Trendy Seattle Digs
When we booked a hotel in Seattle for two nights through Hotwire, we weren’t sure what we’d get.
If you are unfamiliar, Hotwire is one of those online services which can get you deep discounts on hotel reservations as long as you are comfortable with the fact that you won’t know exactly where you will be staying. After you put in your credit card number, they tell you the name of the hotel where you have booked a reservation. A reservation which you cannot cancel.
We were looking for a kid-friendly place to stay in downtown Seattle and, being that we are now a traveling family on a budget, we wanted to take advantage of any discounts we could find. So we rolled those crazy internet dice and booked through Hotwire.
And that is how we ended up with a room at the W Hotel.
There was a time in my life when this would have thrilled me. The W, especially in Seattle, is the hangout of cool, urban designer types who wear chunky eyeglasses, dress in chic black and walk around murmuring into their iPhones. Now, it heaves me right back into memories of my unsatisfying dotcom career experience, with the long hours, crazy travel, and bottomless expense accounts. Bottomless expense accounts are ALWAYS a bad business model.
But the W? With a seventeen month old? Kid friendly? They are joking, right? I am at my most unhip right now, frequently schlepping binkeys around in the side pockets of the worn cargo pants which have become my mom uniform. I don’t have the wardrobe for the W anymore, certainly not while traveling. But we were stuck and the W is where we were staying.
By the way, trying to kid proof a room at the W is like trying to make a china shop safe from a browsing bull. Okay, maybe it wasn't THAT bad. But it was close.
Advantages of staying at the W with a toddler:
-Very stylish, minimalist crib
-Big screen TV upon which to watch an almost life-size Elmo
-DVD player for watching Finding Nemo back to back, repeatedly.
-Large mirrors where a toddler can admire herself while dancing to the techno CD the W has kindly provided in the room's CD player (sorry about those hand prints on the mirror, W!)
-Mini-fridge for the sippy cups!
Disadvantages of staying at the W with a toddler:
-Raised eyebrows of other guests (who all look svelte and put together) when you carry a sleeping toddler into the lobby at 2 am. Especially when you and the toddler smell like the barf she produced in the baggage claim area of the Seattle airport when she became tired and overstimulated.
-Toddler who wakes up immediately because there is dance music blaring in the lobby at 2 am.
-Votive candles that cover EVERY LOW SURFACE in the lobby. Candles that chubby little hands really, really, really want to touch.
-Room service menu where a grilled cheese sandwich can cost almost twenty bucks after taxes and delivery charges.
-Floor to ceiling windows that make it almost impossible to completely darken the room so the toddler gets up at 4:30 am Seattle time.
-Having to take all of the mini-bottles of trendy vodka out of the mini-fridge to fit the sippy cups in there.
-Being tempted by the mini-bottles of vodka at 4:30 am when toddler is running around the room and you have only gotten two and a half hours of sleep.
Crazy room, eh?
(5)
Looking for More?
| Search for more on 'The W Hotel' on this site. |
| Search for 'The W Hotel' on on other houseblogs like this one. |
| Search for 'The W Hotel' on Google. |
| Search for 'The W Hotel' on Amazon.com. |
Cabinet Refacing:
Face Your Kitchen | Your Guide to Kitchen Cabinet Refacing |
Comments
Oh, you're bringing me back to a fab time in my pre-kids life. I stayed at the W in Seattle at a conference many, many moons ago and had an amazing time. I agree with you that staying there now with my 2 1/2yr old terror and a newborn would be out of the question, but ah, the memories...
Posted by: pink | July 12, 2007 7:21 AM
Nice hotel...if you want to figure out WHICH hotel Hotwire is about to stick you in check out betterbidding.com before you do the final booking. I got screwed a few times on Hotwire before I started using betterbidding.com WITH hotwire.com
Posted by: iloveupstate.com | July 12, 2007 8:15 AM
Next time you visit the Pacific Northwest, you might try the Crowne Plaza in downtown Seattle. It's not completely kid-friendly, but there were some things I thought were great about it when my daughter and I stayed there awhile back.
The room we stayed in (I can't vouch for all of them) had sort of a hallway running the width of/parallel to the sleeping area. (There was a coat closet inside the entry door and bathroom at the far end of the hallway by the doorway into the sleeping area, but otherwise, it was a long empty space completely separate from the room. I just rolled the crib around the corner into the darkened hallway and it gave Chloe her own dark, quiet space to sleep in (and I didn't keep her up by watching the TV/checking email, etc.)
The Crowne Plaza chain has a sleep-well program, so all of the rooms have blackout drapes and CD players with soothing sounds CDs to help you sleep. I had been afraid Chloe would sleep poorly from overstimulation, but she slept like a rock - the CD provided some white noise to drown out the sounds of the hotel, and because of the blackout drapes, the room was as dark as a cave. The fridge was pretty large for a hotel fridge as well, which is always handy with a toddler!
It worked out really well for us and it was cheap too (through Hotwire, ironically enough.) It's right downtown - walking distance to everything.
Sure, laundry and a kitchenette would have been even better, but I couldn't exactly complain for $79 a night!
Posted by: Stephanie | July 12, 2007 1:37 PM
Wish I had known you guys were going to be in town, Aaron. I work about 2 blocks away from the W, and we could have grabbed some lunch. Drop me a line the next time you're in the area!
Posted by: Keith Anderson | July 12, 2007 7:03 PM
How much was the W? All that and no price, c'mon, you gotta' give us a price! ;)
Posted by: Richard | July 13, 2007 9:21 AM