Hotel rooms with preteens

[candyfloss89]

Has anyone got experience of asking for interconnecting or adjacent rooms in hotels so parents can sleep in one and kids in another? And if you have asked, have you ever not been given them?

I have a 10yo and a 12yo and until recently we've done family rooms, but for any more than a couple of nights it is becoming a stress fest as they're getting older. Suites are the ideal option, but often pricey and don't really offer separate sleeping areas (i.e a door you can close between sleeping and living area) they're generally a bigger room with a bed round a corner.

10yo needs his sleep so goes to bed about 8pm but 12yo doesn't and readily won't go off until 10ish earliest which is a) tricky when they're in the same bed and b) means we all have to sit in darkness and silence from about 8pm. 10yo staying up later makes for a stress fest the following day as he's tired and grumpy which is just about manageable for one night or so, but for a week's holiday with all the other exciting things/change of routine isn't fun for anyone concerned.

I know the chains (Novotel etc) do them on request, but they don't allocate them until you check in so there's no cast iron guarantee they'll be interconnecting or adjacent. I get very anxious travelling anyway and hate the idea of rocking up to a hotel to find me and DH on one floor, my 10 and 12 year olds on another and no other option! I'm not even sure about the entirely separate room thing, even if they are adjacent tbh. I know we could go down the air BnB type route, but if you're somewhere just for a night or so it's a faff taking food and if I'm abroad I couldn't deal with the anxiety about not being able to get in/finding breakfast/not having a reception desk to help if you need anything e.g a doctor at 3am.

What do other folk with preteens do for holidays?

(when staying with another mum and her DC) we asked Premier inn for interconencting rooms.

Yes our rooms were next door to each other.
and yes they were both interconnecting rooms.....

Our rooms connected with the rooms on the other sides, not to each other 😮
Apparently that is fine because we got the interconnecting rooms that we booked, and its not contractual for them to give them.... they are "subject to availability".

They genuinely thought they were reasonable giving us next door room, both with doors that interconnected with strangers on the other side.

If its a couple of nights we make do with 1 premier inn room, and all stay together

If a longer stay is needed we airbnb it, or book a hotel where you get 2 bedrooms / sleeping spaces in the "1 room".

Omg I hadn't even thought of a room not being connecting to ours ....new fear unlocked!!! I'm thinking we might have to go down the one room route as we have been for odd nights then and just air BnB I the UK (can cope with this as worst case you can just go home!) and do my best to find some sort of suite arrangement for longer trips! Thank you for your reply :)

You need an aparthotel or a 2 bedroom suite (yes, they exist). Aparthotel is probably easiest. They typically have a living room with a sofa bed and kitchen, and a separate bedroom. There is usually a reception on site and sometimes a restaurant that serves breakfast. They are less likely to be all inclusive.

If you ended up with rooms on different floors, you'd need to put one adult in with each child

Yes and yes. We have found staff try really hard to help.

One adult and one child per room is back up surely?

Where do you like to holiday? We do France / Spain / Italy in the all singing all dancing campsites in their top lodges / bungalows / luxury caravans with 3 bedrooms! Cheaper than AI and yes you have to sort your own breakfast but we just eat out lots.

Loads OP top of my head we have been to, pine cliffs Portugal, Sun gardens Dubrovnik, Club Letoonia Turkey and booked into Liberty Signa this year. I know Liberty Fabay has them too .

Hilton guarantee interconnecting rooms if you book directly and choose that option on booking. Everywhere else is on request. Abroad we choose a one or two bedroomed apartment.

Self catering for anything other than the odd night, cottages, villas.

The issue is that the chains often are more like a club, have different owners and different types of rooms so central booking systems can’t know if they have interconnecting rooms or suites with 2 separate spaces, holiday inns and Hilton’s are particularly variable in my experience.

If you can find the actual hotel website, not the chain one, (don’t always have one) you might be able to call the actual branch and book direct to get the room(s) you want, we had success with Ibis Styles hotels who actually offer 50% off interconnecting rooms and usefully include breakfast. Some Hilton’s have family suites with two completely separate rooms off a central corridor, one with bunk beds and each bunk had its own tv with headphones provided when I went (admittedly a few years ago now) dc loved that. I must admit that by the time they were 10&12 I gave up bothering about interconnecting and just put a request for same floor/close on the booking and asked for an extra room card which worked fine (except the time they had a pod coffee machine for the first time and youngest got sick on too many hot chocolate’s due to the cleaner on the corridor giving them loads when they asked so they said, or potentially they swiped them off the trolley when she was in a room!)

We have booked interconnecting for years now. We can't share a family room, nobody gets any sleep and we all end up tired and grumpy.

With premier inn you phone ahead (before booking) and ask if that hotel offers interconnectjng and has them avaiyyon your dates, if they do then you book online and ring them back with the booking ref and they allocate the rooms. We've never not been able to get them.

With Hilton you can book interconnecting on the website.

Others don't advertise it on their website but if you phone up or email they can allocate it.

if you're somewhere just for a night or so it's a faff taking food

You don't actually have to cook for yourself in an Airbnb, you can still go out to eat

i hear you OP and have no suggestions. I just don’t understand why it is so hard to find little apartments with 2 sleeping areas (no, not me on a sofa bed in the living room, I haven’t paid £4k to sleep on a sofa bed) for families. I want AI as self catering is not an holiday for me. Apparently they exist but seem to be super expensive and also it’s not a filter you can apply on tui, jet2 etc.

Since our DC were 10, we’ve had interconnecting rooms, or 2 bedroom apartments and once we had a duplex room where there was a separate bedroom upstairs. We’ve never not got what we’ve asked for and it worked well for several years.

Could you just do two rooms with one adult and one child in each?

Or could you do an air b&b, you don’t need to take your own food- just go out for food. Book somewhere near amenities. Weatherspoons will do a cooked breakfast and I think Toby Carvery does a breakfast buffet.

In cities we do air bnb. We buy a few breakfast/coffee bits but eat lunch & dinner out.

For resorts or hotels … It’s a total pain!! I have spent hours looking for suitable rooms, scrolling through photos, emailing to ask about the bed set up. Even when you find a family suite, often the kids are expected to share a double sofa bed, mine will get no sleep like that. Sometimes they can provide an extra rollaway bed, not always. Most places will not guarantee rooms next to each other.

I wish all hotels showed floorplans of their rooms. Sovereign website is quite good for floorplans of rooms in big resorts.

I find the booking.com option to search by number of beds is quite useful, I search for 1 room 3 beds. It’s not always accurate though.

We did one adult and one child in each room at this age.

But then the adult with the younger child (in @candyfloss89example) would have to go to bed at 8pm.

We only book hotels which guarantee interconnecting rooms. Or book Airbnb.

But there are two bedrooms so they can hang out in the other bedroom.

There are a HUGE amount of AI resorts where 2 (or more) kids have beds in a seperate area (room) to the parents in the one room.

I have been to loads, and never have trouble finding them.

I wouldnt consider doing a week or longer on a sofa bed, and nor would my children so I book places with a king bed in 1 area, then another room / area with proper single beds for the children. (They dont like sharing beds either). (as part of the booked "room", not seperate rooms with 2 room keys)

Often booked interconnecting rooms when our were young teens.

Can you suggest any? I have trawled through so many resorts and the options generally seem to be:

• family room (double bed and 2 singles and living area all together in one room)
• one bedroom apartment (room with 2 single beds, then sofa bed in living area for adults

I want a living area, a proper kingsized bed for the adults, and a separate room (within the apartment) for my kids. I once booked something that looked like this on the floor plan, but the reality was that the ‘walls’ on the plan were waist high so the kids bed was in the main living area and there was a net curtain separating her bed from our bedroom.

I’ve read a few articles which suggest places but when I’ve followed the links the rooms suggested are twice the price of the tui holidays I’ve been looking at (and I don’t go for cheap cheap holidays!!)

look at blue lagoon village in Kos (and the other blue lagoon brand) (been there 3 times, and they have rooms which have 3 beds in the "kids" room for familys of 5)
Look at the Tui holiday villages. HV Rhodes / Kos / Ibiza definitely have them because we have stayed in them.
Pretty sure several Tui blue holidays have them.
We are staying at Palmo Grida, Antalya Turkey later this year, but i short listed loads of places in Antalya with a similar arrangement.
Also look at Atlantica hotels

(I will only stay in places that fit that criteria, and often add swim up to my requirements as well)

I can be happy to use a nice large terrace as the sitting area, when its furnished with chairs and table and the weather is warm and its private etc, and when both rooms access it