Planning a sixteen day road trip from New Jersey to Florida was no small task. Our family is not new to road trips. Both my husband and I spent years as children taking road trips with our families. Since my grandparents lived in California, I was the queen of road trips that went from the east to west coast all in a car. Route 66 was just a part of life. I swore after being a child of a road trip family, I would never subject my children to it. But, there is something to be said about everyone gathering up their goods and packing into a minivan and heading for a special destination.

Our family of five has taken the trip on 95 South NJ to Fla. a few times already, so we are not exactly newbies to it. We always do the trip with one sleepover stop on the way down and two on the way back.

Although we do all have our quirky little roadside pullovers that we need to stop for, when it’s time to pull over for the night everyone agrees that the hotel must be clean and welcoming.

If you know our family, you know that we do love the Marriott chain of hotels. We have come

to rely on them as a brand that we can rely on. They are consistently clean and modern.

We have stayed at many of the Marriott hotels, but have never had the chance to stay at 

Residence Inn. We did not know what to expect. The pictures online looked nice enough, but we 

all know about pictures online. Sometimes they can be quite tricky! 

On this roadtrip we stayed at the Residence Inn, Florence, South Carolina as our first stop.

We always we try to shoot for a little more than halfway through the trip and have found Florence a great place to regroup. There are also a bunch of stores in case we need anything that you have forgotten. By five hours into the trip you begin to realize everything you have forgotten.
It’s better to grab it on the way, before you hit the Orlando area.

Anyway, with a family of five I am always hesitant about booking a room that will accommodate all of us with space enough that no one will get on each other’s nerves. Twelve hours in the van is enough to do that!

We were thrilled to pull up to the Residence Inn. From the outside I already knew it would be wonderful. You know how you get that gut feeling about places. This was a good gut feeling!
The outside of the Residence Inn, Florence, South Carolina was nice enough. I was hoping that the trend continued. Happy to say it really lived up to those photos online. The check in was easy and quick and the workers were very helpful. No one was on their cell phones or preoccupied. Before long we were at the door of the room and about to open it. That is always a pivotal point in the trip for us. Will the room be clean, smell nice, be big enough? The room passed all of our expectations. It was definitely big enough with two rooms and a kitchen that included a full size fridge. I was ready to move in! The room was extremely eye friendly and very modern. It was a room I would more than go back to visit again. If you are traveling on Route 95 through South Carolina and need a clean and comfy place to rest your head, this is perfect for you! Since our family also stayed at another Residence Inn on the way home, I can say that both of our experiences were similar and wonderful. Soon the post will be up about our stay at the Residence Inn Savannah, Georgia. Different look of the hotel, but same hospitality that makes you want to come back and stay over and over again. Click here to find out more about Residence Inn.

You can follow our road trip on twitter #roadtrip2fun or on facebook.com/3decades3kids.
Disclosure: Room was provided for the purpose of review. Email me at ELgeorgia@aol.com or tweet me @3decades3kids.