Every time I travel by air these days, the trip always seems to start with an early-morning flight that forces me to wake up long before dawn, drive to the airport in the dark, park my car, and then schlep to the terminal feeling half asleep and wondering what went wrong. And that's before I even set foot on the plane.
Now it seems there may be a better way.
A growing number of online companies now specialize in helping travelers replace that pre-dawn airport madness with a more civilized approach--a package deal that includes a comfortable room in an airport hotel the night before your flight, up to 14 days of free parking, and shuttle service to and from your terminal.
In most cases, the cost of the whole package is not much more than most travelers pay for airport parking alone.
ParkSleepFly.com is a site that offers one-stop shopping where you can compare prices and services at more than 1,500 airport hotels in dozens of U.S. and Canadian cities, plus a growing number of cities in Europe and Asia. Stay123.com and ParkingAccess.com are two other sites that offer similar services.
So the next time you have a 7 a.m. flight and a memo from your airline to arrive two hours before departure, you may want to consider booking a room for the night at an airport hotel, reserving your seat on the morning shuttle, and getting every extra minute of sleep you deserve.
Photo: Digital Vision/Getty