The hotel's name and location
The Holiday Inn in Navarre Beach, Florida
When is the last time you returned there?
Not since I was about 12 years old. Once, right after I'd seen the movie Jaws, we drove up to the hotel and the sign had a big "bite" out of it. I thought Jaws had jumped out of the water and crunched it! My dad had to explain that a hurricane had taken out part of the sign. I think the whole hotel was eventually destroyed in a hurricane.
What do you remember about the hotel?
When I was a kid, my family used to go to this hotel on the beach every Easter vacation. My cousins and our neighbors would join us, and both their families had kids the same age as me. It was a Holidome. I'm not sure they have those anymore, but basically it was a three story motel-style hotel with all the doors to the rooms facing a central courtyard with a roof. There was even an indoor pool in the courtyard, which was great because it was often too cold to go to the beach. We would play in the kids' club most days, watch movies in the hotel's movie theater, and play video games in the arcade. I would save up my quarters all year for that arcade! The rooms were really basic, just two double beds and a small bathroom. I don't even remember it having an outside window. But the Easter Bunny found us every year there, hiding candy all over the room, so it was perfect.
What I'd Do Differently
- Nothing!
- I miss those arcades where everything was only a quarter! I could have fun for days on five bucks.
- There was so much to do for kids there, even in bad weather, with the indoor pool and movie theater. We felt like we were free of adults the whole weekend (although they were always able to see us, thanks to the holidome).
- I'd love for my kids to have a memory of a place like that, where we went every single year.
