When searching for a hotel, it was suggested to look up Trinity Reservations. They have excellent hotel/park/fly/shuttle services. I'm just sorry I had not learned about them prior to now. They are wonderful and so cheap. You really can't beat the prices.

 

I really struggled over which hotel to pick. I had read terrible reviews on 2 of the hotels I wanted. There seem to be issues with the shuttle service. Since we were flying in, we needed a place that had some type of food within walking distance for dinner that night (even if it was fast food) and also a place (whether it be a gas station, grocery or pharmacy) to get pop (yes POP, I'm from the north, we call it pop...for all you southern "soda" people that don't understand-hehe) for the cruise.

 

Everyone suggested staying at the Best Western Elkridge, which seemed to be located around...n-o-t-h-i-n-g! Ugh. Perfect place, highly recommended, good reviews, but nothing close by.

 

I contacted the person at trinity and they gave me direct numbers to all of the places and the contacts he works with. That way I could ask all the questions I had directly to them and get the answers I needed first hand. I was very grateful for this. The first 2 places (with the no-so-good reviews) was Comfort Inn and Best Western. The issues with these places seem to be the shuttle service. The way things are done there are...you don't sign up for the shuttle service until THE DAY OF the cruise and you MUST be checked out of the hotel AND put on a waiting list. The other problem is that the airport people coming in and leaving take priority over the cruise ship people. So you may be sitting around and waiting for them before they can shuttle you. (There were reports of people waiting as long as 6-7 hours and not leaving the hotel until 2pm). The other issue is that the hotel waits until they received a call from the cruise port saying "we are letting people board now" before they'll even put you on the shuttle. Well, we had purchased FTTF, so that was unacceptable!

 

Now, time for the interrogation with BW Elkridge. You sign up for the shuttle when you arrive and check in. You can leave whenever you want. They have several shuttles as well and someone to drive you 24/7. Also, they informed me that there was a restaurant on the premises in the parking lot if we wanted to eat there AND they would shuttle us to the local mall at any time we wanted day or night.  (We did use this service and it was awesome) They also told us that there were plenty of places to eat there and also a Walmart for our "soda" needs. I think I found the place! Something told me this was a good decision and I'm 100% satisfied I chose it.