I’m honored to have MrsMJonTravel herself author a guest post for the blog.  The only published author in the house, she also does her share of business travel for her day job.  I hope you’ll enjoy her review of a recent stay at the Renaissance Schaumburg.

I recently completed a one-night stay at the Renaissance Schaumburg Hotel.  Despite its suburban location, it’s got quite the chi-chi décor.  The lobby is a large open area that is divided off into more intimate sections by large wood bookcase-type pieces.

Check in was speedy.  They made an imprint of my credit card, and I was on my way up to the 4th floor.  I was a little concerned by the location.  My door faced out into the large open lobby area, so I was a little concerned about noise echoing up.  However, since I fell asleep shortly after going back to room, it wasn’t the issue I thought it might be.

The hotel features two restaurants that are open for guests arriving after 7 pm.  There’s a Sam and Harry’s Steak House and a more informal bar/restaurant called The Gathering.   I opted for The Gathering.  Service was very good, and the blue cheese steak salad was excellent.  The TVs showed the last game of the World Series, but the noise level in the bar/restaurant didn’t detract from my ability to converse with two colleagues.

The room featured a king size bed, flat screen TV, and a TV in the mirror of the bathroom.  I didn’t discover the TV in the mirror of the bathroom until I was getting ready the following morning.  Maybe I’m technologically inept, but I could only get it to turn on when I had the other TV on.  I put it on the same channel as the other TV so I could watch the news as I dried my hair, but the 10 second delay just created an annoying echo, and I ended up turning it off.  The other big annoyance was the lack of a quality AT&T signal.  I could only get my iPhone to work by leaning next to the window.

I didn’t have a lot of time to check out much of the hotel, but I did walk by the gym, which looked pretty nice and was adjacent to an indoor pool.  I tried to access the business center twice, but each time the door was locked.

I took advantage of the two free hours of WiFi in the lobby to do some work.  I did this from 11 am til noon and enjoyed a very quiet, rather empty lobby.  It was a very pleasant way to work.

Since I was there for a conference, I can say that the conference rooms are pretty nice.  I spoke in the Nirvana room.  I thought that was cool.  Our conference luncheon buffet had Chicago hot dogs and Chicago style pizza.  I thought that was a nice touch.

All in all, not bad for the ‘burbs of C-town.