On Bases, Hotels Go Civilian When I completed Army basic training at Fort Leonard Wood in Missouri, I was thrilled I had made it through all six weeks and would never return. Nearly two decades later, I was back as a reporter on assignment. Instead of being squashed into a cattle car with other terrified recruits, I was now in a van touring the huge installation at my leisure. There were no red-faced drill sergeants screaming at me to jump out and run up four flights of stairs with my duffel bag. There were no 3 a.m. workouts with 10 minutes to throw on workout gear and hustle down to formation. But the Army hotel where I stayed looked like my old barracks with the same linoleum floors, fluorescent lights and greenish walls. I expected one of my old drill sergeants to stride into my room for an impromptu inspection at any moment. The days of dour Army hotels are quickly disappearing. The Army is privatizing nearly all of its 17,000 hotel rooms across the country, and outside companies are renovating, building and operating them. The $1.3 billion program saves the Army money and gets the hotels renovated and built faster than the government could do. The work should be done within 10 years. The developer Lend Lease, which has been building private homes on military bases for more than a decade, and the InterContinental Hotels Group teamed up to modernize Army lodging and give it a civilian feel. Out went the old furniture and bland paint schemes and in came flat screen TVs and marble countertops. New perks like free DVDs, hot breakfasts and shuttle buses were also added. These renovated hotels are branded as Holiday Inn Express hotels and the new ones as Candlewood Suites. The hotel at Fort Leonard Wood is currently being renovated and will become a Holiday Inn Express. I am looking forward to going back. Read my story about the coming changes here. How do you book one of the new army hotels? Do it here. Base Hotels You Have Known Tell us about the base hotels you've stayed in. Are there any you will miss? Leave your picks in the comments below. If we get a good selection, we will publish the feedback for our informal, unscientific survey on the blog. Kristina Shevory served eight years in the Army as a linguist. She has written for The New York Times, Wired, Business Week and The Atlantic. You can follow her on Twitter at @shevory.