I should be filing coupons but I am bored with the whole idea so I am taking a little break to write about this because I was SO EXCITED about it.  It doesn’t take much to make me happy.

We live about an hour and forty minutes away from the airport we are flying out of (Cincinnati) for our trip to Sweden next month.  There’s a closer airport (45 minutes) but it usually costs a lot more to fly from there, so we prefer to pay less and drive the extra hour.  It’s about twelve hours of travel time, including a stop in Newark to change plans, so adding another two hours on to the morning sounds… well, terrible.  For ourselves, we wouldn’t care as much… we’ve done it before and certainly wouldn’t be nearly as bad as the six hours we spent stranded in Oslo last time we went, thanks to our plane arriving late.  But, we’re already dreading this trip because we’ll have a three-year-old with us, who will probably have a hard enough time with the traveling without tacking on an extra couple of hours.

Anyway, we were talking about it and how nice it’d be to just go up the day before and spend the night in a hotel.  Much to my surprise, we both ended up agreeing that it would be a smart move, even with the additional cost.  Two hours less driving, less stress in that we won’t have to worry about being late, two hours less traveling in one day, an evening of fun vacation time the night before with an indoor pool (one of our travel requirements) and sleeping a little later.  Sign us up!

But it gets EVEN BETTER!

A little research yesterday led me to book a hotel a mile from the airport.  They offer complimentary shuttle service to the airport that runs every half hour, 5:00 am to midnight… and parking for up to two weeks is free.  So, the new plan is to drive up on the Saturday of our vacation, have a little local fun, play in the pool and then get up on Sunday morning, eat our free breakfast, and then head over to the airport on their shuttle.  When we come home, we’ll ride back to the hotel (again with the free shuttle) and pick up our car and go home.

I bet if you’re a frequent traveler, you can guess why this is so awesome.  Here’s the breakdown.

Hotel room: $79.99, plus Insane Hotel Taxes and one extra day of parking ($5) for the fifteenth day (our return) will run us about $95.

Parking at the airport in the long-term economy lot: $7/day, or $98.

It is cheaper to stay in a hotel.

We may never park at an airport again. :)  Of course, if you have a short trip planned or you live next door to the airport, it might not be worth the hassle.  There were cheaper hotel options available than the one we chose, though, so technically, you could even do this and leave your vehicle at the hotel and not even spend the night, if it’s cheaper than parking at the airport.

I will also add that I found this idea through parksleepfly.com, but I did not book through them because they charge $4.99 per transaction and you have to pay a deposit on the room.  I found the hotel I wanted and called them directly, double-checked the parking/shuttle situation and booked it through them because the rate was lower than ordering online for whatever reason. (Which is another tip… always call. You never know.)

I am SO happy about this.  Now I’m just hoping that Evelyn sleeps well there. She’s never actually stayed in a hotel. I might not be so excited if she stays up all night and we are all running on fumes before we even get to the airport… :)