We review as we travel… destinations, lodging, cruises, resorts, you name it.
DAY THREE (June 13, 2009) — Finally, a Caribbean beach that’s everything a Caribbean beach should be — quaint, with hammocks strung in the palm…
The skate park is amazing — all kinds of dips, jumps — the boys got there around one and didn’t quit until it got dark just after 7 pm. (More about the camp tomorrow).
DAY SIX (April 4, 2009) — Lance is a Hawk, Bailey a turkey vulture and Sonora a two year-old Bald Eagle. The kids’ eyes are…
DAY FIVE (At the Hyatt Scottsdale) — The kids are hard at work — on vacation. They are crafting elaborate sand creations at the small…
“This is Grand Canyon National Park, not Jurassic park,” she says, holding up a plastic dinosaur. “This is the closest you’ll get to a dinosaur!”
We’re about to go on a ranger — led fossil hunt and there are thousands of fossils to be found, she tells the crowd that includes at least two dozen kids. But there are no dinosaur bones here — these fossils are a lot older!
I look around and see all kinds of families — from around the world here to experience what is widely considered one of the wonders of the world. It was set aside as a national monument by Theodore Roosevelt in 1908 and became a national park in 1919. It remains one of the most visited parks.
Today, the train once again carries more than 200,000 passengers to the Canyon 60 miles and 2.5 hours from Williams. Some will return the same afternoon. My cousins — -Jayme and Mike Sitzman and Ethan, 6, and Hannah,4, and I have decided to overnight at the canyon so we have more time to “explore,” as Ethan says.
DAY ONE (Tuesday, March 31, 2009) — The Purple People Eater; Qutie (well it’s a four year old’s turn); Rhinoceros; Tickle Monster… by the time…
Take your pick — you can ride a lift up the chairlift at any of Park City’s three resorts and go mountain biking or hiking. Deer Valley alone has a mountain bike school as well as 50 dedicated trails. There are mid-mountain hiking trails that connect the resorts and the Olympic Park — 27 miles! –where incidentally locals turn out in force on Saturday afternoons to watch Ski jumpers practice their jumps, landing in a pool at the bottom.
DAY TWO — It’s the last weekend in March and we’re knee-deep in fresh powder. Park City Mountain Resort got something like 18 fresh inches…
DAY ONE (March 27, 2009) == MMM… maybe we should skip straight to desert. There’s not one but three kinds of chocolate fondue — white…
Here there literally is a crystal wonderland — a labyrinth created by international artists that use crystal as an art form in 14 Chambers of Wonder, with paintings, sculptures and installations. We loved Jim Whiting’s Mechanical Theater with the dancing pants and the man’s torso that comes apart to reveal his insides that are all glittering crystals.
I decide I want to see what else this tiny resort village has to offer so I decide to go on a walk in the woods with engaging ski pro Alois Gstrein, who was raised here on a farm and has lived here all his life, now with his wife and new baby. His entire family – parents, two brothers, two sisters — all live here.
DAY 4 — The sky is post card blue. The Alps look like they are covered in marshmallow fluff with Oreo crumbles underneath. We’re sitting…
Did I mention our Austrian ski guide Bernhardt Kneissl who has been teaching and guiding here for 43 years — since he was 17? He doesn’t speak much English and my daughter Mel and I no German, so it makes for an interesting day.
The kids seemed to love that you swim in a lazy river from indoor pools to the outside, jump out, run outside for two seconds and then jump into one of these huge heated pools on stilts — with salt water, one with whirlpool and massage and blessedly warm. Inside kids and their parents are playing in the expansive pools under the waterfall and in the kids’ pool that is shaped like a Noah’s Ark
When my 18 year old daughter Melanie and I were touring Austria last summer, she begged me to bring her skiing this winter — her last before she leaves for college.So in the true spirit of let kids lead the way, here we are, about an hour from Innsbuck and just a couple of hours drive from Munich or Zurich.
Memo to junior first time cruisers: “Go to the kids club the first day because you’ll meet lots of kids,” said Kathy Novzynski,10 and a cruise veteran with three sailings under her belt “A lot of kids don’t know that the activities are so fun,” adds Melora Cook, 9, who is from New Brunswick, Canada.
DAY SIX (March 5, 2009) – Two thousand pounds of cereal, 500 gallons of ice cream, 36,000 eggs, 1,600 gallons of milk, 900 pounds of…
The sharks are everywhere — swimming in front of me, behind me, so close I can see their teeth and the marks on their skin. Some are nine feet long!