Howl if you love waterparks! We’re thrilled to be giving away a stay at any Great Wolf Lodge Indoor Waterpark Resort, where every day is a pool day. With eleven locations in North America, a Great Wolf Lodge is never far away.

The prize is a one-night stay in a family suite for 4 people at the Great Wolf Lodge of the winner’s choice; one breakfast, lunch and dinner for 4 people during their stay; two-day waterpark admission for 4 people; and a wolf pup plush.

A stay at Great Wolf Lodge translates to great value for families that love waterpark fun. The rate always includes unlimited access to the enormous indoor waterpark with waterslides, bodyslides, raft rides, lazy rivers, wave pools, climbing structures, and more. Best of all, you can use the waterpark from the moment you arrive to the moment you leave and, since attendance is limited to hotel guests, the lines never get crazy long.

But that’s not all. Families can also have fun playing the MagiQuest adventure game and enjoying nightly fireside Story Time. Great Wolf Lodge offers a weather-proof family vacation that will leave you all howling for more.

For a chance to win this family getaway, just head to our giveaway page. You can enter once a day through June 30, 2012. So come back again tomorrow!

It's baa-ack! The InterContinental Hotels Group is bringing back its popular Vacation Pay program, which pays travelers to stay the weekend  in its hotels this summer. If you spend a two-night weekend stay before Labor Day, at any of IHG properties, you'll be rewarded with a $75 prepaid credit card to use anyway you like. The only condition is that reservation has to be for two consecutive weekend nights — Friday and Saturday or Saturday and Sunday — at the same hotel. Stays do not qualify if guests are paying special discounted or group rates.

You can use this promotion for up to four weekend stays, for a total of $300 in credit back. 

IHG hotels include many family-friendly chains: InterContinental Hotels & Resorts, Crowne Plaza, Hotel Indigo, Holiday Inn, Holiday Inn Express, Staybridge Suites and Candlewood Suites.

To get the card, register and print rebate forms at www.ihg.com/get75 starting May 14. The only caveat is that you won't get your pre-paid credit card immediately. Once your stay is completed, you have to mail in the rebate form along with your hotel receipt. Still, free money is free money.

The Days Inn Chicago, located two miles north of downtown in the bustling Lincoln Park neighborhood, is walking distance from both Wrigley Field and Lincoln Park Zoo. Its convenient location, combined with a variety of room options, free breakfast and wi-fi, make it a popular hotel choice for families.

The hotel has rolled out a package tied to the Field Museum, the Windy City's legendary science and natural-history museum. The Field boasts plenty of kid-friendly attractions (think family playlab and 42-foot T. rex skeleton), plus a rotating line-up of special exhibits. Next up is “Opening the Vaults: Mummies,” running February 27-April 27.  The exhibit will feature more than 20 mummies, some of which have not been on display for over a century. Visitors will be able to virtually navigate into a sarcophagus, unwrap the outer wrappings, and explore the interior. 

The Field Museum Package bundles passes to the museum and a few other extras, with advertised nightly rates starting at $129. To find out if it's really a good deal for families, we did the math for a Saturday stay in late February. The package includes:

• Overnight accommodations (worth $111 for a double room)
• VIP All-Access passes for two adults to the Field Museum that include the museum’s special exhibits and 3-D theater, plus a 10% discount in the museum’s gift shops ($29/adult x 2 = $58)
• Continental breakfast (always free)
• Wi-fi (always free)
• Kids stay free (they always stay free)

The package includes two adult VIP all-access tickets worth $29 each. But you don't need that high-end ticket to visit the Opening the Vaults exhibition. A less expensive entry ticket that allows admission to the exhibition costs just $22 per adult and $15 per child. Without the package, a family could spend $111 for the room and $74 for museum tickets ($22/adult x2 + $15/child x 2), or a total of $185. 

With the package, a family of two adults and two kids would pay a nightly room rate of $145. Since the package doesn't include kids' VIP museum passes, the hotel suggests purchasing them separately for $23 each. Note that this price includes a mark-up, as the VIP all-access kids' passes are available at the museum for just $20 each. Yet unless you need all the bells and whistles of the VIP pass, your best bet would be to buy the less-pricey admission children's tickets directly from the museum, thus bringing your total spend to $175 ($145 for the package + $30 for children's tickets). The net result is a somewhat unimpressive savings of $10.  

Deal or no deal? Here's a good example of a package that seems to give you a lot of bang for your buck, but closer scrutiny leaves you feeling deflated. You don't need the package to get the free breakfast and wi-fi, and kids always stay free at this hotel. So it comes down to this: How much museum ticket do you really need? It's not necessary to buy the VIP all-access pass to visit the Opening the Vaults exhibition, so in our minds, this package delivers negligible real value.

Book online (look for the Field Museum package after entering dates), or call 888/576-3297 and ask for the Field Museum package. 

Dreaming of getting away for a weekend in the big city?  Affinia Hotels, a group of seven boutique hotels in three of America's most-visited cities, has announced a three-day sale that will run January 11 to 13.  Nightly rates start as low as $89, and are valid on stays through March 31 at Affinia properties in Chicago, Washington, DC, and New York City.  The hotels boast central locations and roomy accommodations, including suites with kitchens and outdoor terraces, which can be hard to find in urban hotels.  

At the newly-renovated Affinia Manhattan, in the heart of midtown, studios and suites all have kitchens, and guests can easily walk to hot spots such as the Empire State Building, Times Square and Broadway. During the sale, nightly rates start at $139, a discount of nearly 40% when compared to the lowest best available rates. When we price-checked a Saturday night stay in January, rates started at $234 a night.  Similar discounts can be found at Affinia locations in Chicago (sale rate starts at $89 a night) and DC (from $109 a night).

Interested? Bide your time for a few more days, since sale rates can only be booked January 11 to 13. Blackout dates and other restrictions may apply.  Book online or call 866/246-2203 and use promo code JAN3DY.

If you're going to be flying over the Christmas week, you can connect with loved ones more easily thanks to Skype. The VOIP service is offering one free hour of wi-fi at over 50 US airports between December 21 and December 27. You can use Skype WiFi to make voice and video calls to computers for free and to landlines and mobile phones using Skype credit.

The offer is available in more than 50 major airports, including  JFK, LaGuardia and Newark in the New York City area, Boston's Logan Aiport, Chicago's O'Hare and Midway airports, Jackson Hole, and Miami. For a full list, see the interactive map.

'Tis the season for shopping and school concerts and holiday parties and frazzled nerves.  If the crazies have hit and you're dreaming about an escape, listen up:  Hilton Hotels is running The December Sale, which promises savings of up to 33% at participating Hilton properties around the globe when you book by New Year's Day and stay before January 8, 2012.

Turns out that "savings of up to 33%" doesn't mean you'll always be able to chop a third off your hotel bill. When we test-booked the offer at two family-friendly properties, we found actual savings hovering closer to 20%. At the Embassy Suites Washington D.C. at the Chevy Chase Pavilion, which boasts a location directly on the Metro Red Line, a two-bedroom suite runs $127 a night, which is a savings of 20% off the best available nightly rate of $159.  Want something warmer? Take a look at the Grand Vacation Suites at Sea World.  At that all-suite resort, we found December Sale nightly rates that were also 20% less than the best available rate: $119 for a one-bedroom suite and $199 for a two-bedroom suite (compared to best available rates of $149 and $249, respectively).    

As always, there's plenty of fine print. The rates are non-refundable, full payment is due at the time of booking, there's a seven-day advance purchase requirement, and blackout dates may apply. Book online or call 800/HILTONS.

Feel like a plush holiday getaway in the big city right about now? The Ritz-Carlton Chicago, located on the Windy City's Magnificent Mile, offers lush rooms and suites with marble bathrooms, twice-daily housekeeping service, and a full-service spa.  Families are welcomed into the mix with an indoor pool, babysitting services, complimentary baby gear (think bottles, strollers, diapers), special in-room amenities for kids, and the option for an in-room campout with a kids' tent and s'mores. This month, the hotel rolls out the red carpet for the holidays with dive-in holiday movies and cookie-baking for the kids. Also on the table through December 31: a Third Night Free offer.

The offer lists starting nightly rates of $233 after the third night credit is applied. The room rates are the same with and without the offer, which means this is a straightforward 33% savings.  We found a superior room—the least expensive room category—with a nightly rate of $350 in December. With the third night free offer, a three-night stay will cost $700 instead of $1,050, effectively reducing the nightly rate to the advertised $233. 

Got an only child? This offer is right up your alley. For the rest of us, not so much. The Ritz's least pricey rooms are limited to families of two adults and one child under 18.  A family of four would have to book a suite, the least expensive of which is an executive suite at $495 a night.  With the offer, the tab would come to $990 instead of nearly $1,500, bringing the nightly rate to $330. But that's still nearly $100 more a night than the superior room category.

Even though this offer does translate into savings of a solid 33% off regular room rates, families of four or more will still pay a minimum of $330 a night. Yet if you're looking for an upscale family city getaway, this promo does deliver it for less.  Restrictions apply; book online or call 800/621-6906 and ask for the "Third Night Free" offer. 

Racking your brain for the perfect present for a special family? Consider giving the gift of travel.

We're giving away a $500 gift certificate for Tauck Bridges, the leader in guided family travel. Tauck is known for putting together inclusive, fun family vacations for every age to enjoy together in the United States, Canada, Latin America, Europe and Africa. Tauck Bridges family travel adventures are all about shared enrichment and inclusive value, meticulously planned and seamlessly orchestrated so all vacation plans and details are handled for you so your family enjoys ease of family travel.

To enter, visit our Facebook page. You can enter through December 17, 2011.

On your marks, get set, shop! While you're online today, take advantage of the great travel sales to land a great deal on a family vacation for 2012. Here's a round-up of great Cyber Monday sales:

• What's better in the Bahamas? Savings, for starters. Save $450 on an air-inclusive package when you visit Bahamas.com, select the resort of your choice and use the promo code CYBER450 to receive an instant savings on an air-and-hotel package. Travel must be completed by February 29, 2012.
• Frontier Airlines is slashing 10% off every airfare today. Use promo code CYBER10.
• Alaska Airlines is offering fares as low as $40 each way for travel December through February.
  
• Orbitz's weekend sale is still on, offering 50% savings at popular hotels in destinations such as Orlando, San Diego, New York, Miami and Hawaii.
• Marriott is holding a Cyber Monday sale for savings of 25% at select Florida resorts for stays through January 8, 2012.
  
• Shell Vacations Hospitality's Black Friday sale continues, promising up to 50% in savings at its 23 family resorts in the US, Canada and Mexico.
  
• DirectAir is having a BOGO sale through today: Buy one ticket, get one free! Good for airfare through September 2012.
• Funjet's weekend sale showcases the 10 best deals of the season, promising big savings on vacations in Mexico, the Caribbean, Hawaii and Las Vegas when you travel through February 6, 2012.
• In Southern California, save 35% through today at the plush Terranea Resort in Rancho Palos Verdes.
• Like to ski? Liftopia.com's sale runs through today and offers up to 81% off lift ticket packages for your next ski vacation.
• Today between 9am and 9pm EST, there will be a new deal every three hours at Yuupon.com, with savings of up to 90% (no, that's not a typo) on vacations to destinations all over the world. Sign up for their e-mail alerts for an advance schedule of the sales.
• CheapCaribbean.com's Cyber Monday sale promises up to $100 per person in instant savings on trips to Mexico and the Caribbean.