Trip Motivation
In October 2024, we took a Fall break trip to Southern California. We visited some family in LA, met up with some Nashville friends for a day of adventuring at Joshua Tree National Park and enjoyed family hotel life at a lovely resort in Palm Desert, CA.
Flying: BNA to LGB: 4.5 hrs
We purchased tickets from Southwest Airlines. Because we visited family in LA, we flew in and out of Long Beach Airport. This is a great airport and much more manageable than big LAX. Highly recommend if you’re planning a trip to this part of the country. Its an easy drive to LA, Anaheim, and about 2-2.5 to Palm Springs/Joshua Tree. You can also fly to the Palm Springs Airport if that works with your home airport. You can fly using Southwest points from Southwest credit cards or by transferring Chase points using the Chase portal. Read more about tips for airline trips here.
When traveling with layovers or to new cities, we always check the local airport website and the Priority Pass Lounge website prior to the trip. The Chase Sapphire Reserve card (in addition to others) comes with Priority Pass access. This card gets you access to various airport lounges. It is much more common internationally. In Nashville, there is a Minute Suites lounge in terminal D.
Another perk you can get from several credit cards we have used is Global Entry/Pre-Check. This is always helpful for avoiding long lines and spending as little time as possible with others. After you activate your credit card, you’ll use it to pay for the Global Entry fee and get reimbursed immediately. If you want more on this particular benefit and how to use a credit card to receive it for free, check out our tips here.
Grand Hyatt Indian Wells Resort
We loved our stay at the Grand Hyatt Indian Wells. The hotel is in Palm Desert, about 20 minutes from Palm Springs. It is about 2 hours from LA.
Prices vary and can get expensive. There are lots of convention visitors as well as families. When we stayed in Oct, prices were $400/night. The price came with a ton of perks, some available to all guests, and some because of our hotel status. Unfortunately, we were not able to get a free suite upgrade on this stay, which is usually a nice benefit from our status. When sleeping with kids, extra space to spread is always a great perk. We were able to get a double King bed room and it was plenty of space for us to spread out and conveniently near the pool. This hotel has a lot of suites and villas. some have extravagant living rooms and even private pools!
You can earn Hyatt points from Hyatt stays, the Hyatt credit card and Chase points, which can be transferred to Hyatt. Learn more about points here.
When we stay at nicer resorts, we try to make sure we have lots of time to enjoy the hotel activities. Its not worth it if we leave! We spent 3 days at the hotel. Read on to learn more about what to do in this hotel.
Water Slides and Lazy River!!
The waterpark at this resort was incredible! There were two 3- story slides, a small slide, a glorious lazy river, and a kid’s splash area. We had an absolute blast. The kids did races and the adults joined in on the fun. We spent hours floating along the river. Even though it was over 100 degrees, it was well-shaded and there were lots of water jugs surrounding the pool areas. When we visited, the waterpark area was open from 10a-7p. Kids need to be 42in to ride the slides and 48 in without floatation on the big slides. Both kids passed!
All the Pool Time
Even those hours of pool time weren’t enough for our little fishes. Before and after hours, we spent time in the other pools around the resort. We packed goggles and dive sticks and had a blast. The other pools were open from 7a-10p! My favorite kind of vacations involve pina coladas and sitter-vising. Virgin with cherries for the littles.
Hotel Recreation
Although not as large a property as others we’ve stayed at in Orlando, Maui, Lost Pines, or Coconut Point, there were still some resort amenities to enjoy . There was a yard game area, and free bikes to use to adventure around the resort. We also did some evening s’mores!
Eat, Eat, Eat!
Hotel breakfast: Our kiddos are becoming spoiled from hotel breakfast omelets! As a perk of our hotel status, we were able to enjoy free breakfast buffet with omelets, bacon, French toast, birria tostadas and more! the resort had many delicious foods. The poolside restaurant had several options, such. as salads, and sandwiches but we did not eat there.
For lunch and dinner options, we left the resort area. within ten minutes there were several options. on one evening we had Mexican and on another, we had ramen
Final Thoughts
It’s not very easy to get to from Nashville, but it was worth it. Similar vibes to Coconut Point in Florida if that’s closer to your home destination. I don’t know that we would make a special trip here again but I’m glad we went! <3
