Parents Would you get a hotel?

[doublestrike]

We always get a hotel for an early meet time, we are not morning people and she gets more uninterrupted sleep.

 

[Amanda]

If traffic was relatively predictable, I wouldn't get a hotel for that. If I feel like I can leave at 6:00 AM or after, I don't like to pay for a hotel.

 

[Madden3]

I am usually in the 'no hotel unless unavoidable' camp, because it does seem like a large, unneccesary expense. Decent hotels around here are almost always over 125 per night so it is a big expense. But recently I needed to bring my very young daughter to a 7:45 arrival time Acro meet about 1.5 hours away and we did the hotel. It was a weekend morning so the issue was not traffic. My daughter likes to sleep late and can be quite poky when sleepy. Plus I was stressing about having plenty of time to do her hair. I know it sounds silly but I have figured out I need to not feel rushed when I do her hair.

Anyway, it turned out to be a good decision. It was nice for my dd and I to have a little trip together.

DD slept like a dream and woke up in a fantastic mood and raring to go. I on the other hand I got maybe 4 hours sleep because I never sleep well in hotels.

I worried about the stress of packing up and checking out, but I solved that concern by getting a hotel really close to the venue and getting a late checkout (which I ended up barely using.) Once dd was at the meet I had plenty of time to go back to hotel and pack up and check out.

And we conserved in other ways. No buying her a t-shirt or anything at the meet and we packed in our own meet day food from home.

 

[Deleted member 18037]

For an hour ride. No.

Exceptions. Possible weather issues. Or, lack of alternate routes, which based on where we live is unlikely, but if it was one road in and out kind of place we would.

Otherwise 2-3 hour is where we consider a place to stay the night before.and that depends on who is going. Husband the early riser 3 hours, just me and the kid, 1.5-2 hours

Full disclosure, kid can sleep in the car. 1.5-2 hour decision is based on what us grown ups have going on.

Also age matters. As long as I know she gets good rest as she has to flip, we save dollars.

 

[FlippinPrincess]

No hotel for us either. Neither of us sleep well in the hotel so I try to avoid them whenever possible. (Saves $, too!)

 

[raenndrops]

Both OG And YG are "car babies" so we rarely did hotels when we drove them to all meets and most of our meets were 1:30-2:30 away. We would carry sleeping girls to the car (or wake them up and have them walk to the car with their blankets and pillows) ... buckle them up, and be on our way.
First time we got a hotel was for a District Championship meet about 2 hours away ... but that was because it was the last meet of the season and we had never been there before, so we wanted to make sure we wouldn't get lost.

 

[mommyof1]

Update: My unscientific poll (n=7 parents, 2 gymmies) indicates a unanimous preference for leaving at 4:30 a.m. (what we all did this meet) over getting a hotel (what most of us did for at least one of the last two meets). More sleep for everyone, but some parents did admit to anxiety over the possibility of traffic.

Parents observed no correlation between hotel usage and athletic performance or gymnast mood post-meet. Proximity of doughnut shop was a possible confounding variable.

 

[Muddlethru]

Six of one, half dozen of the other. If your daughter struggles with getting up early, sleeps fine in a hotel, there is traffic and weather concerns and you don’t mind paying for a room, get a room. If daughter doesn’t mind getting up early, sleeps better in her own bed, there are no traffic or weather concerns, and you prefer not paying for a room, drive to the meet. Personally, my daughter would prefer to get a room and I would likely get a room so she can have fun the night before. But if most of her teammates are not getting a room, we’ll drive. Good luck at the meet!

 

[M2Abi]

The only time we've gotten a hotel for a local meet (about an hour's drive) was when it was forecast to snow 6+ inches overnight into the morning of the meet. It was absolutely worth every penny to not have to stress about getting to the meet on time while driving in a snowstorm. If the weather's fine, we just get up early.

 

[sewgood]

Nope. We’re used to driving an hour to gym. Lol

 

[HoldThePhone]

DD is not a morning person and we pretty much have the exact scenario this weekend for State. We are getting a hotel. Yes, it's an extra expense, but she won't sleep in the car, and I'd rather her not be up at 5 am when I know she won't be in bed early enough for that wake up time. Sleeping in a hotel will allow her to get a good night's sleep...for just any meet, I don't know if we would, but for State, and her wanting to qualify for Regionals, we will do it.