Not long ago, I thought the height of hotel travel with kids was discovering that the place had a pool and free breakfast. With extra points if the breakfast contained something other than bread products and cold cereal. But no longer! Now upscale hotels are wooing families by providing way more than the simple babysitting of the past.
For instance? At The Peninsula in New York, kids participating in the kids' programs there receive a personally-engraved silver Tiffany spoon. Too precious for you? (me too) They also offer trips (complete with personal shopper) to FAO Schwarz. How about gold panning and fly-fishing at a Paws Up, a Montana resort? Or bamboo-pole fishing, crabbing and lei-making in Hawaii's Kahala Hotel and Resort?
Of course, not every kid is a candidate for organized activities. I think mine would rather jump on the beds and ride the elevators up and down all day, but isn't that much more fun at, say, The Breakers in Palm Beach than it is at an interstate-side Days Inn? I'll tell my kids to save their pennies.
