OT: Traveling to Colorado with kids

Hi There!

  We are planning a little family vacation to Colorado.  We have two boys ages 3 and 11.  We are planning to go to the butterfly pavilion, Children's museum, the Denver zoo, and Elitches.  Since we've never been to any of these places, we were wondering if these would be good places for the kids.  Are there any "kid friendly" hotels in this area?  Do you know of any "deals" we can get to make our money stretch a little farther?  Any information would be greatly appreciated, as this will be our "last blast" , as a family, before school starts.

I wouldn't stay downtown as that is pricey and unnecessary.  The Butterfly Pavilion is nice and a good experience for a couple of hours.  The children's museum would be good for them.  The Zoo is excellent and Elitches is not as big as lot of the other Six Flags amusement parks are as it is still growing.  Sometimes you can get tickets for these events at a discount at one of the local grocery stores, I shop at King Soopers.  The Museum of Science and History is located near the Zoo and it is also a very cool place for kids and adults.  There is an Aquarium here and it is just ok...they are working on improving it but you will see it when you go to the children's museum.  There are so many really fun things to do in the mountains I am curious why you would want to stay in Denver itself.  I hope you are going other places?

Thank you for your reply.  Also, thanks for the discounted ticket idea at the supermarket!  We're not doing anything more, because we don't have the time.  We've only got a few days before school starts, but we're planning a return trip in the spring, so maybe we'll be able to check out the mountain fun then.  Thanks again!

Not sure if you've left yet. But there are a couple of places to stay within a very short distance to the Butterfly Pavilion which also puts you within a 30 min drive to all the other mentioned locations you'd like to see.  On the upper end of the scale is the Westminster Weston which is right across the street from the BPav.  Across the highway (US 36/Boulder Turnpike) is a Spring Hills Suites.  These are part of the Marriot system of hotels but the rates are reasonable.  We've had a couple of birthday party/sleep overs at the Spring Hills.

I would agree with the other poster about not staying downtown.  Too much money for not enough kid value.  There at the BPav is a local outdoor mall called the Promenade which has an Ice Arena, Movie Theaters, Splits Bowling, Even an indoor glow-in-dark putt-putt course.  There are also several nice restaurants at the Promenade as well as within a 5 or 10 minute drive from either of those hotels.

Good luck and have fun!

Hi Kevin!  Thanks for your reply.  We actually just got back!  We ended up staying at the Spring Hill Suites.  We had a nice, clean room.  We weren't too impressed with the continental breakfast, but otherwise had a wonderful stay there.  We booked for the weekend getaway, whi*****luded a free in room movie and two medium pizzas.  We ended up having to ask how we were supposed to get those two things, so we wondered about their organization there.  We loved the zoo and the butterfly pavillion, but were not impressed, at all, with Elitches.  We rented a VIP cabanna, but were definately not treated as VIP.  Overall, though, our kiddos loved their little weekend trip, so that's all that really matters!

Glad to hear you all had a wonderful time.  Wish I had seen this post before you left.  I might have suggested that you try ou****er World instead of Elitches.  Sure there are no rollercoasters and other rides like Elitches has, but WW is one of the top 10 water parks in the country and has a full days worth of fun in it.  It would have been especially fun for kids the age of your two.