A SURVEY of 2,100 corporate travellers by the website tripadvisor.com revealed that 12 per cent of the survey’s respondents had visited a strip club during a business trip.

This sensory trend was emphasised by the finding that favourite travel perks include “luxury sheets and fancy bath products”— all of which suggests that what business travellers claim to do with their leisure time and what they really do may not be one and the same.

This gap between perception and reality or, more accurately, between aspiration and reality is a constant source of frustration to hoteliers. They complain corporate clients insist there must be a gym — yet few guests actually use them.

Although some business travellers will seek the path of virtue, like spa treatments or running, many prefer instead to relax with vices. These range from the ones they are accustomed to at home, such as drinking and watching trashy television, to, it would appear from the survey, those they are not accustomed to at home.

Indeed the erotic impulse seems a strong one for the business traveller. Pornographic movies account for 60-80 per cent of the average hotel’s in-room entertainment revenues — a lucrative haul given that the average duration of a viewing is less than five minutes.

However, not all business travellers are students of the loving arts. Here are some alternative suggestions as to how they might profitlessly spend their down time during a trip:

Goodbye belt! One glance at fellow guests’ loaded plates in the hotel breakfast room shows where the average business traveller’s culinary interests lie within the spectrum between healthiness and cholestorol.

A business trip is at the very least an opportunity to enjoy those cuisines which do not agree with the palates of nearest and dearest left at home.

Hash House Harriers If the need to exercise cannot be ignored, at least make it fun.

The worldwide network of Hash House Harriers clubs meet regularly according to www.hhh.org.uk to enjoy a form of non-competitive running with the main objective of working up a decent thirst.

The accidental tourist One cannot be a Philistine for ever. For travellers with families, one of the genuine advantages of time away alone is the opportunity to do what cannot be done with children in tow, such as enjoying two quiet hours in an art gallery — or, of course, a strip club.