I agree, no customs at the airport, just regular security. The airport is quite small (one terminal) and it took us NO time at all to get our boarding passes, through security and to the gate. We had a 6:30am or a 6:50 am flight (cant remember exactly what time with Independence Air) and took the 4:45 am shuttle. We were WAY too early for our flight but saw a play area (good for kids 2-8) near the Independence air/SWA gates.
We are booked at the Comfort Suites for Friday Dec 16, so I assume a Saturday night rate would be the same as a Friday night rate in December?
The free breakfast was available by about 4:30 am. It was much more then we expected (hot and cold food). We ate some there and then filled a ziplock bag for the airport/airplane. I was TOO excited to eat that day, but everyone else had a ton of food at thehotel prior to going to the airport.
IF you do book at the Comfort Suites, consider a first floor room. We had requested second floor and didn't realize that this hotel does not have an elevator. There were a lot of stairs to get our luggage up. This year I have requested a first floor room.
The rooms are very large but are starting to show their age. If you can get a great rate at the Holiday Inn, I would try it (due to newness). Also, the lighting wasn't very good in the rooms and made the rooms look very dark. We were just so excited to be going on a holiday of this magnitude though, that as long as the room was clean (which it was) we didn't care about anything else.
The shuttle was a 15 passenger van. It was an older van but clean. When we arived back at BUF and called for the shuttle, it was there in less then 10 minutes. The staff at this hotel was friendly.
About getting SWA boarding passes, sorry I don't know. You could ask them about it prior to booking. We flew an airline where we had preselected seats, so didn't have to worry about this.
Let me know how you make out.
Suzy V.