Tampa hotel with cruise parking or use one of the lots

[cowgrlkirby]

OK...so I know this has been asked but one of the threads I found...the answers were 6 years old...lol! I am looking for a SAFE hotel to stay in the night before our cruise. I have noticed that some of the hotels that offer the packages for leaving your car will drop you off at the port but want to charge for the ride back. Is that the norm for this, we have never left a car at a hotel for a cruise before...always used one of the lots. Also , has anyone heard of anyones car being damaged or anything while they were gone? I just need help figuring out if we should do this or just stay there and park our car at one of the secured lots. Thanks in advance!!!!:D

[FlaGrl4Evr]

Intercontinental has a park and cruise special that includes round trip port shuttles plus secure garage parking for your car.

 

The hotel is in an upscale and safe area of Tampa, very near the airport and about a 15 min shuttle ride to the port.

The hotel has a Shula's steak house and a few others in the surrounding area.

 

http://www.intercontampa.com/tampa-vacation-packages.php

 

 

:)

 

 

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[bam1958]

We are staying at Hyatt Place Westshore. Rate includes transportation to and from port, parking for the week and a complimentary breakfast. They also have a free airport shuttle. If there are more than 4 people in your room there is an additional $10 charge per person each way for the shuttle to the port. :)

[aria48]

There's quite a few hotels that offer roundtrip shuttle with the package. There's a list on this site : http://www.parkingstay.com/p/tampa.html .

 

Personally, I would have no problem leaving my vehicle at any of the Rocky Point area hotels, it seems to be one of the cleaner, safer areas IMO.

[EviesCruisin]

We stayed at the Holiday Inn Rocky Point in Jan 2012. It was completely fine and safe as far as the parking lot (We didn't leave a car there but it was not in a shady area at all). There is a nice restaurant (Bahama Breeze) with good food and live music.

 

The cruise package included transport from airport to hotel, hotel to port and port to airport (or hotel - whatever you prefer). We were given cards to call the transportation company when we got off the ship, they had several vans running to the hotel or Tampa airport.

 

The company was especially lovely. I had to disembark about 3 AM to the Tampa Hospital with my infant son, who had developed croup. We were taken via hospital to Tampa General. The company picked me up from there and returned me to the port so the baby and I could meet the rest of our party. They did not charge any extra for doing that. It was quite nice to not have to worry about that.

 

There is not a lot around the hotel besides the restaurant as far as shopping. To go to get diapers/baby supplies it was a good 15 minutes. But if you just want a good pre-cruise stay with parking and r/t transport and a nice place to eat within walking distance, it was perfect.

[FlaGrl4Evr]

I mentioned the Intercontinental in my above post as they offer a secure parking garage.

 

In addition, here is a list of some more park & cruise hotels that serve the Port of Tampa:

 

http://www.parkingstay.com/p/tampa.html

 

 

 

:)

 

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[cowgrlkirby]

Thanks for all of the great help everyone! There is so much info out there for the other ports but not too much for this one so I hope that this will help out other cruisers as well! :D