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Schrödinger's non-smoking rooms in Ireland

Posted by (Northeast Ohio, USA) on

Hi All, I am just booking rooms for a trip to Ireland this fall, using the "non-smoking" filter (among others) on Booking.com. Yet confirmations are coming in with the notation "non-smoking preferred", as though the rooms are non-smoking rooms, except when they are not.

I am wondering how often it happens that a non-smoking booking in Ireland is not honored and, in such cases, how bad the air quality is. We have been in a couple of places (in the US) where the "air freshener"-plus- stale smoke would about knock you over.

If such cases are rare, or the air quality still reasonably decent, not much harm done; clean air is not a medical necessity for us. Otherwise I see some rearranging of schedules in our future. Thanks

Posted by
1563 posts

Well the cat is out of the bag - or should I say box. In any event, Ireland was one of the first EU countries to ban smoking in the work place. I have never seen anyone smoke in a hotel or B&B. Nor have I smelled cigarette smoke in a hotel room. And if anything, finding a hotel room that permits smoking is harder than finding one which prohibits it. So I don't think you (or Schrodinger's cat) need to worry.

Edit to add: Maybe you should go to the hotel/B&B's website to double check whether smoking is permitted in the rooms? That would give you the most reassurance.

Posted by
219 posts

I don't think there can be too many hotels left that offer smoking rooms any more, I can't even remember the last time I was offered a choice. Definitely best to check with your accommodations but I can't see there being any issue.

Posted by
27907 posts

I've only smelled smoke three times in European lodgings since 2015, and I've stayed in nearly 150 of them for about 600 nights. In all cases it was active smoke coming from employees or owners. They were small lodgings, and in two cases my room was very near the reception area where the on-duty employee/owner spent his or her time. The third case was a private room (soba) in a couple's home in Rovinj, Croatia. The male owner was a very heavy smoker. I had booked that room at a travel agency and neglected to ask about the smoking situation. Big mistake in Croatia.

Posted by
707 posts

Thanks everyone. This is looking like another case of my worrying too much. For all I know, every one of the 60-70 Booking.com places I've booked has had "non-smoking preferred" on the confirmation, and I just never noticed since I've always assumed that once you specified non-smoking as a filter, that was necessarily what you'd get. So maybe a non-smoking room is not for sure, but rather just overwhelmingly likely.

(And here is a Schrödinger joke: A veterinarian says to a man, "Mr. Schrödinger, it's about your cat--I have good news and bad news" :-)

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