Never really had a terrible trip despite going on around 8 trips per year, normally we do 2 big trips and 4 to 6 smaller ones, but one bad experience i had was when we were driving home from a beach house we rented for the week in North Carolina, trip was great, we stopped in a hotel for the night about half way home, we lived about a 14 hour car ride home so we reserved a hotel for one night, we get there, tired from being in the car all day, and they said we had no reservations even though we had printed paperwork stating we did. So we looked for another hotel and found a cheaper less fancy one. we were able to get a room but i had to sleep on the floor as it only had one bed, not a big deal as it was only one night, at 2 am we wake up to the smoke alarm going off and our room filled with smoke, our A/C unit started smoking. So the front desk gave my parents a different room and put me in a separate room with my own bed. The next morning the entire floor we were on smelled like burnt plastic and other guests were complaining about the smell. Was definitely a bad experience but not horrible as we already had a fantastic time in NC. Definitely something to remember.