tl;dr – How do YOU value complimentary breakfast? Where and when do YOU indulge?
I just put the bow on a three week around the world trip that saw me visit French Polynesia, Japan, Germany, and the Dominican Republic. Bangkok was supposed to be part of my itinerary as well, but as I wrote earlier, it wasn’t in the cards this time.
The trip was wonderful and I’ve had the chance to stay at some exciting properties: The Westin Bora Bora (subject of one early installments of our Deal’s I’m Booking That You Should Too series), Le Taha’a by Pearl Resorts – a Relais & Châteaux, the Patina Osaka (a sibling brand of Capella Hotels), the Waldorf-Astoria Osaka, and Cuvee J2 Hotel Osaka by Onko Chishin (the world’s first ‘champagne hotel’), the Conrad Osaka, and the Kennedy89 in Frankfurt, to name a few.
As each of these properties included rather robust breakfast offerings, I thought it worthwhile to offer some basic thoughts as to how I approach complimentary breakfasts when traveling in different scenarios.
First, though, I figured it makes sense to cover a few things about how I approach breakfast generally. At home, I tend to eat twice a day – usually a later breakfast and a dinner. I’ve also been on a significant weight loss journey, where I’ve lost over 100 pounds – entirely naturally through diet and exercise (no weight loss drugs of any kind) – over the last few years. (I’ll have a dedicated post about this journey at a later time). So with those two pieces of information, here’s how I typically approach elite complimentary breakfasts when traveling:
Complimentary Breakfast at Hotels in Remote Locations
It’s obvious, but I tend to value an elite breakfast benefit at a property where there aren’t other readily accessible dining options. Case in point: The first stop on my around-the-world trip was the Westin Bora Bora in French Polynesia. I’m not huge on buffets – I’d much prefer a quality à la carte breakfast – but buffets are super common (and in many ways unavoidable) at hotel chains nowadays. I visited the Westin Bora Bora as a Titanium elite status (Platinum elites and higher receive free breakfast), and for what it’s worth, you can order à la carte items in addition to (or in lieu of) the breakfast buffet. There’s a lot of ‘downtime’ at this resort. Despite being a self-professed ‘water baby’ – after spending much of the day swimming in the lagoon, hurling myself off the overwater bungalow, and diving down deep to hang out with manta, I still found it hard to drum up an appetite for another meal after hitting up breakfast.
Even as a frequent visitor to the property’s gym, I found that I was just-sort-of-kinda in the mood for dinner. Accordingly, having breakfast at this type of property was super helpful. Though I wasn’t concerned about the costs of food at the property, I will say that the robust breakfast offering made it very possible (likely, even) to eat just one other time each day. I was just traveling with Mrs. Blackbeard. I can imagine that a family visiting this property would stand to save quite a bit of money by using the complimentary breakfast benefit.
The other thing I would add – which is more unique to French Polynesia than to every remote destination – is that French Polynesia isn’t much of a food destination. While the food at the Westin is fine-to-solid, I’ve been to French Polynesia three times in the last ten years and visited six different islands. I’ve yet to be wowed by anything I’ve eaten there. You visit for the culture, beautiful water, and scenery, not the food.
Complimentary Breakfasts in Urban Destinations Where the Local Cuisine Isn’t My Favorite
Again, not a surprise here, but I tend to value complimentary elite breakfast more at properties in locations where I’m not in love with the local food. FOR ME (emphasis on this being my personal preference), Frankfurt is a good example. I’m not super excited about German food generally, and while I definitely enjoy sampling the local fare wherever I am, I do appreciate knowing I have a solid option to fuel up before venturing out for the day to explore. In many ways, I’ll put more effort (and bring a better attitude) towards finding some adventurous/exciting/’good’ local food to eat, later in the day, knowing that I was able to satiate myself earlier on at the hotel.
Complimentary Breakfasts in Urban Destinations Where the Local Cuisine Is ‘Exciting’
This one is a bit trickier. The reason is that I tend to target more upscale properties when visiting cities, and those properties, by default, tend to have stronger breakfast offerings. When visiting Italy/Japan/Taiwan/New Orleans etc., I’m bullish on trying as much of the local cuisine as possible.
As a result, I tend to ‘split my time’ and sample the ‘elite complimentary breakfast’ while focusing more on being ‘out and about’ and seeing the city I came to visit.
Large Asian cities are a great example here. On this most recent trip, I spent a few nights each at the Conrad Osaka, Waldorf Astoria Osaka, and Patina Osaka. For each property, I sat for a more ‘traditional’ breakfast at each property once, skipped it altogether once, and grabbed ‘something quick’ once as well.
Bottom line, I enjoy complimentary hotel breakfast, but when and where I tend to ‘hit it harder’ all depends upon where I’m traveling to.
