We visited the Grand Canyon at the end of 2024 and since we had planned to spend one full, packed-to-the-brim day at the Grand Canyon, we elected to travel into the area the night before, spend the night at a hotel, and get up bright and early to start our day.
With this in mind, and since we were driving up from Phoenix, Arizona, we found ourselves looking for a hotel that would get us as close to the Grand Canyon as possible – which is what led us to The Squire.
This is a full, in depth review of our stay at The Squire at Grand Canyon located at 74 State Route 64, in Grand Canyon, Arizona. We stayed at this hotel for one night in December 2024 and this was our experience.
OVERVIEW
Because of the branding of this hotel, it almost seems like it is an independently owned and operated location. From the name, to the logo, to the signage, to the building design – it just does not look like your typical Hampton Inn or Embassy Suites.
The Squire is part of a hotel chain though – it is part of the Holiday Inn Resorts, which is part of the larger InterContinental Hotels Group, which includes other hotels like Candlewood Suites, Staybridge Suites, and of course: Holiday Inn. If you look closely, it does note that The Squire at Grand Canyon is a Holiday Inn Resort Hotel on the website, but it’s in very small print – and if I missed it on my first time perusing their website, I can bet that you might too.
The hotel is spacious, boasting over 300 rooms across several different buildings. (In other words: don’t pull up to the entrance, send someone to go check in, while someone outside starts unloading your luggage onto a cart – your room very well may be in another building that you have to drive to!)
Since we were there in the “off-season” (turns out: not a lot of people visit the Grand Canyon in December!) we found the hotel to be fairly empty. We only encountered a handful of other families and couples staying in the rooms around us, but I would imagine that this hotel easily and quickly books to no vacancy in the warmer months!
Since we were there in December, the hotel’s lobby was beautifully decorated for Christmas with lights, multiple Christmas Trees, glittery centerpieces – it was such a fun vibe.
Further, since it was Christmastime, the hotel had a scavenger hunt in the lobby for the kids. They were each given a sheet of paper with pictures of Christmas ornaments, figures, and different Christmas items that were hidden around the lobby. The kids had to find and cross out each item, and upon the return of their completed scavenger hunt papers to the front desk, they were each given a silver jingle bell!
I have no idea if a lobby scavenger hunt is something they do outside of the Christmas season – but it was just a fun little touch that really took our stay and experience up a notch.
THE ROOMS
We found the rooms at The Squire to be fairly average.
They were clean, the beds were comfy, and overall, they simply felt like any other average hotel room.
The bathrooms (at least in the rooms we stayed in) are TINY. There was zero counter space at all – it was a sink and that’s it. There was nowhere to even put your toothbrush!
Further, once we were actually in the hotel room and looking around, we realized that there was this large chunk of completely empty space outside of the bathroom. It’s space that would traditionally be occupied by the bathroom – and if it encapsulated the bathroom, it would feel spacious and much more average. Instead, it was as if they cut the bathroom space in half as an afterthought, but still had the square footage in the room that is simply open space.
It was strange.
But, overall, the rooms are nothing to write home about. Think of your average hotel room and that’s about what The Squire has to offer.
THE AMENITIES
As average as the rooms are, the hotel’s amenities are where The Squire really begins to shine and pull away from the pack.
There are multiple restaurants on site (we’ll talk more about that in a minute), both an indoor and an outdoor pool, an indoor and an outdoor hot tub, and we saw lawn games set up in the grassy area next to the pool. There was a full arcade and bowling alley downstairs, and a game room upstairs.
In other words: The Squire is the perfect place to relax and unwind after a day of sight-seeing around the Grand Canyon – no matter what your preference in activities is!
The pool and outdoor areas of The Squire are really beautiful.
Since we were there in December, the temperature never got above 50º – making the indoor pool and hot tub where we spent our time (even though Derrick was brave, err crazy, enough to take a quick jump into the outdoor pool – it just looked so beautiful!)
Both the indoor and outdoor pools were large and clean and the same can be said for the hot tubs. There were complimentary towels stashed in cubbies around the pool and, if you are there in the evening, the hotel has a screen that they project a movie on every night in the indoor pool area!
Upon check in, we received complimentary $5 cards to be used in the arcade. Not that we wouldn’t have gone down to check the arcade out, these cards gave us a more exciting reason to visit (because we could actually sample a few games on the hotel’s dime).
There were a variety of typical arcade games, like basketball, skeeball, claw games, shooter games, as well as air hockey, and pool. In other words: there was something for everyone – even if you aren’t typically an “arcade” person.
Adjacent to the arcade is the bowling alley. Our kids had never been bowling before, so as soon as they saw it, they were so excited and begged to play a game. We found the prices in both the arcade and bowling alley to be fairly average, not the extremely elevated prices that normally come along with amenities inside of a resort! And so, we enjoyed a very fun game of bowling!
Since it was December and the pool and outdoor areas were limited, the arcade and bowling alley did get busier as the night went on. But to be honest, that just made the experience that much more fun. The atmosphere was exciting, competitive, and lively – we really enjoyed our time hanging out in the arcade and bowling alley!
THE FOOD
The Squire is the home of four restaurants, although not all four are open simultaneously.
The Canyon Room (located down the hall from the hotel’s lobby) offers breakfast from 6:30am-10:30am. This is NOT a complimentary breakfast.
The Canyon Room offers a menu of various and traditional breakfast foods as well as a buffet option. As of this recording, the breakfast buffet runs at $20 for adults and $10 for children.
Oh and additionally, even though The Canyon Room is not open for lunch, they do offer a “boxed lunch” option that you can pre-order and pick up to take with you on your Grand Canyon adventures. Depending on where you go in touring the Grand Canyon, lunch options aren’t exactly plentiful (there are no Chick-Fil-A’s along the Canyon Rim), so having this option is wonderful.
The Desert Lounge & Grill is the hotel’s dinner location and it is open nightly from 5pm-9pm. This location is located just off the hotel lobby and they offer upscale American dining and a bar.
We peeked into this restaurant: it looked very cozy with it’s fireplace and candlelit tables and we could smell the food out in the lobby – it smelled delicious!
The Squire Pub & Social is open nightly from 5pm-10pm and is located across from the arcade and bowling alley. Think of this as the hotel’s main bar location with dim lights, TV screens, a long bar to sit at, and a few tables. Their menu includes food you would expect to order at a bar: appetizers like chips and salsa, onion rings, and wings, burgers, wraps, and sandwiches, salads, and pizzas.
And last but not least: The Watchtower Pool & Patio is the casual dining location at the pool. In other words, this location is only open seasonally and it turns out: December is not the right season to take advantage of The Watchtower Pool & Patio. If you are at The Squire in the warmer months and enjoying an evening around the pool, this is where you’d order burgers, hot dogs, wraps, finger foods and drinks.
While we’re on the topic of food, allow me to warn you: food outside of the hotel is EXTREMELY expensive. We had decided that we’d get dinner somewhere close to the hotel before checking in for the night and we were quite flabbergasted at the prices of the restaurants close by.
We ended up at a pizza place and spent about double what we would normally spend on pizza for dinner (and it was just “okay” – nothing to specifically highlight or write home about).
Thinking that the McDonalds in town would be a cheaper option, we planned to grab breakfast there instead of eating at the hotel and we were shocked when our order of 6 breakfast sandwiches – no drinks, hashbrowns, or extras, landed us at over $40).
The only reason we can think of for the food prices being so exorbitant is that The Squire is literally located in the last town you drive through before arriving at the Grand Canyon. As such, since it’s the last stop before you hit the State Park, the prices everywhere reflect the fact that they truly are your last place to grab food outside of the very few food locations along the Canyon Rim.
After seeing how high the prices at the McDonalds were – all of a sudden the prices at the hotel’s restaurants didn’t seem so bad! And at least there, you could get a fresh, more quality meal than McDonalds.
If we had known about the elevated cost of food in the town The Squire is situated in, we would have done two things differently:
- We would have eaten dinner before arriving in town or simply planned to eat at the hotel.
- We would have stopped on our way up from Phoenix to buy snacks, bottled water, and some breakfast foods (like yogurts, muffins, fruit, and donuts). This would have saved us our morning-run to McDonalds, filled us up with better foods, and saved us the frustration and shock at seeing the prices on the McDonalds menu.
THE GRAND CANYON
Sure, The Squire has a beautiful pool area, some fun amenities, and a great lineup of food options, but let’s be honest: the reason you’d be staying at this hotel is because it is SO CLOSE to the Grand Canyon.
How close? Well, it is just 2 ½ miles to get to the South Entrance Station of the Grand Canyon. The Squire Hotel is literally located in the last town before you get to the Grand Canyon, in other words: this is as close as you are going to get, unless you are staying in one of the hotels, resorts, or cabins on the Canyon Rim within the State Park.
So, I looked at The Squire’s website and saw that they boast being just 2 ½ miles from the Grand Canyon and I took that to mean the ACTUAL Grand Canyon.
However, it’s 2 ½ miles to the South Entrance STATION (where you pay your fee to enter the State Park).
The Grand Canyon is another 4 ½ miles down from there – so to be accurate, The Squire is situated about 7 miles from the Grand Canyon. Maybe that’s just semantics, but I like being accurate!
For many people, going to visit the Grand Canyon in the United States of America is a BUCKET LIST item. Whether you live in the USA or anywhere else in the world – traveling to visit one of the Seven Wonders of the World is truly a once in a lifetime experience.
Words, photos, and videos truly do not come anywhere close to accurately describing the Grand Canyon. I mean, trust me: we really did our best to capture in photos and videos the grandeur and majesty and gravitas of this epic hole in the ground. But I feel like, even if we were equipped with a full month of shooting, from the top, the bottom, and the air – we still would not scratch the surface of it’s breath-taking greatness.
Seeing the magnificent sight that is the Grand Canyon is something that EVERYONE should do at least once in their lifetime. Regardless if you plan to go to the extreme and hike from the top of the canyon to the bottom and back up (a feat you honestly have to train for and would take several days to do) or if you simply plan to spend one day exploring the Canyon Rim, the experience will leave you in awe that such a place really truly does exist.
LAST NOTES
As noted on The Squire’s website: a $25 daily amenity fee is added to every reservation. They note that this fee covers the pools and hot tubs, the fitness center, complimentary WiFi, self-parking, and the seasonal resort activities.
If you ask me: these are amenities that come standard with every hotel. In my opinion, they can get away with adding this additional $25 fee simply because they call themselves a “resort” and because they are so close to the Grand Canyon.
Is it petty? Yes. But they can charge whatever they want, so just be aware when planning your vacation budget that the price of the room will have additional fees added on top.
Last but not least, I’ll mention that there is a gift shop located in the hotel lobby, which includes Grand Canyon souvenirs and a small “grab and go” section with snacks. It looked like they also had a section of “frequently forgotten items” like ibuprofen and toiletries – so if you forget to pack something, the gift shop off the lobby might save you from having to hop in your car and drive to the General Store down the street.
CONCLUSION
If you are planning a trip to the Grand Canyon for the first time, newsflash: it’s big and completely overwhelming.
Even if you do your research ahead of time and plan out your visit, I highly recommend stopping at the Visitor’s Center as your first stop. This is not your average, ordinary Visitor’s Center – it’s filled with VERY helpful information to guide you in your exploration of the Grand Canyon. There were signs that gave ideas depending on how much time you planned to spend at the Grand Canyon, maps, and Park Rangers to answer all of your questions and give advice. Oh and restrooms! You’ll definitely want to hit those up before setting out on your adventures!
So! Have I sold you on a trip to the Grand Canyon yet?
