Bed bugs hate heat. So if you blow the hairdryer at full heat on the mattress (with the sheets pulled back) often times the bugs will come pouring out. They also like to hide between the mattresses. So pull up the top mattress and look between them. If there is an infestation look for frass (bug poop) in the seams of the mattress. Bed bugs like crevasses. Find tight crevasses and you'll be looking at highly desirable bed bug real estate.

If there you are covered in bites a little creative investigation should help you to find a sample to show.

Talk about my biggest travel fear. *shutters at the thought*

Read an article about this recently, talking about the rash of bed bug reports popping up around the country. The Bed Bug Registry (http://bedbugregistry.com/) was mentioned, but with ~200 nights in a hotel this year, I'm afraid to search for properties I've been to or will be at in the future.

+1

I no longer bring any cases into the hotel that aren't disposable. You'll recognize me as the traveller with a $10 vinyl Men's Warehouse hanging bag and $10 clear disinfectable rubbermaid box with my toiletries. Nothing of mine touches a surface that isn't disinfectable (i.e. hard table surfaces only and I pull those away from walls and fabric furnishings). When I get home my laundry goes directly into a hot wash and my bag is thoroughly checked. I only stay 70 nights a year and mostly at the same places so I've screwed up the courage to check The Registry at those places. No reports yet. *knocks on wood*

As one of the unlucky travelers that has brought them home, I am now nuts about looking for them the second I check into a room. If I find them, I am gone, no switching to another room. Another thing. I'm sure they are in airplane overheads, cargo holds below, airport carpet.... anywhere the traveler is. Paranoid? Maybe, but if you saw me throwing my mattress and box springs out my front door onto the lawn at 2:30 one snowy winter morning you'd understand my thinking!

Bedbugs were quite common once upon a time (look back a bit over half a century) in he US, and they are baaack! Though they are gross, and especially gross-sounding, they fortunately do not transmit communicable diseases, and can be prevented.

For travelers, keep your luggage off of soft / stuffed surfaces (couch, stuffed chair, etc.) and keep to wood, marble, glass or luggage jack. If you suspect bedbugs, 20 minutes at higher temperatures in the drier will do a reasonable job (even if you do not need to wash, a drier can be your friend). Keep a bedbug proof encapsulating cover on your mattress set.

There's lots more on reputable Internet sites (and lots of rubbish too, like the glurge circulating this year warning about "foreign-made" clothing, so caveat emptor applies here too), and bedbugregistry.com says, "The New York metro area has the worst infestation in the United States, with over 4000 bed bug reports."

There's no genuine reason to suspect the Waldorf=Astoria would be any less prone to bedbugs than the Hampton Inn and Suites, even though they would like you to think so.

Some useful guidance on how to identify signs of bed bugs. The tip about placing your luggage in the bath while you investigate is very clever.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/co...-bed-bugs.html

...and the tip about throwing away your suitcase is a little overboard :p

Hey- I was just there! No bedbugs for me, though, and I do some checking. Family picked up headlice from a higher end chain hotel in the 80's, so I'm a bit on the paranoid side myself. I don't disassemble the bed, but I do check under the sheets, and my suitcase always goes on the desk or other hard surface.

ick.

^^

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I think one can go overboard; one can get beddies on aircraft, for instance, or even busses. Travel enough to sufficiently varied places, it will happen. (With 7 continents and nearly 100 countries ranging from Canada to India, Laos, Guatemala, etc. I can tell you the only place I didn't worry was Antarctica, and it's not like I could check out, anyway.)

And if you want to dream (nightmare), I got a nice case of Sarcoptes scabiei, AKA scabies, on an airplane once. (Once on a Guatemalan intervillage recycled L A Unified school bus as well, but that's less surprising.) These little critters burrow into your skin and cause unreal itching... :eek:

Ouch! With a 3 night stay coming up at the W-A I wish I hadn't opened this thread :eek:

What misuse? Doesn't "shutter" mean "to close"? I thought it was quite clever as I closed the post and the laptop shortly there after (to think about more pleasant things like angry emails and the marked increase in political spam on my tv). But perhaps I shouldn't play so much with my words as not everyone gets the same giggles out of them that I do.

don't worry about it....i have stayed here a bunch of times....never had a problem....

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