If you and your special someone go to a hotel in Prague, Czech Republic, but don’t want anyone to know, the name to register under is “Pan a Pani Novak.” In Paris, check in as “Monsieur et Madame Dupont.” In Milan, Italy, make it “Signor e Signora Rossi.”
This is just one of the helpful hints in “The Smiths’ Hotel Collection Europe,” one of two English travel guides created by a couple that have checked into hundreds of hotels undercover.
Their real names are Tamara Heber-Percy and James Lohan, and they came up with the idea for their sexy guides after a weekend getaway at a hotel that sounded perfect in the guidebook but turned out to have all the aphrodisiac charm of a retirement home.
They decided to write a hotel guide that would help discriminating couples find the right places to sneak away. Their first book, in 2003, was on hotels in Britain and Ireland and was followed in 2004 by their European cities collection. Now they have a Web site (mrandmrssmith.com) that offers Internet booking, discounts and special hotel extras to Mr. and Mrs. Smith members. A volume on American hotels is in the works for 2007.
Heber-Percy and Lohan enlisted a cadre of young English-style aficionados–fashion designers, club owners, foodies and hoteliers–to help research and write the books.
Their mission is to get the real scoop by taking a weekend getaway at a hotel with their honey, doing so anonymously.
Mr. and Mrs. Smith guides tell people where to eat, shop, party and hang out. Tourist sights also are mentioned. But these aren’t Blue Guides. Mr. and Mrs. Smith readers hope to go away and spend the whole weekend in the hotel room.
Your books are geared to short breaks. Do you think that’s the way most people travel?
JL: Everybody’s so … busy these days, they can’t afford to take (long) vacations. They don’t want to come back to a mountain of work.
Do you think people really plan to stay in their rooms while on vacation?
JL: Some of the more energetic Mr. and Mrs. Smiths might. These days, hotels are designed with the couple in mind. They’re so much better than home. … People come to your room to give you a massage. They serve your dinner on the terrace.
In America, it seems women are more interested in romantic getaways than men. Is that different in Britain?
THP: I find it hard to believe that a man wouldn’t want to spend time with his partner in an amazing place, especially if it has a big bed.
JL: The French claim they invented the dirty weekend. But we (Englishmen) like to date our girls a few times and then take them away to some great country house hotel, like they do in “Bridget Jones.”
So that whole no-sex-please-we’re-British thing is outdated?
THP: Before, no one wanted to talk about it. But if a couple is going away, it’s there. What are they going to do–sit and tell stories? Sex is a big part of it, and hotels should make you feel that way.
