Beyond the one-room hotel or motel

When we went to Hawaii last year, we knew someone who lived near where we were going. In fact, he owns a spectacular rental home RIGHT ON Sunset Beach, Oahu, however, it was (by a factor of 10) way more money than we could afford. He did suggest that we check out www.VRBO.com (Vacation Rentals By Owner) for some economical, larger than a hotel room, rental properties.

After a bit of searching, we narrowed our options down quite quickly, and were happy to have a 1-bedroom, 850 square foot home with a queen, kid bed, and a queen futon couch - plenty of room for our family of 4 and my mom. It also had a kitchen, full bath, beach toys, beach chairs, boogie boards, beach cruiser bikes (2) all included.

The added bonus was that the family we rented from lived on the top floor of their home (many have to rent out part of their house just to make the mortgage!), and they had kids the exact same ages as ours, which was great (except, that the kids often didn't want to leave!).

We found that having a 'home' for the kids for the 8 days we were there enabled us to more easily maintain a bedtime routine, and despite the many hours on a plane to get there (from Maine), we all adjusted quite quickly. The ability to cook some of our own meals (and spend the money on other activities, and a few really GREAT meals out), the room to spread ourselves out etc.. was so worth it. Not to mention, it only ended up costing us about $110 a night - much lower than what any hotel on Oahu with much less space would cost. If your budget is larger, there are even more options. As it were, we were only 2 blocks from the beach (and ALL beaches are public in Hawaii!), and we walked to pastries and coffee every morning!

A few websites to check out are: (and, there are hundreds)

• Home Away
• Vacation Rentals by Owner
• Cyber Rentals
• FindRentals.com
  

And, of course, you can always check (in the U.S.) with the local Chamber of Commerce wherever you are looking to go, and find vacation rental options as well.

When traveling with kids, we feel it's important to make as many of the aspects of the trip feel like 'home' so they are more apt to enjoy the things that you are traveling to see!