Ben and Claire, travelling with their two children through Europe and beyond, are currently in Bosnia and Herzegovina, having spent time in Mostar before moving on to a mountain resort near Sarajevo. As ever, there’s no fixed plan for what comes next. They’re weighing up a possible stop in Belgrade, Serbia, and Budapest, Hungary, as they slowly work their way towards Austria and Switzerland.
Right now, we genuinely don’t know where we’ll be a week from now, and that’s become the whole point of this stage of the trip. We’ve stopped booking ahead, we’re deciding country by country, sometimes day by day, and the plan only ever really extends as far as the next decision we need to make. It’s a different way of travelling to how we started, and it suits us.
Most of that thinking happens in the evenings now. Once the kids are down, we lie in bed and start exploring where we might want to go next, looking into why one place might suit us better than another, comparing hotels, and getting a rough sense of prices for different areas. Nothing gets fixed, we’re not booking any of it there and then, but we still like to properly research where we’re heading, even when the plan itself stays loose.
But “unplanned” doesn’t mean “no research.” As we look ahead towards Austria and Switzerland, further along the route, we’ve started putting together a shortlist of family hotels that have genuinely caught our eye: places we’d consider stopping at ourselves, and ones we think are worth telling you about too.
Austria
Alpenpark Resort, Seefeld
A well-regarded four-star family hotel in the Tyrol, and one of the more reasonably priced options among Austria’s full family resorts. It’s built around a proper family spa (with treatments for kids as well as adults), a large family pool area, a kids’ dining room, a bowling alley, and a full childcare programme. It sits in Seefeld, which has a strong reputation for family skiing, including a dedicated kids’ ski school, so it’s a genuine year-round pick rather than just a summer stop, though skiing isn’t on the cards for us this time around, we’d be visiting for everything else it offers.
Bio-Hotel Stanglwirt, Going am Wilden Kaiser
This one stood out for being properly different: a biodynamic working farm with horses on site, alongside the usual hotel comforts. Families who’ve stayed talk about the horse riding as the highlight of the trip for their kids, and describe the whole stay as relaxed and high-end without feeling stuffy. It’s fairly remote, so having a car makes sense, which fits how we’re already getting around. We love the idea of it too, being in amongst a working farm would feel a bit like home, since we live surrounded by farms and farmland back in the UK.
Familienparadies Sporthotel Achensee, Achenkirch
A “families only” concept hotel, which we think is a strong story in itself. It’s built entirely around a spacious indoor playground and an award-winning childcare programme run by professional staff, so rather than being a hotel that simply tolerates children, it’s one that’s designed around them from the ground up. That’s what makes it extra appealing to us, it’s exactly what we want for our children, for a place to feel like it’s genuinely about them.
Switzerland
Kempinski Palace, Engelberg
A five-star property at the foot of Mount Titlis, with a full-scale kids’ club, dedicated programmes for children aged three to twelve, and a genuine focus on family stays, including Kids4Free ski pass offers through the winter. This is the aspirational pick on our list, the kind of place that would make for a real highlight of a Swiss leg. The ski pass itself is irrelevant to us this time round, but it’s exactly the type of environment we think the kids would thrive in regardless.
Frutt Lodge & Spa, managed by Kempinski, Kerns
A mountain resort on a high plateau near Lucerne, with its own kids’ club, a family spa with a dedicated children’s area, a children’s pool, and ski-in/ski-out access in winter. It’s quieter and more wellness-led than Engelberg, a nice contrast if you’re choosing between the two. Though we suspect the Audi might have a word or two to say about tackling another mountain.
Swiss Holiday Park, Morschach
A large family complex built around a spa and waterpark, with slides, a kids’ club, and a genuinely useful mix of hotel rooms and apartments with kitchens. It’s the most accessible of everything on this list, and having a kitchen option is exactly the sort of thing that matters when you’re travelling with children for longer stretches, as we know from experience.
Why these Made The Shortlist
We picked these six with a simple test in mind: would we actually book them for our own family? Each one offers something a standard hotel doesn’t, real childcare, genuine family-specific spaces, activities that keep kids properly occupied rather than just out of the way, and in a couple of cases, something a bit more memorable than a pool and a kids’ menu. Given we’re travelling without a fixed itinerary right now, these are the kind of stays we’d be glad to build a few unplanned days around.
What else is possible, when even the places you haven’t booked yet are already part of the plan?
Related reading:
Frequently asked questions
Do you need a car to reach most family hotels in Austria and Switzerland?
For several of these, yes. Properties like Bio-Hotel Stanglwirt are fairly remote, and having your own transport gives you far more flexibility around the Alps generally, much as it has done for us elsewhere on this trip.
Are these hotels suitable for very young children as well as older kids?
Most offer age-banded childcare and activities, so they’re built to work across a range of ages rather than just one. It’s always worth checking the specific age ranges for kids’ clubs and ski schools directly with the hotel before booking.
Is it worth choosing a hotel with an apartment or kitchen option for a longer family trip?
We’d say so. Having the option to cook some of your own meals, like at Swiss Holiday Park, makes a real difference on cost and flexibility over a longer stay, something we’ve found true again and again on this trip.
Leave a Reply