Arriving into Wodonga around 3:00 pm was…something of a surprise. Looking at it on a map it looks an average sized (rural) city area, but I wasn't expecting it to be as busy as it was.
It didn't help I guess that it was peak school pick up times.
I was staying at the Motel 24, which was quite close to the freeway and the main road connecting Wodonga and Albury, which also made it somewhat difficult to get to coming off the freeway as it was on the west side of the road.
With my phone plugged into my ute for Google Maps suggesting I turn across the the traffic in the other lane and do a loop (at least that's what it looks like replicating it now in maps) or needing to do a u-turn on High Street in Wodonga, neither of which I wished to do on the quite busy road, I went for a little drive around Wodonga.
New Coles in Wodonga
It certainly feels like a town which has recently expanded quite a bit to accommodate a new population, with new buildings and A LOT more traffic which the roads seemed to barely be coping with.
In looking into this now, it seems the Wodonga Rail Bypass realigned the rail track away from the inner city of Wodonga moving the railway station from where it had been. I assumed something like it had happened when I later parked and ate at Mann Central Shopping Centre. Which was new and looked like it had been recently developed.
Eventually I found myself back to Motel 24.
I booked this motel because it looked modern and did not feature brown bricks. It also had no check in, or rather no check in reception, it was all through a "state of the art check in system".
Problem number one, I parked at the check in and proceeded to begin the check in process, then someone came in behind me, I was half way through the process which seemed to be taking a really long time.
In hindsight I should have parked inside and then walked back to the check in touchscreen. But I didn't and was a little flustered by the old person in their red Hyundai beeping their horn while I was trying to check in. I moved my ute and parked across four spots, which seemed to annoy the person who'd tooted because they drove through the motel and drove off.
Returning to the check in screen the "state of the art" might have been a few years ago when it opened. Now you can clearly see a mouse cursor on the touches of the touch screen and you need to be careful with these touches too.
It's fine, it works, it's just not as responsive as you might be used to with modern touch interfaces.
You don't get a room key, once you get through the check in process which involves agreeing to the terms and conditions it then assigns a number for the room key, by default this is your mobile phone number you used to book the room plus the # key.
Then when you get to your room there is a number pad on the wall, you punch in your number and the door unlocks.
It's very efficient.
The car parking spots are on an angle and they do not really align with the the rooms. The room I had booked a king single room was at the very front of the building on the right as you come in. A Ford Falcon was parked in the spot closest to the room and this spot was one of the few on that side that wasn't on an angle. I parked in the next one down but one, which meant there was a sport between mine and the Falcon, but no car would have been able to get in. (Image of entrance)
I think it must have been in the about book inside the room that said that parking wasn't assigned and you could park anywhere you wanted. But it was a bit of an odd change from most other motels where you essentially park outside your room and there's a spot per room.
The book of information in the room had obviously not been updated recently, despite being plastic pocketed paper so they could have, because of the suggested places to eat was an Irish pub across the road, which had shut down.
I elected to go into town and go to the Mann Shopping Centre which I'd driven past earlier in the day so knew there was easy to get to parking there.
I ended up at Burger Urge, which didn't have any defined opening times unlike some of the other dining options I looked at that were around Wodonga if I wanted a more pub-type meal.
I was the only one in there when I first walked in, signed in with the QR code when I stepped inside. It was nice, the tables were a little high.
The style aesthetic is industrial meets bar, but with a lot of windows all around, and round booths with green leather seats. It was here that I was sat opposite the quite large door.
As I sat having ordered there were several food delivery people coming in and out picking up food this was around 4:50 pm. I'd not had lunch and wanted to eat and go back to my motel room early so I could relax and get an early night.
Watching the traffic go past on Elgin Boulevard and High Street further cemented that Wodonga had increased in population but the roads not kept up because there was a lot of traffic. It was fortunately flowing without any issues, but seemed from where I was sat quite fast despite a 50/60km speed limit. Also sat where I was I could see a former rail bridge / signal lights across the road, which made me realise that this area had been rail-related before obviously all being turned over to commercial.
The motel room itself seems to be trying to offer more than your average motel room, or possible steal some people away from AirBnB-type accommodations by offering a kitchenette, including two burner induction hot plate, extractor fan, along with toaster, microwave and various knives, cutlery and bowls / plates. Although only two of the cutlery and bowls. Which given the room's bedding arrangements etc that's probably more than enough. There was also a full sized fridge, it being within cabinetry and perhaps being a better brand of fridge it was not remotely noisy.
Milk was provided in the fridge in the form of two different brands of 15ml UHT single serve milks (Dairy Farmers and Anchor).
Tea (Lipton's), Sugar and Instant Coffee (Moccona) was also provided.
The bathroom was fine, with an unusually deep stainless steel sink, until you remember that any of the cooking items you use in the room you're expected to wash up and put on the provided dish rack, otherwise you're charged a $25 cleaning fee.
The shower is a "rain style" shower. It's a large square shower head mounted from the ceiling, which is glorious to use. However, because of the angle of where the door hinges for the shower, and how the water hits you, a large amount does make it through the (about 1mm) gap between the door and the rest of the shower, it makes the floor a bit wet. Not so much that the bath mat and towel can't mop up.
Being on High Street and closest to the road there was road noise in my room at Motel 24, but it wasn't egregious road noise. Once it got into the evening the traffic dropped down to a pretty low volume and noise level.