'Horrified' tourist finds 'festering human poo' in Edinburgh Travelodge corridor

Staff told her it wasn't the first time this has happened.

The incident occurred on the first floor of the hotel.

A tourist who visited Edinburgh to do some shopping and sightseeing got a lot more than she bargained for when she returned to her city centre hotel at the weekend to find a 'full-sized human poo' on the floor of the hotel corridor.

Laura Garland, 33, was visiting the city from Belfast with her boyfriend, a university lecturer.

The couple arrived back to the Travelodge on Waterloo Place around 1am on Saturday morning to find the unpleasant mess on the carpet of the first floor.

The incident occurred on the first floor of the hotel.

Ms Garland reported the issue to reception, but the carpet was not cleaned until around an hour later.

A disgusted Ms Garland took to Twitter to complain of 'well over an hour of festering sh*t on Floor 1, Waterloo Place, Edinburgh Travelodge.'

She told the Evening News: "Around 1am, arriving back on the first floor, we discovered someone had relieved themselves; depositing a full sized, human poo. Then in their rush to vacate the scene appeared to have stepped in it."

"Horrified, I returned to reception to report this to the staff member on duty [...] the beleaguered staff member informed me it wasn’t the first time it had happened."

Ms Garland said the presence of the poo distracted her for the rest of the night.

"I went back to my room, and tried to go on with my evening. Alas, I couldn’t sleep, I couldn’t relax, knowing just outside my door, waiting to catch another guest unawares was the festering pile some miscreant had decided to deposit.

"An hour passed. The poo was still there. I heard a lady in the hall exclaim ‘That’s disgusting!’ She had removed her boots to tiptoe to her room as not to wake other guests…she may have failed there, but luckily had not stepped bare-footed in the mess. I reiterated that I had reported it. I went back to my poo-vigil at the door peep-hole."

The mess was eventually cleaned up by staff.

"Around 20 minutes passed and the poo was half-heartedly removed, and a unhealthy dose of air freshener unleashed," said Ms Garland.

"A wet floor sign stood sentinel over the stain. It was finally properly cleaned around 10am the following day."

The incident did not prevent Ms Garland and her boyfriend enjoying their stay in Edinburgh.

"All in all, we found Edinburgh a delightful city, and our hotel – mostly lovely. A swifter approach to unwelcome scatological guests is recommended," she said.

A spokesperson for Travelodge said: "We take hygiene and cleanliness of our hotels very seriously. Unfortunately a customer encountered an accident on the way to his room.

"Our hotel team cleaned up the area immediately and followed it up with a thorough deep clean in the morning. We would like to sincerely apologise to any customers who were affected by this isolated incident."