Top sheets in hotels

I find the duvets too hot as well. I always pack a twin sheet with me (if the sheets are itchy at all I can't sleep) so I just use that DH loves the duvet - apparently he is part lizard!

Some hotels use top sheets, some don't. You can try taking a look at the photos, or you could email or call the hotel and ask if they provide "draps plats".
I wouldn't bring a sheet from home, but if you absolutely needed one, you could pick up an inexpensive one in France.

Most residents don't use top sheets, either - it's just one more thing to wash.

German/Austrian people at home and hotels often use duvets with duvet covers. They just change the duvet cover instead of a top sheet. Personally, I love it as I always get tangled up in bedding consisting of multiple blankets and sheets. And at home it's so much quicker to make your bed in the morning!

French people traditionally don't use duvets. Our French friends were actually baffled as to how to sleep in a German bed with a duvet when they were visiting us in Germany ;-) So I think you most likely will find similar bedding as to what you are used to at home.

Thank you for the replies! I will follow up with the hotels.

I think if it's as important an issue for you as it seems to be, I would bring my own top sheet.

We all need different things to be comfortable -- if that's yours, then fine! No one's going to control what goes into your bag.

I find European bedding to be quite perplexing, being used to a sheet and blanket and thin quilt at home. I don't like my feet hanging out and that seems to happen with duvets so I usually end up with it tucked around my feet, and I'm usually too warm.

I find European bedding to be quite perplexing....

Friend who operated a European style Canadian lodge with duvet bedding said that some Americans slept inside the duvet cover thinking it was some kind of sleeping bag.

If you want to bring a warm weather alternative sheet try a silk sleep sack.

Some hotel do have them & some don't.
When we were visiting Provence this June, it was quite warm, so we also took the comforter out of it's cover & used the cover as a sheet.

We stayed in a B&B in Amboise, where they did have top sheets, but most of the hotels we stayed in, didn't as far as I recall.

My daughter actually packed a twin top sheet when she studied in Scotland where they don't have top sheets, so you can certainly do the same.
I wouldn't bother because I wouldn't want the extra weight in my carry on luggage.
I have, however, packed a small soft, down pillow! ;-)

Jo in Frankfurt told me how she asks for an extra duvet cover, so that is what we did when the temperature rose and we didn't have air conditioning. That way you don't fiddle taking the duvet out of the cover, but just set it aside and ask for one to use as a top sheet.

All of our family and friends in France use top sheets, whether with blankets or quilts or old family feather quilts.

Seriously?

Travel is about things being different .

I sleep in whatever bedding is provided as long as its clean.

There are some things people really like to have 'close to home' -- one is breakfast which is why international hotels serve pickled fish and rice and pongee as well as bacon and eggs and another is bedding.

I find most duvets too hot as well and so prefer so sleep against them with a sheet covering me -- I cope when that isn't available, but in France in an apartment with only a bottom sheet and duvet during fairly hot weather, we just took the duvet out of the cover and used the cover as a top sheet during our stay. It as too hot to have anything more. sometimes a hotel or apartment will provide another sheet on request; I did that in London when our apartment only had the duvet. The owner thought it was weird -- but we slept better.

Our apartment in Paris had a top sheets on the twin beds and just a duvet cover on our double bed. Since we tend to sleep just under a sheet in the summer, but we do like at least a sheet, this was problematic. We solved the no top sheet problem the same way we did in The Netherlands, The Czech Republic and Austria, by removing the duvet cover and using it as a top sheet. It is of course twice as thick as a sheet, but much thinner than the comforter it covered.

I use the same approach as pat mentioned - whatever is provided is just fine with me. In hotels which use Duvets, I just cover as much of myself as necessary to achieve the desired level of comfort, and that always works well.

Friend who operated a European style Canadian lodge with duvet bedding said that some Americans slept inside the duvet cover thinking it was some kind of sleeping bag.

Edgar made my day!!! Wish there was a LOL button to click!

This has caused me to chuckle a bit as we have the same problem with duvets, just too warm and heavy. We also took the sheet off of the duvet when we stayed in a lovely hotel in Lucerne and now I see we are not the only ones. We have friends that love the heavy feeling of the duvet, again proving we are all different! Sometimes you think you are the only one with a certain preference and then it's addressed in this forum, gotta love it!

Travel is about things being different .

@Pat, after you have had hot flashes that have kept you awake ALL NIGHT long so that you are so tired in the morning that you will be immediately cast as an extra for "The Walking Dead", and the thought of having a comforter on top of you makes you cringe in horror, then you will sufficient information to support your position convincingly.

And, we now know why the French have the expression: "chacun a son gout."

We like to have a top sheet too because the duvets are usually too hot. If there isn't one, we just ask at the front desk and we have always received one.

I know where you are coming from. Last year we stayed at an airbnb apartment in Paris and it was just a fitted sheet and duvet. Of course, halfway thru the night, it got too hot, so I pushed it off me, Thirty min later I'm too cold. It's hard to get a good night sleep when you keep waking up because you're too hot/cold. Some people are more sensitive to sleep temp. Hubby on the other hand doesn't seem to care. I actually think in all our years of travelling that's the first time I can recall ever not having a top sheet!

Smag.. sorry.. been there and doing that.. I throw covers on and off all night.. hot and sweaty flash.. throw off cover.. later cooled down and chilly from evaporating sweat.. cover up.. and so the cycle goes.. for years apparently.
I still make do.. covers are removable.

Agree with the view as long it is clean, I sleep in it, but sleeping with a duvet is great in what I have experienced in Austria and Germany in hotels and Pensionen.

Don't like the duvet, even in the winter. Way too warm for use in the European hotels especially considering how warm most of the rooms have been to start with. I like a cool to chilly room to sleep in. Can't remember when the last time was I slept under any kind of a blanket/comforter anywhere anyway.

Smiling at some of the humorous replies!

I travel a lot for work to San Diego, and the hotels have the thick duvets. Seems like someone from a different part of the US set the standard across their hotel chains. No way could I sleep with the heavy interior portion of the duvet! Most of the hotel staff leave it off after Day 1 because I have it stacked neatly away from the bed.

We usually remove the duvets or top blanket in Europe, also, to save the hotel from the need to run the air conditioning so high all night.

I actually prefer just having a duvet or at home I just use a quilt (not to get personal but we each have our own quilt...no more tug of war). Top sheets interfere with our sleep. Maybe it is a New England thing but growing up in the winter we had top sheet, blanket, quilt, but in the summer we were set free and only had the quilt at our summer house. Less laundry to be done for my mother. This is rather a fun discussion, but what I don't understand is if the duvet is too hot for some people, why don't you sleep with no cover at all?

@Wray, without any cover, I shiver! :-)

I agree that the duvet is much too hot. 2 years ago I spent 5 nights in Lucerne (early September) in a hotel that had no air conditioning and windows that did not open (except for the bathroom). Hotel management provided an oscillating fan, God bless them. However it did nothing to cool me off when I slept with the duvet...I sweated constantly. Now I know to take it out of it's cover!!