Ideal Hotel Tips

I love love love hotels!!!! I love the rooms, the pools, and the entire experience! I believe this stems from many happy and fun memories of hotels with my family and with my Dad (my parents divorced when I was 6).  I have played games, spent hours and hours swimming, watched cable TV (before it was the norm), and laughed a lot!

For most children, merely the idea of staying in a hotel is exciting but children are children and eventually you may hear the words – “I am bored…” Hotels are fun but at the times we may need to entertain our children.

We stay in hotels for a few reasons – a trip, a stopover, a visit, a wedding, or a business trip. You need to decide the point of the trip before you choose the hotel. Are you staying purely as a stopover or is it a vacation? Are you part of a business trip? Are you at a location where you only sleep in the room or are you somewhere where the room is the trip?

If the hotel is a stopover, then the choice should be about convenience, cleanliness, and sleeping – amenities are not a major part of the decision.  However, if you are there for a few days, enjoy the following advice on Family Fun in a hotel!!!

First and foremost, the reason you are in a hotel is the first key to deciding on a location. As mentioned above if you are on a stopover, convenience is usually the key. You may want a pool or a nice restaurant close by for a break. If you are on a trip like visiting Disneyworld, and you will only be in the hotel to sleep, location and things like shuttles are what you want to look for.   But we often find ourselves in hotels for a variety of other reasons – travel, business trips, weddings, or many times the hotel is the trip!

Yet the words “I am bored” still arise...  Children will be children...

Ideal hotel fun tips are:

• Choose a location you will make a lot of use of. If you love to swim, find a waterslide or a pool but if you love to shop make sure the room is near a mall. Whenever we can, we accompany my husband on a regular business trip to a great hotel with pools, waterslides, a mall near by and we stay pool side. The kids love it as they can swim non stop and I love it because I can let them!



• Do the opposite of home and have fun with it. We do not watch a lot of TV, so in hotels I let my children watch away – they love it. Eat out or eat in more… do things different! If possible let them jump on the bed, sleep in their clothes, have a pillow fight, sleep with mom or dad, skip a nap or a bath, have a treat before bed, eat sugar cereal… Make it unique and fun!



• Be willing to spend a little bit more to get the right room or hotel. We paid $10.00 more to have a poolside room, we have paid a few more dollars to have a pool, or we have paid to be close to our destination. Overall the fee difference often saves you time and money. Another option is to stay farther away to experience something new. During a stopover in Boston we went to Cape Cod for a few nights – it was amazing.



• Plan ahead and bring new and different treats, games, and toys. I have stocked up at the dollar store or at garage sales. I keep these secret until I NEED them…



• Children love new ideas, treats, and toys. A new puzzle, a new trinket or as I have found recently a new $7.00 electronic card game entertains children for hours.



• Create unique experiences – we eat cereal in a cup with a plastic spoon keeping the milk cold in ice in the sink. If there is a mini bar, I clear it out and fill it with fun food – fresh raspberries on a trip are as exciting as candy.



• Allow for a few treats – room service is pretty exciting for children (I still find it exciting myself...)

And finally, parents you need to relax and enjoy yourself. When we are relaxed, so is everyone around us. Pillow fights, a bit of candy, and flipping channels are not things to worry about in a hotel. We can and DO get so caught up in the little things that we forget the point of a holiday – act like children, and you will have the best trip ever!

Tracy Lyn Moland is a time and mom management expert. For more information visit her website www.TracyLynMoland.com or read her best selling book, Mom Management (tgot, 2003).