what area of san diego do i need to stay in if i am going with kids (11/13) to seaworld, animal park and zoo? i hear good things about park manor suites. anyone? my hubby stayed in hotel del coronado for business, loved it! but a bit on the high end.......coronado, gaslamp district, la jolla, so many to choose! help.

Mission Valley would be a good, central location for the Zoo, the beaches and most other tourist attactions. There are dozens of hotels there.

Park Manor Suites is right next to Balboa Park, so location is great. It is an old apartment house converted to a suite hotel. I stayed there a few years ago and it was a little shabby, but at the same time charming. Still, for a family of four on holiday, a more full-service hotel would be better. The better properties in Mission Valley would be fine. La Jolla is lovely (truly upscale neighborhood), and the drive to the attractions would be less than 30 minutes. Same with Coronado, actually. SD's a pretty big city, but the things you're looking to see are not far from each other.

I like Loews Coronado Bay Resort on Coronado Island - about a ten minute drive from the Hotel Del Coronado.

It is a lovely property and may be a good choice for you if you can find a deal.

how about humpreys half moon? hilton gaslamp? i read alot about it on this site, soooo confused as to where to stay! and this is only our first stop. i need to find 7 more hotels throughout calif!

I second Mission Valley (Hotel Circle) for a good central location.

We're staying at Humphrey's Half Moon at Christmas...got a lovely deal on a suite off the Southwest Airlines site, of all places. Of course we can use an AARP discount as we joined that group as soon as we were eligible (was that @40 or 50?)

We spent 5 days in San Diego this summer and obsessed about what area to stay in. Assuming you will have a car, we found ourselves driving everywhere so it did not really matter where we chose to stay. Places you mention are in different parts of city anyway.

Someone else here mentioned Humphreys. It is on Shelter Island and we stayed down the street from there at a Best Western (Island Palms and Marina) with our 2 teenagers. Nice sized suites with full kitchens and either balcony or patio, 2 TVs. Nice to have extra room with the kids.

We chose not to stay in either LaJolla or Coronado so we would be closer to downtown.

Humphreyshalfmooninn.com !

We spent alot of time in Balboa Park,the zoo, gaslamp this summer and we stayed at the new Sheraton Suites downtown (close to the park) It has a nice indoor pool. And we have kids your exact ages and were able to all fit very comfortably in the suite- my husband and I had the bedroom to ourselves (w/door that close) and the kids slept in the living area that had a pull out love seat and we got one rollaway. It was good for us. Used to be a Marriot Suite but was renovated when Sheraton bought it in last few yrs. Very clean and nice. Good service. It is locateed in a bldg. that also houses the symphony bldg. I think, so parking is a bit hairy but you can self park in the garage which we also liked. Sheraton has that deal where if everything isn't right, you get something to make up for it. we had one complaint (can't even recall it now, it was minor) and we all got a free full breakfast to make up for it.

i wouldn't choose la jolla with kids. consider pacific beach area - catamaran hotel, bahia, pacific terrace inn, best western (can't remember the specific name). mission valley will be very central but there's not really anywhere nice to walk if you enjoy that. hotel circle is basically hotels lining each side of a freeway. but, this is one of the cheapest areas for hotels.