Personally, I lost interest in Budget Travel’s 40 Best Girlfriend Getaway Packages article when I discovered that girlfriend was used in the Oprah colloquial sense.
These are not romantic getaways for love-struck couples, but rather escape holidays for women who want to leave their men far behind. The suggestions canvas the globe, highlighting package trips that cater specifically to the feminine demographic with such tantalizing treats as spas, facials, chick flicks, shopping sprees, girlie cocktails, personal shoppers, cosmetic bonanzas, manicures and more. The following is just a few of the 40 suggestions served up in Budget Travel.
The $499 In a Girl’s World package at Boston’s Nine Zero hotel, for example, includes “bath products by Boston stylist Mario Russo… a personal shopper at Giorgio Armani or Louis Boston…a manicure and pedicure at Salon Mario Russo, a DVD of Girls Just Want to Have Fun… and a round of cosmopolitans.”
The Aqua Hotel in Miami Beach offers an $889 Girls Gone Wild Weekend that charms guests with, “champagne, imported cheeses, chocolates…chick lit titles for bedtime reading… a two-hour limo rental… and VIP passes for some of South Beach’s hottest nightclubs.”
No cute name for this trip, but for just $949 a woman with itchy feet can fly from LA or San Francisco to Asia and spend two nights in Singapore and four in Ho Chi Minh City. Pampering includes, “a reflexology massage… a one-hour deep-tissue massage, a cooking class at the Vietnam Cookery Center, shopping excursions and a fitting at Khai Silk.”
Girls Night In, a $275 promotion of the Pacific Palisades Hotel in Vancouver, offers a “60-minute spa manicure; a free in-room movie rental; a room-service delivery of popcorn, licorice, and Häagen-Dazs ice cream; an evening wine reception; morning coffee; and a newspaper.” And, of course, one night in a hotel room to enjoy all this.
Only $159 buys a Housewives on Hiatus evening at the downtown Los Angeles Omni Hotel. Guests receive “a bottle of wine, a gossip magazine, slippers, specialty bath products… and a disposable camera.” If there is more than one housewife escaping, room service can also rush up a handful of games, such as the Desperate Housewives Dirty Laundry trivia game and Twister.
My advice? Take advantage of these great escapes. Me and the guys will solace each other in your absence with pizza and ESPN. Don’t be too long, honey!