The main difference between 'now' and 'then' was more about the location of the hotels rather than the hotels themselves. Places like Bora Bora, the Seychelles, Maldives, African safari parks, Komodo etc were far better before the advent of mass tourism and development. The hotels, though, were far less luxurious than we are used to these days. Just think of what cars were like in 1970 and what they are like these days. Even major city hotels in Paris, London or New York might have had wonderful service but the 'hard product' as it's called on this Forum would barely be a three-star these days. For me the real game changer was Amandari in 1990 which was on a totally different level to everything I had experienced before. Bali was also beautiful back then. Now it isn't.