This is Part 3 of my “Stress Free Travel” series.  If you haven’t already read the first two parts, you should read them first: Travel With Kids Without All The Stress and Packing For Your Trip.

Chances are, the first thing you do when you get to your travel location, will be to go find the hotel (or where ever you are staying).  Here’s a tip.  Don’t immediately take your bags in.  Chances are, the hotel and room you stay in will be okay, but every once in a while, there will be something wrong (rude staff, a dirty room, a running toilet, sink or tub water doesn’t run right or is hard to turn back off, bathtub drains slowly, TVs don’t work, bedbugs -as much as we hate to think about them, it does happen- or something else that is just an irritation or a major issue) and you have to change rooms, or worse choose another hotel, and then you have the work of carrying your bags to another room or back out to your vehicle.  A lot of hassle for something that could have easily been avoided if you had checked out the room first.

So, when you arrive at the hotel, before carrying everything into the room (This is assuming you have a vehicle to get around in, obviously this doesn’t work if you used a shuttle from the airport and can’t just leave your luggage sitting unattended), check everything out.  Make sure the fridge is working, toilet flushes and isn’t running constantly, turn on faucets, make sure everything works the way it should.  Check the beds for bed bugs, because like I said, it does happen sometimes, and you don’t want to be carrying bed bugs home with you.  They are so hard to get rid of.

Once you are satisfied, go for a walk.  Yes, we aren’t taking our bags in yet, though you can take in electronics if you don’t want to leave them in your vehicle or if it’s too hot or cold for them.  We are going to walk around, check out the hotel and explore the area.  This gives you chance to warm up your muscles after sitting in a vehicle for an extended time.  Stretch your legs, work your arms, get something to eat, whatever you need to do to get the blood flowing.  If you are in an area where you can’t walk outside, at least walk around the hotel for a little while.  This serves two purposes.

1. You aren’t as likely to injure your body lifting heavy luggage right after having been sitting in a vehicle for a long time.
2. You familiarize yourself with the area.  As much time as you have spent researching everything, you may get to a place and realize it’s not really where you wanted to be after all.  The hotel may not be in the location you thought it was, or you may not feel as safe as you thought you would.  Perhaps it’s too noisy there.  There are a lot of things that could affect your happiness at the hotel that you thought would be perfect for your vacation.

If you aren’t happy with your location, your vacation will suffer for it, so always check everything out before you decide that you are ready to settle in.  Okay, we are now satisfied with the room and the area the hotel is in.  Can I take my bags in now? YES! Once you are satisfied that everything is fine, you can take your bags into your room and get settled.  Once you have done that, even if you are staying only one or two nights, unpack your bags.  Take advantage of those drawers and the hangers in the room.  It’s a lot more stressful if you are living out of your suitcase and you feel less at home.  The point of vacation is to be able to relax and enjoy yourself.  If you have to dig in the suitcase for everything you need, it’s just more stressful.

Okay, now you have moved into your hotel room and settled in, you have checked out the location and feel great about everything! Now what?

Before going out again, make sure everyone has had chance to nap, relax, eat if necessary and then just enjoy your vacation!  This is why you have done all the work ahead of time.  You know what you want to do, and you can now really enjoy yourself rather than stressing over trying to figure things out, find things to do or deal with unexpected weather.  Enjoy your next vacation without all the stress!