When it comes to holidaying, Travel Guides stars Matt and Brett think the hotel experience is just as important as what’s on your itinerary.
For the married couple, they have had it all, everything from luxury in Tahiti, where they’ve watched stingrays through a skylight, to rooms that have horrified them.
One clear example? A hotel that had carpet in the bathroom!
“We had to put our shoes on to go to the toilet, because we didn’t want to walk on the carpet in the bathroom,” Matt shares exclusively with New Idea.
Thankfully, there were no such horror repeats this season, and their accommodation was stunning, especially in Indonesia.
“Essentially, it was built on the side of the hill. So, it was very James Bond,” Matt explains to us, before joking that it was “like the White Lotus without the murder”.
With all these years of travel experience under their belt, they’re taking everything they’ve learned to transform a 100-year-old bungalow they purchased before they signed on with the Channel Nine show.
It’s been on their agenda for 10 years, but their plans have changed every year. But now, they’re finally ready to make it their dream home.
While they intend to maintain its facade, the interior will be upgraded.
The couple tells us that so many people have asked them if they’re going to make their home like a hotel. However, that’s the furthest thing from their vision.
“We’ve seen things that we like and what we don’t like,” Brett shares with New Idea.
“There are so many dodgy bathrooms out there in a hotel where they’ve done a reno, and we go, ‘Okay, we’re not doing that.'”
When they’re travelling, they often leave the bathroom light on, so they can quickly orient themselves if they wake up in the middle of the night. To avoid having to do this in their dream home, they are making one crucial design choice so they won’t have to run up their electricity bills.
“We’re getting a master switch near the bedhead so that we could just go to bed, turn it off, and everything goes quiet,” Brett continues, as the solution to spending 10 minutes trying to figure out the light switches in hotels.
They have an ambitious 12-month goal for their renovation, so they won’t have to deal with any building work in their retirement.
