birthday

BIRTHDAY STAYCATION AT BARCELO MUSSANAH RESORT

April 29, 2022 by Little Miss Honey

It was Howell’s birthday last March 9. The night before his birthday, we got him a cake. We sang him “Happy Birthday” and he blew his birthday candle. He is already 6 years old! We told the kids to sleep early because we are off to Mussanah, a little over 45 mins away from Muscat which totals 2 hrs and 45 minutes of driving from our place. We booked a stay at Barcelo Mussanah Resort for Howell’s birthday.

It was indeed a long drive from our place until we reached the resort. We were happily accommodated by the concierge and gave us our room card. Unfortunately, we learned that the floating island that we were excited to try out and the main reason why we wanted to visit Barcelo Mussanah was temporarily not open due to pandemic reasons. The surroundings was lovely and we were excited to explore the place but we headed to our room first.

We have lovely spacious room with King size bed and large office desk. There was a balcony overlooking the whole resort. There were maps of the resort in the room and we saw there are lot of amenities. They even have water sport activities, spa and fitness centre.

After we unpacked, we took our handy tripod with us to take some photos before the kids will swim in the pools. We took some family photos and explored the area. There were lots of people in the resort, enjoying the lovely weather and relaxing atmosphere.

We changed the kids into their swimming attire and they were just too happy going from the kiddy pool to the water park to the medium size pool. They played in the water until the sun faded in the horizon. They were playing the other kids who were there too.

Nightfall came and we headed back to our room. We shower the kids and we prepared for our dinner. We bought some takeout Chinese food. The kids were so hungry from all the playing around in the pool that they ate a lot during dinner especially Zeke who kept eating lot of the crispy fried chicken.

Our stay comes with free breakfast. We went down for our breakfast and opted to sit indoors because the place was packed and there were no seats available outside. The food, unfortunately, lacks variety and choices was not a lot. I settled with my usual vegetable omelette and salad while the kids had some cereals and bread.

After breakfast, we headed to the Children Play Area which is in another building. There were lots of things for kids to do there and we stayed there for a couple of hours. It was nice that they are an area for kids.

It was already midnoon when we packed our belonging and said goodbye to Barcelo Mussanah Resort. But we said we will definitely come back again.

Barcelo Mussanah Resort

Wudam Al Sahil Mussanah, 300 Sport City, 300

Phone: 26 871555

WINDY BIRTHDAY STAYCATION AT CROWNE PLAZA MUSCAT

February 19, 2022 by Little Miss Honey

For J birthday, we planned to spend a night in Crowne Plaza Muscat. We heard so much of the hotel from J’s friend who used to work there. We drove to Muscat on his birthday weekend. We went to Oman Avenue Mall first to buy some stuff then proceeded to Crowne Plaza Hotel. It was a very very windy day.

The drive to Crowne Plaza Muscat was such a lovely sight. You see the Qurum Beach at the left side and few cute cafes & restaurants spread out at the right. In the end of that beachside view drive up on a hill is the white huge building of Crowne Plaza.

We were attended by two lovely receptionists of the hotel. After seeing we have three active cute little ones with us, they upgraded our room. They gave us three kiddie loot bags for them. The kids were so happy to get them.

We got a ground floor room. The room was very spacious! There is a big king size bed. There was a large sofa set which the staff converted into one bed and added another additional bed.

We have a sliding door which leads to a large lawn outside with patio chairs outside. We were overlooking the tennis court and the swimming pool was nearby. The day was super windy, the tall potted plants were laid down to the ground.

We, of course, took our traditional hotel family photo. Then the kids were busy checking out their loot bag which contains a booklet of activities for the kids, stickers and coloured pencils. The kids were busy in each corner colouring the booklet and doing the activities in different pages.

When we all settled a bit, we change into our bathing suits and headed outside for a swim. There was a party in the restaurant near the pool and loud dancing music was blasting. People was happily partying near the poolside but no one was swimming. It was impossible to swim on that day because of the wind and we were advised not to swim in the big pool. The kids settled into swimming in the smaller pool in the corner. J and I ended up not swimming because it was just way too cold and too windy. We just watch over the kids who really wanted to swim but after 15 minutes, they wanted to get out of the water because it was too cold.

They ran for a bit on the ground. Our room was just nearby. We, then, went back to our room, away from the angry wind that is spoiling our fun for the day.

For dinner, we bought food beforehand in the mall. We got grilled chicken, chicken skin and garlic rice at Bacolod Chicken House and sushi at Zen Asian Fusion. J ordered some can of beers from room service. We had a satisfying dinner.

The next day, we were looking forward to our breakfast buffet. They have a wonderful spread, lots of variety of food to choose from – from salad, to cereal, to fruits, to main dishes, to breads and desserts. For eggs, you can tick in a paper what kind of egg you want and a server will bring you the eggs you ordered to your table.

Naj was happy with his pancakes from the pancake maker while Howell was enjoying with his big bowl of cereal. Zeke was busy with his donuts, banana and glass of juice. This is my happy brunch plate. This seems to me my go-to brunch meal in hotels : some greens, a bit of fruits, a smoke salmon if they have an vegetable omelette with cappuccino.

We had a lovely stay in Crowne Plaza Muscat. We weren’t able to maximize our stay because of the wind. We werent able to swim in their pool or visit the beach there. We might go back there one day. We will see….

Crowne Plaza Muscat

Qurum Heights, P.O. Box 1455, Muscat | 112 | Oman | 968-24-660660 | Email

STAYCATION EXPERIENCE AT HILTON GARDEN INN DURING RAMADAN & LOCKDOWN

June 15, 2021 by Little Miss Honey

Since staycations has been our official way of celebrating birthdays in our family, we booked ahead for our sons’ birthdays. Last May, we booked a stay at Hilton Garden Inn for our 3rd son’s 3rd birthday. We, however, didn’t anticipate that there will be a lockdown plus it coincided with Ramadan time. We planned to drop by Philippines Embassy for some transactions but we learned they are closed! Lesson learned that we should have checked the schedule first before dropping by. We also dropped by Oman Avenues Mall to learn that all commercial establishments were all closed. Oppss! We just bought take out from Jollibee before heading to the hotel. We couldn’t eat in the restaurant or even in our car because it was Ramadan. Out of respect for our Muslim brothers and sisters, we should not eat in public until sundown. This practice is not new to me because I experienced that too when I was studying in Saudi Arabia that we should be mindful not to eat in public before sundown even chewing gum is prohibited.

We, then, headed to Hilton Garden Inn which is strategically located in Al Khuwair. It just nearby Jollibee and Oman Avenues Mall.

We were greeted by a nice friendly Filipina hotel receptionist, Ms. Janet. She helped us with the checked in. Check in was swift and easy. We were informed that the pool in the top floor is closed because of the pandemic restrictions. We got the King Connecting Family Room. We was basically two rooms with one King bed in one room and two single beds in the other when our two older sons will sleep in, with a connecting door to both rooms. We got the room at 34 Omani rials without breakfast included.

The design of the rooms are pretty much basic hotel decor with lots of beige colour. The view from our room is the street with a nice little garden park and a playground below. I like best is the lighting streaming inside our rooms.

The bathroom has a bathtub which the kids are happy about. No pool? No problem, as long as there is a bathtub, they are happy. Also their toiletries are from Crabtree and Evelyn which smells divine and feels luxurious on the skin.

Once we settled down, we prepared Zeke’s birthday cake and our Jollibee lunch. We bought again at Isfahan Sweets for birthday cake. We got the Honey cake again which is the same cake we bought for my birthday.

We rested a bit and watched a bit of TV. Since there is no malls open or the pool is not open for swimming, we headed down to the playground for the kids to play. The kids enjoyed playing at the free public playground which my husband and I relaxed at the nice garden park. There were a few people jogging around and some using the public exercise installations at the park.

Since the lockdown was imposed at 7:00 PM, we ordered delivery via Talabat using their easy-to-use app. We choose Yellow Cab for dinner time and the delivery was fuss-free and punctual. We got our food from the Talabat delivery guy and headed up to our room.

We had a very filling dinner. We enjoyed the rest of the night in our hotel room.

In the morning, we woke up a little late. We, again, ordered our brunch via Talabat. We choose Chowking for brunch.

We made sure we had a heavy brunch before check out because we will be heading to do grocery before going back home.

REVIEW OF HILTON GARDEN INN

Service: The reception staff were all very nice and we were able to do a quick check in without any hassle. We commend Ms. Janet from receptionist for the wonderful welcome and accommodating us with our needs. There was just a bit of delay when we were asking for some utensils for our room and we need to call housekeeping several times. However, they compensated by providing us with more water for our room and extra toiletries as well.

Cleanliness: The room was clean and the sheets were comfortable. We saw some rooms that placed their bag of trash outside their room, out in the hallway but it was removed immediately afterward when we went outside the room.

Location: The location was perfected located at the heart of the city with lots of restaurant and malls nearby.

Amenities: Too bad we weren’t to access the pool. Even if we weren’t able to access their pool, it was nice to have the park and playground below near the hotel. The lobby was darkly lit but well-designed. There is the usual digital key and wifi is fast.

In conclusion, we plan to book next time a stay in Hilton Garden Inn . We hope that time we can already use their pool. If we ask the kids how they find our staycation, they just happy with the simple birthday of Zeke. Kids just love hotel staycations. We are looking forward to staying at Hilton Garden Inn Muscat again.

Hilton Garden Inn Muscat

Address: OM, Dohat Al Adab St, 118

Phone: 22 515555