FAMILY FRIENDLY HOTELS, AUSTRALIA

[caryn]

We are travelling to Australia with our 3 children aged 3,2 and 4 months in February staying in Melbourne for 3 weeks with my husbands work and then looking to fly north to spend 10 days away as a family. Does anyone have any advice on hotels that would be suitable? Preferably by the sea, with pool, kids club of some sort, child friendly rooms and food etc.

Also any top tips on flying long haul with small children gratefully recieved - one short stop 1.5 hours in Singapore.

whereabouts North?!?

No idea really about Melbourne.

If you do a search on long haul flying - there are a number of threads with hints.

Sunshine Coast - Qld - we stayed

here

We were in a self contained apartment.

no kids club but plenty to do - pool and grounds to play in, beach not far, lots of things to do in the sunshine coast area.

Have a look here for Melbourne.

We stayed at Darling Towers serviced apartments on Murphy Street when DD was 4yo. It's nowhere near a beach and doesn't have a swimming pool which I found very annoying but

worked out a reasonable price compared with hotels

was a short stroll to Toorak Rd - loads of restaurants, got to do Pinocchio's Pizza with children but other restaurants also welcoming -

only round the corner from South Yarra station where you could easily take the train to Melbourne's CBD or out to the beach at Brighton, Hampton or - our fave nd where we ended up living - Sandringham

St Kilda is by the sea but is more vibrant than kid-friendly.

TBH, I don't know of any hotels such as you describe with kids club etc in Melbourne but someone else might. My impression was more of a city-by-the-sea than a tourist-book-the-kids-into-a-club hotel scene.

Message withdrawn

We stayed in a deffo brill hotel in Melbourne with DS aged nearly 7 years with pool and whirl pool baths near the centre of city

Can't remember name of it atm

but no kids clubs iirc

Lots of accomodation in Oz is self catering apartments. Generally the larger the resort the more activities they have. I haven't seen much advertised with kids clubs, and what I have has only been for children over 3.

Some of the Qld island resorts have kids clubs - Daydream and Hamilton definitely, but you could look at others. Daydream is a bit less upmarket (and therefore cheaper) than Hamilton, though their kids club is excellent. I think there are some Gold Coast resorts with kids clubs too, though I am a born and bred Sunshine Coaster we NEVER go there!!