the room both before and after of early evening repast. By the end of the day the vehicle had been fully recharged and relocated to a handicap spot nearby the front of the hotel.

While our departure this morning from the hotel was agreeable in every sense (the reconnection to our highway route was effortless), the breakfast precedent was memorable. The restaurant staff were superb! Without having to ask, Lucille offered a complete review of the menu; then – having heard of my preferences – arrived at table with everything in hand. My partner attended the toaster and variety of culinary additives directly – returning with homemade strawberry jam, chocolatine, in-house baked beans and creton, caramel sauce (reminiscent of tarte au sucre), and hardboiled eggs with mayonnaise.