Hotel Review: InnSuites Tucson Foothills

Living in Phoenix in the fall and winter is pretty sweet. I'm just now starting to forget four months of scorching, unrelenting summer heat. I can go outside without fear of dehydration!

But still, I needed a change of scenery. That lead Sarah and me to Tucson to hike a bit and check out the Arizona-Sonoran Desert Museum (a post on that is coming up soon). We wanted to spend the night, and I got online to find a decent place the morning we left - the day after Thanksgiving, no less!

I quickly found the InnSuites Tucson Foothills, which is owned by Best Western. The often-handy (but sometimes maddening) GoogleEarth helped me find it. I wanted a place a little farther from the University of Arizona, and a little closer to hiking trails. Here are some bits you need to know about this hotel:

1. Hiking trails are about 10 minutes away. Not bad! And it's actually a really good system. The Pima Canyon trail can keep you occupied all day. The scenery is striking and varied.
2. The rooms all seem to have comfortable beds and decent lighting. They all appeared to be clean and well-maintained. Each room had its own region-inspired name, which was kind of funny. Ours was the Show Low Suite, or something like that.
3. Try to get a room on the second floor. The tiled floors downstairs make a racket in the morning once all the housekeeping carts depart for their rounds.

Now, this last one is the big one:

4. Do not, under any circumstances, stay in room 146. Here's why:
-It's right next to the headquarters for the hotel's cleaning staff. So you can always hear the jet engine-like whine of the commercial-grade laundry facilities. You can also hear the staff talking and loading up. And those carts I mentioned earlier on the tiled floors? Yeah. This does not equal a good night of sleep.-When we were there, we could hear the strangest noise coming from one of the walls in the bathroom. It was almost like a dripping sound, but there was no reason, rhyme or rhythm to it. The sound would speed up, slow down, disappear for a few moments, then come back with a vengeance it's not a big deal if you have the TV on. But it really sucks at 3 a.m.