Making A Great Summer Vacation

How to make a great summer vacation?

 

It’s a time-tested custom: Summer vacation, the annual journey to an exciting destination for the family. It’s an event marked by months of planning and anticipation, and the anticipation that builds as it approaches is palpable.

But now that a few generations have carried on this tradition, we sometimes feel like it’s a little stagnant. We struggle to come up with new ideas to keep the family vacation from becoming boring.

The struggle ends here. We’ve got some great ideas you can use to kickstart your vacation planning process and make it something that the whole family will enjoy.

Make The Traveling Part Of The Trip

Sometimes our destination is so far away that we work to find the fastest way to get there, then focus on our experiences after arrival. But the actual traveling can be an experience in and of itself.

Travel by rail remains a romantic idea. Trains are great because they skip the traffic jams, and restless kids can get up and move around.

And don’t forget boating, which presents the option of buying your own boat and using it on a variety of trips. With multiple options for boat financing, a vessel of their own is within the reach of almost any family. The bonus there, of course, is that you’ll have transportation covered for as many future vacations as you wish.

Finding a way to escape the interminable car ride can do wonders for your vacation’s enjoyment factor.

Amp Up The Old

By adulthood, most people have been to a beach somewhere. It can sound a little dull to both you and the kids to say, “We’re going to the beach!”

You don’t need to abandon the beach. You need to enhance it. Those of us in the lower 48 states have probably visited beaches elsewhere on the mainland. No problem. You can still make the beach exciting, no matter your level of experience with it, by upgrading it and going to a Hawaiian beach. Sound crazy? Maybe at first, but if you think it over and have the kids help you to plan ahead (in terms of both the itinerary and the financing, it could turn out to be a legendary trip that you’ll remember for a lifetime.

That can be done with any familiar vacation. If you’ve gone skiing in New England, find a way to get to Colorado. If you’ve been to Broadway in Nashville for the live music, hit Broadway in New York for theater. You get the idea.

Sequential Vacations

Most of us look at a map of the country and immediately write off certain areas as being devoid of vacation opportunities. But that’s not the case. Connecting the dots between various options can draw a line right through areas where amazing experiences are waiting for you.

 

 

For example, you might load up from your home in upstate New York for a trip to Pittsburgh to catch a Pirates game. From there, you can swing through Ohio’s Amish country to the Newport Aquarium near Cincinnati, then loop through Kentucky’s horse country before starting back home.

It’s not necessary for a given location to entertain you for a week by itself. You can string together a series of shorter experiences into a single vacation that’s like nobody else’s.

The whole point of a family vacation is to have fun together. When it becomes boring, it’s time to shake it up. By looking at the trip with a fresh pair of eyes, you can turn it back into an exciting summer tradition.