Our Afternoon at the TWA Hotel at JFK Airport
Recently I found myself with a ridiculously long layover at the JFK airport in NYC. I played around with options for how to spend our time since waiting for seven hours in the airport didn’t sound ideal for my family. Initially I thought we could Uber into Brooklyn, grab a nice lunch on a spring day and walk around. Well.. the weather had other plans for us. Heavy rain and wind was in the forecast with no chance of a dry spell. After brainstorming our options, we came across the TWA Hotel.
The cool thing about the TWA hotel is that it offers a Daytripper option. This allows you access to a hotel room for four hours or more between the hours of 6 am - 8 pm. Please note the Daytripper is non-refundable. Since I booked kind of late, there was only a King room available but it worked out just fine for us. The total cost of our stay was $231.67. The hotel is very easy to get to from Terminal 5 at JFK, just head down to the baggage area and look for the signs. Check in was super easy! Now I realize this option may not be cost effective for everyone but once I calculated the money we would spend on food and how uncomfortable we would be trying to find a place to camp out, this seemed like a fun, unique option.
We grabbed a quick coffee from the Intelligentsia Coffee Bar and made our way to our room to drop our bags off since our lunch reservation wasn’t until 12:30 pm at the Paris Cafe.
The cafe had such a fun vibe and the food was wonderful. The only picture I got was of my mimosa haha. We ordered pizza, fries, salads and a burger.
After lunch we still had about three hours to kill so we went to check out the pool. Wow! The rooftop infinity pool over looks the tarmac and is heated up to 95 degrees in the colder months and nice and cool in the summer months. How fun to float with a drink while watching the planes take off! Unfortunately it was pouring and very windy so we didn’t use the pool. We opted to grab a drink at the Rooftop Alpine Hideaway Chalet Bar. It had the perfect cozy vibe we were looking for on such a rainy day. On our way back to our room we stopped at the gift shop to check out the merchandise and to take photos in the free photo booth! It was fun to be silly in the pics and you can even have the photos emailed to you to share with others.
**Please refer to the TWA website for updated pool reservations/pricing info.
So would I recommend?
I would! It was a unique opportunity to check out all of the history and feel like you’ve been transported back in time when travel was luxurious and special. I really wish the weather would have been nicer so we could have experienced the pool and the views, but there is always next time. I really enjoyed all of the places to just hang out and relax and our room was clean and comfortable. There is also a 10,000 square foot fitness center with a Peloton Room, yoga studio and more and is free to use with a reservation. I might also note that anyone can visit the hotel, dine in the restaurants and bars and check out all of the history. No reservation necessary to just wander around! Be sure to explore the whole terminal because there are tons of photo ops!
I just saw that the hotel opened up a roller rink on the tarmac!! Open Friday - Sunday and tickets are on a first come, first served basis. How fun!!!
Happy traveling everyone!
x, Julie