First time here? Check out the site's "greatest hits" or read a random post from the archives. Feel free to ask a question, and consider subscribing to the latest posts via RSS or e-mail. Thanks for visiting!

What if you could arrive in a distant location and yet be assured that you wouldn’t suffer from miserable jet lag?

Pipe dreaming, perhaps. But it’s encouraging that hotel chains are working to help travelers in getting on the right time zone quickly and comfortably. For example:

[Westin] has partnered with Philips and a group of sleep doctors to create a “concept room” aimed at aiding sleep deprivation and cutting jet-lag recovery time in half. This hotel-room laboratory is currently being tested at the Westin Chicago River North […]

The concept room is equipped with Philips’ ActiViva lamps — revolutionary new blue-light lamps that provide high-quality lighting and directly affect the way people feel by supposedly making them feel more alert, awake and energized. […]

The lights, along with other cutting-edge amenities such as a guided-meditation TV program (it actually walks you through into a sleep experience) and a room-service menu filled with calming snacks such as a banana-milk smoothie, are being tested by Westin through a series of evaluations with travelers who have recently crossed two or more time zones. Window shades are custom blackout models. Other white-noise machines are also in the room. […]There are oscillating fans, calming tea, and [a shower with] a high-intensity light that its manufacturer claims will reset your body clock.

I appreciate the fact that hotels are thinking about this, and not just by offering customers cherry pie or offering jet lag advice like their airline counterparts. But this takes it up a notch. It’s very welcome.

And I kinda want those shower lights for home.

Staying awake until a “normal” time for the local time zone is often a struggle, so travelers need all the help they can get. These innovations are welcome, even if some of them, individually, are corny. (Talking meditation machine, anyone?) Anti-jet-lag features would especially be a great feature at airport hotels — particularly since airport hotels are rarely inspiring spaces.

(image)

For ages, hotels have offered “romance” packages to couples looking to reignite the flame. Now, hotels have introduced something new: the procreation vacation (or “procreavacation”?).

Having trouble getting pregnant? […] Doctor Jason James says he often recommends fertility-challenged patients book a vacation. He says de-stressing with your spouse away from daily life can actually aid in conception. […] Hotels are introducing procreation vacation packages, offering everything from on-site sex doctors to age-old fertility boosters promising to hasten the pitter-patter of little feet. At The Westin at Our Lucaya Grand Bahama Island, couples can sip fertility-boosting pumpkin soup and down sea moss elixirs.

And I thought pumpkin soup was just a seasonal dish.

With European governments worried about an aging citizenry and minimal growth putting their pension systems at risk, perhaps this will be the next great policy prescription from Brussels.

But the name “procreation vacation” has got to go. That’s even worse than the mancation.

(image)