What has been your favorite family vacation? I'd love some ideas for future trips, especially that are family-friendly!
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We've done Breckenridge and Winter Park, Colorado recently and both were great for kids. Winter Park's summer resort is awesome for kids (and better priced than Breckenridge). I liked Breckenridge better for proximity to trails, shopping/downtown, Dillion Lake, and Loveland Pass. It's also close to Georgetown if you wanted to take a train ride.
I think we're planning to go to Yellowstone next year, and will return to Colorado Springs in 2 years. We're also doing Lake of the Ozarks this summer - never been.
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Disney World seems like an obvious one but oh man, did we ever have fun. But we also spent a week at Coconut Bay in St. Lucia and it was magnificent.
I'd like to do some things closer to home, Blue Mountain maybe. I was really intrigued by Tyler's Place, which I saw in another thread, and would love to find some kind of similar family vacation.
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We love the Black Hills! We just got back from there after the 4th. I love that you get a big variety of activities all within a couple hours of each other in the area. We did a few days in Rapid City, SD doing all the little kid touristy stuff, then a few days in Custer State Park doing Mt. Rushmore and hiking, then a couple days in Spearfish doing more hiking. We camp (in a camper, not tent!), but there's all kinds of places to stay in the area - hotels, resorts, cabins, etc. It is such a beautiful area and great for little kids (ours are 1, 3, and 5).
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We drove the Ring Road in Iceland with our son when he was 2.5. That might be complicated for multiple younger kids. There were some treacherous places on hikes, like with steep drops, and with just the one toddler we could have him ride safely in the frame backpack. Plus he happens to really enjoy eating fish. Awesome trip though.
We took him at age 4.5 to Palm Springs. The hotel (Omni Rancho Las Palmas) had a huge pool complex with water slides, a lazy river, etc. Each morning we did an activity off-property them spent time in the pool before dinner. Nice balance.
We are taking our third trip to Mount Washington this summer, first trip with all three kids. Fingers crossed!
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We often try to prioritize trips with extended family bc we don’t live near them and also then there are extra hands to help w the kids. My favorite trips are always renting a giant cabin in northern Michigan on a beach (inland or Lake MI).
We are doing WDW this winter and am pumped about the house we rented in the Reunion Resort subdivision.
We also enjoyed Disneyland/Anaheim for 3 nights followed by Palm Springs for 4 nights (simple 2 hour drive between the two places). We stayed at a Marriott a five minute walk from DL that had a fun water park (and bonus, we used points). Then we rented a big house with cool pool in Palm Springs. (We often prefer house rentals for the convenience of kitchen and multiple bedrooms over hotels).
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Oh man, this makes me miss travel. We used to try to take one international trip and one domestic trip each year...my favourite international trip was one we made to Peru 4 years ago, when our kids were 4 and 7 and it was the best. We spent time in the Andes, went to a jungle lodge (which was by far and away the best part of the trip!!!), and then a bit of time in Lima before we left. It was amazing.
And locally, we have had some great ones--including a magical trip to Vancouver Island (Tofino and Victoria were incredible!!!).
I can't wait to travel again. -
@woodentulip: Same! My daughter is a Covid baby so we haven’t done any family travel yet, but DH and I used to do two trips per year as well. I’m itching to start again, but won’t fly as a family until my toddler is vaccinated. It makes me happy to hear you are able to do more adventurous travel with kiddos—gives me hope!
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@kayla0416: I think Black Hills would be my kid's (3 and 5 at the time) favorite vacation! We stayed in a VRBO in Hot Springs, SD - this was the kid's favorite vaca because of Evan's Plunge Hot Springs waterpark. Hot Springs also has the Mammoth Site which we didn't make it to, and a really nice park where the kids could play in a stream. We did Mount Rushmore, Bear Country and Needles Highway / Custer State Park, and Rushmore Tramway Adventures (another fav for the kids).
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@ElbieKay: DH and I did Iceland a few years ago and cannot wait until our kids are older so that we can go back with them. I'm super impressed that you went with your little. Maybe I'm just way out of shape b/c I got winded going up some of those stair cases to the top of the waterfalls. I can't imagine doing that with a 2.5 yo on my back!!!
We haven't done any too crazy vacations with our kids yet bc my youngest doesn't have the stamina to do too much and I'm just too crazy to want to get the most out of everything! So we have tended towards the beachy "relaxing" type vacations which we love. We're headed to San Diego next month and I'm super excited!
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We took a vacation to Denver, CO when our oldest was about 20 months. It was our first real vacation or travel as new parents and it was really fun!
Travel by car was easy and we loved the museums and botanical gardens - all were super kid friendly. Tons of restaurant options for all of us. And we took a day trip to Boulder for some hiking and to enjoy their downtown and splash pad.
We also braved NYC for the holidays in 2019 (kids were 7 and 1) and it was AMAZING, but with COVID I really don’t think we will be back to a city like that for a long time. We found an awesome 1-BR hotel room close to a metro stop so it was very convenient. We enjoyed some playground time in Central Park, the natural history museum, Top of the Rock, the American Girl store, CAMP toy store, Dylan’s Candy Bar, and a nighttime visit to see the tree at Rockefeller Center and look at holiday window displays. It was a whirlwind 3 days and was as exhausting as it was fun schlepping a stroller up and down the subway station stairs 🤪
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Our best trip with a baby was to Asheville, NC. Our daughter was five month old at the time, and it was so easy to take her along to everything we wanted to do...she was still really happy in a wearable carrier, would nap in the stroller, was still easy to feed, and didn't need a ton of stuff to keep her happy. I didn't know how easy we had it for travel before she could crawl and had more stuff to take along to keep her entertained or fed.
Our best trip recently with both kids (age 4 and 6) was actually just something nearby to us. We took a staycation week and did things locally. We stayed at a hotel in DC for a couple days of the week - the kids loved playing in the pool, we could easily walk to the zoo, took walks around the monuments, and stuff like that. I loved getting to walk to do things that usually feel like more of a hassle to drive to, and it was nice to "get away" but not have the prep for a bigger trip. I needed a low maintenance kind of trip this year!
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Our go-to spot for family vacations is Myrtle Beach, SC. There's a lot of family-friendly things to do there, in addition to the beach.
We just got back from a trip to Williamsburg, VA. It had a little something for everyone - historical sites that were pretty kid-friendly, Busch Gardens, and Great Wolf Lodge. If there hadn't been such a heat wave going on when we were there, it would have been nearly perfect.
We've also enjoyed short camping trips and have a trip to Disney World planned for next spring.
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We took DS to Disney World when he was 4, and it was surprisingly awesome. We were torn about spending that much money and not having a "real" travel/new culture experience. But we all had a great time.
As a kid, my family went to Costa Rica, and that was awesome. There's so much nature stuff to do, and it's really helpful that it's only 1 time zone different for us.
I love the idea of this family camp thing. Does anyone know of any within driving distance of Chicago?
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