Turks and Caicos — Day Two
Milo Greenspon may only be four but he drove his family’s vacation decision—straight from Chicago to Beaches Resort in Turks and Caicos.
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Beach Vacations | Cruises & All-Inclusive | Families & Groups | Food and Dining | Lodging | Travel Diaries
TURKS AND CAICOS, November 2009 — Day One
The concert goers are swaying to the music, clapping and crowding the stage so they can reach out and touch their favorite stars. Their smiling parents are right behind, video cams and digital cameras in hand. That’s because these concert goers are toddlers and preschoolers, many in diapers. Their stars are Elmo, Burt, Ernie, Cookie Monster and the latest to join the Sesame Street gang Abby Cadabby, a fairy in training. They sing and dance for the kids for an hour
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Giving Back While You Travel
Avocados bigger than grapefruit, star fruit, breadfruit, wild watercress and vegetables I’ve never heard of… We’re not perusing a menu on the Caribbean island of St Lucia. We’re touring a local hillside farm owned for more than 40 years by the Richards family. Isaac Alphonse, the purchasing manager for The Landings
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St. Lucia — Last Day
We sit on the deck overlooking the ocean, palm trees and St Lucia’s most famous site–The Pitons, the two tall lava cones that differentiate this Caribbean island. We’ve stopped at Jalousie Plantation, spread over a 192 acres on what was once a working sugar plantation just outside the town of Soufriere in between Pitons. We are staring right at the mountain—right next to us!
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St. Lucia — Day Three
It’s not even 10 am and already they are handing out the rum punch! We’re on a catamaran courtesy of Carnival Sailing that will take us from the north part of the island where we are staying at The Landings resort to the town of Soufriere (which translates to “sulfur in the air,” we’re told). Along the way we have spectacular views pf St Lucia’s claim to fame — Petit Piton and Gros Piton.
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KINDER, GENTLER AIRLINES?
Don’t we wish! I was thinking about that this morning as I drove my husband to the airport because his elderly mom had been rushed to the hospital and was very seriously ill. Luckily, I was able to get him a free flight. If not, it would have cost nearly $1,000 for a round trip ticket from New York to Chicago (and never mind change fees since he doesn’t know when he returns.) That’s what you get for trying to buy a ticket instantly.
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St. Lucia — Day Two
Tangerines, star fruit, breadfruit, wild watercress. We’re not perusing a menu in St Lucia. We’re touring a local farm owned by The Richards family for more than 40 years. Isaac Alphonse, the purchasing manager for The Landings, the 120-plus unit new resort where we are staying
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St. Lucia, November 2009 — Day One
There’s something to be said for direct flights to out of the way places. We are taking Jet Blue’s new nonstop service from JFK to St. Lucia, a small island near Martinique and Barbados. But instead of taking all day with connections in Miami or San Juan, we arrive in a little more than four hours. Nice!
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Scoring a Holiday Deal That Won’t Bust the Budget
I’m perched in a wooden treehouse lazing on a cushy double mattress atop a white sand beach along Mexico’s Riviera Maya. Overlooking the turquoise Caribbean Sea, I’m about as far away from holiday hoopla and craziness as I can get when the beach butler comes by to see if I need anything.
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PIGEON FORGE, Day four
Check out the lights! Four million–really–blue and green and clear ones on trees and buildings. Welcome to Dollywood. Of course it is named for star Dolly Parton who grew up in a two room cabin not far from here, pigeon forge, TN—you can even see a replica of the cabin where she grew up with 11 brothers and sisters and it seems one bed.
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PIGEON FORGE – Day Three
I haven’t stopped eating—corn fritters made from corn meal milled at the historic Old Mill that is on the National Register of Historic Places–continuously operating for 170 years. I started the day at The Log Cabin with country ham and fresh biscuits.
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PIGEON FORGE – Day Two
Trivia question: What is the most visited National Park? (Hint: It isn’t Yellowstone, Yosemite or the Grand Canyon) It’s Great Smoky National Park—more than 550,000 acres that straddle Tennessee and North Carolina that attracts more than 9 MILLION visitors a year.
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GET RID OF THAT OLD CRIB–NOW!
I know when the new baby comes to visit it’s tempting to put your grandchild in the same crib you used as a new parent. DON’T!
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PIGEON FORGE, Tennessee – Day one
The Living room is beautifully decked out for the holidays with greenery, wreaths and a tree in all its glory. On the mantel in my bedroom, Santa shares space with golden elk and garland festooned with bright red holiday balls and ribbon. Even the lamp is tied with a big red and gold holiday bow and there’s a poinsettia (albeit a silk one) in the bathroom.
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DIFFERENT STROKES FOR DIFFERENT FOLKS
I just got back from two entirely different kinds of destinations that are winners for entirely different kinds of families.
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When Life Interferes With a Planned Celebration
Life has a way of changing planned celebrations. Jean Anne McKiernan and Richard Sandano were planning a big Brooklyn, N.Y., wedding when they discovered—very happily—they were going to have a baby.
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It pays to ask
I’ve been saying for months that in this economy, we should ask for what else the hotel/resort/ cruiseline can do for us–a better room, resort credits, free food. But until last week, I hadn’t thought about that in the context of a family emergency. I found myself handling flights and hotels for family converging in Illinois after my 90-year-old mother-in-law was rushed to the hospital and then died.
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Sailing Home from Bermuda
Life is too short to waste a minute, I think. We say goodbye to Bermuda and Hamilton’s Town Hall (click image to enlarge) DAY 5—I wake up on board Royal Caribbean’s Explorer of the Seas
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High Tea at the Hamilton Fairmont Hotel
We learn it is the only place—and the place—for a traditional English Tea. In the 1840s, Anna, the 7th Duchess of Bedford, wanted a snack for tea and thinly sliced bread and butter.
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To San Francisco’s California Academy of Sciences, the Greenest Museum in the Country
In the year since it has re opened, the Cal Academy has emerged as the city’s top cultural tourist attraction, drawing more visitors than Alcatraz Kids get up close and personal with specimens at the Academy of Sciences
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Beach Vacations | Cruises & All-Inclusive | Destinations | Families & Groups | Lodging | Travel Diaries
The rain stops in Bermuda
Not sunny, but not raining. Just 66,000 people live on this pristine island—actually a series of about 360 small coral island, which is part of the British Commonwealth. Yes, we see businessmen wearing Bermuda shorts, knee-high socks, and shirts and ties to work. Hedges are manicured and lawns mowed. Houses are painted a rainbow of colors—bright orange, green and blue, pastel pinks and yellows.
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Cruising when the sun doesn’t shine
It’s not the weather we imagined on our trip to Bermuda. The seas are rocking. It’s pouring and the waves are high. We get sprayed standing on our little balcony.
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A cruise to Bermuda with old family friends
The cruise was long planned and then a week before tragedy stuck…
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To Yosemite National Park
I smile remembering two other kids about the same age who were equally proud of themselves for making it to the top of Vernal Fall, also their first “big hike” in Yosemite.
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A visit to California wine country
We drive to Healdsburg, a small picturesque town where, around the Plaza Park square, are tasting rooms, restaurants, antique shops, and more. My 23 year old daughter Reggie is excited because she scores a cast iron frying pan for $15. I’m excited because it is a perfect sunny fall day and I’m spending it with my husband and daughter.
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A quick trip to Yosemite National Park
DAY 4 — Five year old Rivers Klopson is turning cartwheels on the rocks next to Yosemite’s famous Vernal Falls. It’s sunny and everyone sitting…
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To the historic ships in SF where Reggie works
Here’s the chance to give your kids a lesson — without them even realizing it — in San Francisco’s seafaring past and the people who made their lives sailing in and out of San Francisco Bay, hauling lumber, canned fruit and more. Five vessels — the Alma, Balclutha, Eureka, Hercules and C.A. Thayer are designated National Historic Landmarks.
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Learning About African-American History at Colonial Williamsburg
Colonial Williamsburg explores the lives and complexities of free and enslaved blacks during the Revolutionary Era, highlighting personal and unified contributions, sacrifices and decisions made by 19th-century blacks in securing their freedom
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At the Cal Academy of Sciences
We’re at the California Academy of Sciences in Golden Gate Park in San Francisco which in the year since it has reopened has emerged as San Francisco’s top cultural tourist attraction, drawing more visitors than even Alcatraz.
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Visting San Francisco with my grown up daughter
The Hotel San Francisco atop Nob Hill was getting ready for its grand opening when the city suffered its devastating earthquake April 18, 1906. The hotel survived and a year later, opened, celebrating the city’s renewal. The hotel has hosted celebrities and presidents. Tony Bennett first sang “I Left My Heart in San Francisco “here.
