Doubletree Cleveland Downtown Lakeside – Review

With all the Christmas chaos that takes place this time of year, it’s nice to get away from it all every now and then, even for a night.

So when Doubletree Destinations contacted us with the chance to take the kids to stay for a night at the Doubletree Cleveland Downtown Lakeside, we were thrilled!

A break from our regular holiday routine was just what we needed and at the same time we were excited to see downtown Cleveland dressed up for the holidays.

We drove to the Doubletree on a Friday night and were excited to see that Public Square and the big Christmas tree. We were also impressed by some of the decorations adorning various storefronts and street corners. A wreath here, a strand of Christmas lights, it was almost like we were in a holiday movie!

When we arrived at the Doubletree Cleveland, we pulled into the parking garage and immediately found our parking space. We all piled into the parking garage elevator and then hit the Lobby button expecting the doors to open on the garage’s first floor. Instead much to our surprise and delight, the doors opened into the warm, cozy, hotel lobby which was decorated for a very classy Christmas. With garland, lights, and even a tree with wrapped packages it all brought huge smiles excited comments from the kids.

At check-in, we ran into a slight snag when they couldn’t find my reservation, however when I showed the front desk clerk my confirmation number the reservation popped up. After a bit of typing and looking around in her computer, the clerk realized that our confirmation was set for a different day for some reason. She was incredibly nice about the mix-up and was able to find us two adjoining rooms under the same terms as our first reservation so there was no problem at all. It seemed like she had to do a lot of looking to find the rooms, but did so happily and was very nice about it.

Once we got our keys the front desk clerk asked if we wanted our complimentary check-in cookies. You should have seen Kora and Logan’s faces! They were so excited about the cookies and talked about them the rest of the trip. It really was a great surprise for them and of course the cookies were warm and delicious!

We got our things from the car and went through the lobby to another set of elevators and up to our rooms on the 6th floor. The rooms were beautiful and the beds were so inviting, I immediately wanted to climb in and take a nap!

There was a flat screen tv with a wide selection of channels.

There was also a nice office desk with instructions full of hotel and area information as well as helpful wireless instructions.

Our view was much to be desired because we looked right out at the Cleveland Water Department. Not having much of a view was to be expected though because we’ve driven by this Doubletree often and have long known the rooms don’t face the lake – so we really weren’t disappointed.

Kora and Logan, however, thought it was amazing and couldn’t believe how “high” up we were.

I really don’t feel that we missed out on anything because of the view and was happy to see that the décor inside the room was so attractive we didn’t feel the need to look outside all the time. The city photographs on the walls were very intriguing and the lamps were very unique and different.

The beds were incredibly comfortable to lounge on (as well as sleep in) and the tv offered so many channels to choose from it was easy to find a Christmas show that we all enjoyed watching together.

The bathrooms were very up to date with granite sinks, nice fixtures, curved shower rods, and creatively folded towels.

After taking a bit of a break, we all pulled on our hats, gloves, and boots and headed on out to Snow Days at Progressive Field. It was nice short drive to the field and once we arrived we had lots of fun sledding, finding our way out of a hay maze, and watching others ice skate.

We stayed at Snow Days for a couple hours and then decided it was time to head back to the Doubletree Cleveland to warm up by taking the kids swimming. Normally, I wouldn’t say swimming is a good thing to do to warm-up, but the hotel pool room was so warm, and thankfully so was the pool water, that we were happy to be there. I absolutely love to take the kids swimming, but almost never do it unless it’s the middle of summer. When we got to the Doubletree’s pool, to Tired Dad Dave’s surprise, I was ready to hop in.

We had a nice swim and found the pool to be very clean and a good size.

At 3-feet the shallow end was a bit too deep for Logan to stand on his own, but he had fun being pulled around and gliding through the water with Tired Dad Dave and I. Kora enjoyed trying to swim underwater and got better each time she did it. We swam for quite awhile and after everyone declared they were starving, we decided it was time to head up to the room to wait for our pizza delivery.

We dried off with the pool towels – which I have to say I thought was a wonderful amenity. There’s never enough room to pack towels, and I never like taking the hotel room towels down and then having to asking for more. So to see that towels were folded and ready for us at the pool, I was pleased – there was even a comical little placard in our room telling us about the pool towels and not to bother taking the room towels.

After cleaning up from the pool we all sat around, enjoyed some pizza, and watched The Incredibles. Not exactly a holiday movie, but one the kids have never seen. It was fun spending time together and unplugging a bit with a funny family movie. We almost never get to do that at home. Tired Dad Dave and I are always getting up to “just do one thing” and then get trapped online, or cleaning up, or on a house project, and don’t get back to the family until a good chunk of time has passed.

Once the movie ended, we put the kids to bed and headed into our adjoining room – leaving the door in-between open, of course, and settled in to watch some tv ourselves. We both drifted off after not too long. Everyone slept so well that we were shocked when the kids didn’t wake us up until 9:00 am! I found the beds and pillows extremely comfortable and the curtains were thick and dark. There was some street noise, but not really that much until after 7 am and that’s to be expected when staying at a downtown hotel.

While we should have squeezed in a workout in the incredibly nice fitness center, we didn’t get a chance. But I did get a video of it. I love that the cardio equipment all comes with built-in tvs. How nice is that?!

Check out wasn’t until noon on Saturday, but the kids were hungry so we got ready to go and left around 10 am. The Doubletree Cleveland does offer a breakfast buffet but it was $15 per adult. Even though kids eat free with the purchase of an adult buffet, this was still outside our budget so wedecided to head home for breakfast.

Upon checking out, the desk clerk made Kora and Logan’s day (ok, mine too) by offering check-out cookies! The kids wanted to eat them as breakfast and while I was half-tempted, if they hadn’t had their school Christmas parties the day before where they ate a massive amount of Christmas cookies,I just may have allowed it this one time!

We had a wonderful time staying at the Doubletree Cleveland and would highly recommend the hotel to anyone visiting the area or to those who just need a break from daily Cleveland life. Again, while the view is lacking a bit, there are so many other amenities you won’t miss it much and it’s so close to the lake you can  drive a short distance to the E. 9th Street Pier or Edgewater Park or any number of Cleveland lakeside locations.