I am a planner, through and through. When I am gearing up for a big family trip, you’ll catch me (months in advance) researching and scoping out the best museums, bookshops, and parks to hit. I make itineraries and spreadsheets. I color-code things. I am that person. (I swear to you, my family likes it!!! Someone needs to be in charge, right?) When it comes to a vacation, I can plan everything… except the weather.
Enter: the European heat wave.
London in July typically runs about 70 to 75 degrees most days, which sounds perfectly lovely! However, we happened to be traveling to the UK during a week when the high hit the 90s every single day. Also, fun fact: almost nothing there has air conditioning. Not the Tube. Not the shops. Not the museums. Not the cafes where you duck in for a matcha latte (Shoutout to Blank Street!).
We arrived on a Monday afternoon when the heat index hit around 87 degrees. My daughter, 7 going on 17, had been on a transatlantic overnight flight for eight hours, and was already starting to wish she were back home. We were tired, hungry, and sweaty. We were a family on the edge of disaster.
I owe our saving grace to the London Marriott Hotel Park Lane — our home base for the next four days.
The hotel room was cool, spacious, with a king bed and a big bathroom. My daughter had enough space to feel like she had her own area. We could spread out and breathe. I really do not have words for how good it feels to walk into an air-conditioned hotel after sweating through a London street market.
As the week went on, we realized the London Marriott Hotel Park Lane wasn’t just a place we rested our heads every night. It became the cornerstone around which the whole trip was built.
You need to book a hotel with air conditioning and food on site
We started every morning in the Executive Lounge, which included complimentary breakfast, coffee, pastries, and eggs made however you wanted. My daughter would eat approximately four croissants and announce she was ready for adventure. Each day, we’d head out, see the city, sweat our butts off in the heat, and then we’d come back mid-afternoon during the hottest part of the day and just be at the hotel for a while.
The Executive Lounge became our landing pad. We had full meals in there beyond just breakfast — snacks, drinks, a proper sit-down when nobody had the energy to find a restaurant. It sounds simple, but with kids in tow, during the summer heat, having somewhere that felt comfortable and familiar (with good) was genuinely everything.
And when we didn’t feel like having something from the lounge, we ventured over to the hotel’s restaurant, Lanes of London, which ended up being one of the best meals we had all week. Lanes of London served Mediterranean-inspired sharing plates with Hyde Park visible through the windows, my daughter eating things she’d refuse at home (seriously, she ate goat!).
The staff was warm, accommodating, and insistent on making our stay as comfortable as possible. When in doubt, we headed down to the concierge for help or advice on where to go or what to do. They arranged two of the best things we did all week: a Thames River Cruise and a Hamleys sightseeing bus tour. Both tours were fun, informative, and exactly right for our family.
The boat guide was genuinely brilliant (Yes, I am using London phrasing now) as well as informative and engaging in a way that kept all three of us listening. Seeing London from the Thames is a completely different experience than seeing it from the street.
The boat dropped us off at the Greenwich Pier, where we explored Greenwich Market — stalls, food, vendors selling everything from antiques to fresh crepes. There was also an adorable guitar shop that stole my husband’s heart.
Then, we found ourselves at what I can only describe as the best pub I visited on the entire trip: the Trafalgar Tavern, right on the water and everything you’d imagine when you think of a London pub.
Another day on the trip, we headed to the famous toy shop on Regent Street, Hamleys, which turned out to be mine and my daughter’s favorite store on the trip for two very different reasons. For her: the slime-making station. For me: the sweet, sweet air conditioning.
I say this not as a joke but as actual travel advice: put Hamleys on your London itinerary in July and thank me later when you’re standing under the cool AC unit while your kid plays with a toy drone.
And then, on our last full day in London, the Hamleys experience came full circle.
The hotel arranged an in-room Hamleys picnic! A team member arrived at our room with a blanket, a teddy bear, and a full spread of food in an adorable picnic basket. This was, without question, the highlight of my daughter’s trip.
The hotel actually does matter when you’re planning a family trip
I have planned a lot of family trips. I have stayed in a lot of hotels and spent a lot of time convincing myself that the hotel room doesn’t really matter. And maybe that was true when I was single because you’re barely in the room and it’s more important to put the money into experiences instead, but not as a mom, I no longer believe this.
The hotel was a reset button for us. It was a place we all came back to when someone (not always our seven-year-old, trust me!) was melting down, it was 92 degrees, and the Tube platform couldn’t be stuffier.
London is an incredible place to visit. We already talked about how we cannot wait to go back, and if we do, we’re booking the same hotel.