Pre-cruise hotel in Ft Lauderdale?
 

Looking for something near the airport & cruise port that is better than average. I would like it to be very nice, very clean, very convenient for leaving on a cruise the next morning.
Will only be there one night so it doesn't have to be super-amazing but the point in going down a day early is to lessen stress and staying in a cruddy airport hotel will not do that so can anyone please recommend someplace nice? Thanks.

Leslie, I have been looking for the same thing. Please post back if you find something affordable. In the meantime, you might get some help by doing a search of 'ft lauderdale' on the cruise board. There are several such posts there, but they have still not lead me to my pot at the end of the rainbow.

Check out the Hampton Inn AIRPORT NORTH. They provide airport-hotel-cruiseport transportation and it is a very clean hotel in the airport area. I've stayed there before and have it booked again in December for my precruise nite.

I've been reading a lot of posts on cruisecritic and people recommend the Sleep Inn in Dania and also the Ft. Lauderdale Grande but both of those had a bunch of poor reviews on Trip Advisor so now I'm afraid of them.

I think some people are okay with a not-so-special hotel if it's just one night and only for the convenience of being near their cruise port -- but I'm a light sleeper and I know if it's not a nice hotel (kinda dirty or loud, e.g.) I'll be freaking out and won't sleep at all...defeating the purpose!

Why would you want to be near the airport?

The Embassy Suites on 17th Street would be my first pick. About 1/2 mile to the port.

What are your dates? There are a lot of city wide things going on that will affect rates and availibility.

I got the Renaissance and could view the top of one ship from the room. We could walk to Mariott and the water taxi. This was from Priceline for a trip in Feb. and I ordered the Priceline room in Sept. or Oct. I think the bid that I had accepted was about $79 and the rack rates were more than twice that amount and fully booked by sailing. Since it was Feb. prime time for FL- I was really surprised when I won that particular bid.

There are all kinds of nice places around the port.

The Mariott Marina was really nice looking.

I stayed at the Marriott Marina last year. I think I paid around $75 on priceline (my first time using it). The Marriott is a $10 cab ride from the airport and right on the water taxi route. I'd definitely stay there again.

Duh. :-o
GoTravel makes the excellent point that I don't need to be near the airport. I'll start a new thread to see about hotels in general in Ft. Lauderdale. My brain is really fried with 36 hrs. straight of internet travel research!

You didn't need to start another thread. Priceline's market for Ft.Lauderdale is fabulous. For that length of time, I would stay in Ft. Lauderdale, ride the water taxi, see all the houses (water taxi drivers comment as they steer) and see the shops / beach area. You won't have time to do much else. Beach area in winter is empty of swimmers, was when we were there, by the way. And it wasn't even cold.