Living in washington DC i can definitely agree - unless you are ok with long unexpected and unexplained delays steer clear of any presidential situation.
Not hotel related, but personal experience - I live in an urban area of DC. Walked out of my front door one evening and our entire street was cordoned off by secret service and local police because President was at a function 1 block down. Walked the other direction, had dinner and came back and attempted to get back into our building which was about 30 feet past where the street was blocked off.
It is pouring rain by the way. Police officer says stop the street is closed. I point to my front door and say I live right there so I continue walking (obviously a mistake). He yells "SIR - STOP RIGHT THERE" and moves to draw his weapon. So I back up and stand under a store-front awning for 20 minutes while this poor guy stands out in the middle of the street in the absolute pouring rain. He actually drew his weapon on a car that inadvertently turned down the street and made the driver get out of the car in the middle of the street and stand there for 10 minutes with no umbrella or anything - they driver was in a sports coat and could not have gotten any wetter if he had jumped in a pool.
Eventually they just opened the street - no motorcade came through. Assuming this was a backup / emergency evacuation route or something.
Last edited by TMAYER; Sep 7, 2006 at 11:32 am