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They need a vacation from this vacation.
Staying at a luxury resort nowadays can be anything but relaxing — that’s according to avid travelers and industry insiders, who call competition-beating techniques like pre-dawn trips to snag poolside loungers the new, stressful normal.
Speaking to a range of sources, the Wall Street Journal has thrown a spotlight on the space-saving scrum that’s leaving some sun-seekers cold — as luxury travel booms and pricey properties stuff in more guests.
Florida man Mark Toler had his hopes of a relaxing few days by a pool in the U.S.V.I. last year dashed — when he realized he’d have to be out of bed before the crack of dawn to ensure good seats for himself and his girlfriend.
“We hated getting up at 4 a.m.,” Toler told a reporter of his stay at an unnamed hotel.
“It is a brutal payoff to have a great chair in the premium spot or at all, in some cases. If you get up at 5 or 6 you might still get a chair, just not the best one. If you get there at God-forbid 7 a.m. you might miss out altogether,” he said.
Because many hotels don’t provide enough chairs for their guests — even while often charging exorbitant resort fees for the amenity — travelers have no choice but to spend their vacations in a battle mindset.
And often, it’s not nearly as simple as being first — lots of resorts choose to enforce a whole set of rules to keep things as democratic as possible, the outlet detailed.
Some even seek to capitalize on the shortages, offering guests the chance to pay more to guarantee a cabana or other upgraded seating.
That’s not in the budget for clients of travel agent Kristian Beck of Honeymoons, Inc., who said she gets specific requests for resorts where guests don’t have to “play the chair game.”
It’s a game even pros like Beck, administrator of a busy Facebook group where thousands of fans discuss all-inclusive resorts in the Caribbean, are forced to play sometimes — the insider detailed a recent trip to Cancún where a mid-morning dive for space around one of the hotel’s three pools came up dry.
Even when there are enough chairs, Sarah Fershein of Tripadvisor finds it hard to relax, she confessed.
The head of editorial for the travel ratings site revealed that during a stay in Puerto Rico, her leisurely morning coffees were interrupted by worries she’d miss out on a slice of prime poolside real estate.
“I could’ve spent 90 more minutes at breakfast since there were plenty of chairs,” she said. “But that rat-race mindset on vacation took over.”
Meanwhile, chances of less chair competition at top hotels in the near future are slim, according to numbers from luxury travel agency consortium Virtuoso that were published by Travel Weekly.
Sales on high-end vacations in 2024 were up 25% over 2023, the organization said — while this year and the next are looking strong as well, with increasingly lengthy booking windows allowing analysts a glimpse into the busy future.
Compared to 2019, last year’s numbers were up a total of 239%, Virtuoso said.
