“It was three days into our week-long New Year’s holiday, and I’d finally let myself unwind from the madness of Christmas,” recalls Canberra mum-of-two Leanna.
“We were on a family trip to an all-inclusive resort in Mexico with my parents, my brother and sister, and their partners and kids. My husband Allan went back to the room to get some more sunscreen for the kids while I lounged by the pool thinking how long it had been since I’d felt this relaxed. In fact, I was remembering the vivid dream I’d had the night prior - a sign that I’d been really deeply asleep.”
When Allan got up to the room, however, he discovered the key no longer worked, and visited the concierge to get a new one - where he got far more than he’d bargained for.
“As soon as he identified himself to the concierge, they pulled him into this little room with two resort security guards,” says Leanna, shaking her head in disbelief. “Then started lecturing him about this being a family resort, and a zero-tolerance policy on nudity and sexual behaviour. Allan had no idea what was going on, until they showed him the video.”
Security personnel showed Leanna’s husband something unexpected on their computer - footage of his dazed-looking wife wandering haphazardly down the hotel corridor. The kicker? She was completely naked.
“Allan knew immediately what must have happened,” the mortified school teacher continued, “I’m an occasional sleep-walker. On this night, I’d gone to bed nude because it was so warm in the room, and, the bathroom being right next to the hotel room’s entrance, I must have been trying to go to the toilet, then found myself locked out.”
The footage continued until a female security guard arrived on screen with a towel to cover Leanna’s body and gently escorted her back to her room, where Leanna assumes she went back to bed without disturbing the other members of her family, completely unaware of what had happened.
“Allan came back to the pool barely able to contain his laughter, and told me there was an issue we had to attend to at the front desk,” says Leanna.
“He explained on the way what had happened, and I wanted to fall through the floor. My blood ran cold when I saw the footage, and the poor security personnel couldn’t even meet my eyes. They explained they thought I might have been on drugs, or a sex-worker soliciting for clients, but after we cleared it up everyone seemed keen to just put the incident behind us, none more than me!”
Leanna, recalling the “vivid” dream she’d had the night before, realised that she’d actually been remembering her experience trying to get back into the hotel room, rather than enjoying the rested slumber of the truly relaxed.
And while she was eventually able to enjoy the rest of a holiday with the help of a few poolside margaritas to soften the sting of humiliation, she says one thought occasionally keeps her up at night.
“Apparently I’m not the first person to find themselves sleepwalking naked in a hotel,” she says, “and there are certain sites online on which you can find security footage that has been leaked. While the resort staff were absolutely adamant that all footage was destroyed a few weeks after being recorded, I just pray that is actually the case, and I don’t end up online.”
“Still though,” she says with a wry smile, “six months on, it makes for an excellent story. I’ve put an end to sleeping naked on holidays though. Too risky!”