Travel ideas and reports for families and groups, including multigenerational families
We’re 950 miles from the North Pole. While some of the crew and naturalists scan the horizon—all we see is blue sky and floating ice of all different sizes and shapes—the captain explains that as much as 30 feet of the ice bergs are below water… This ship, of course, is built especially to handle ice. “Potentially any floe can have bears,” he says.
Though we’re just a 30-minute drive from Jacksonville International Airport, and plenty of nonstop flights from major cities like New York and Atlanta, we might as well be on another planet with long, deserted beaches, lots of wildlife and clear, warm water. It feels more like the South, though, than South Florida, with canopies of trees and locals who seem happy to live life in the slow lane.
Because of Lindblad’s partnership with National Geographic , there is now a new Expedition Photography Initiative, which means that there are certified photo instructors aboard all ships in the Lindblad Expeditions-National Geographic fleet who can help take our photography skills to the next level, from composition to proper exposure. There are special sessions for kids too.
We were told the night before to be prepared for middle-of-the-night sightings here in the Arctic north of Longyearbyen, Norway. “You can sleep any time,” exploration leader Lisa Trotter had told us the night before. We’ve been instructed to have binoculars, cameras, mittens and hats always at the ready (It’s cold here—just 40 degrees today!)
Welcome to an excellent exhibit at the Nobel Peace Center in Oslo, Norway, where an amazing interactive exhibit for children about refugees– Nansen and I– has recently opened. At the same time, the Center is showcasing Transit, a terrific photo exhibit about Nobel Peace Prize laureate and Norwegian Fridtjof Nansen and refugees of today.
I wasn’t dreaming. We were floating high above Albuquerque, N.M., in a giant, rainbow-colored hot air balloon. We gave each other one of those I-can’t-believe-we’re-here grins that made every argument we’d had on our Southwest road trip fade away. Every vacation should have at least one standout moment like this.
The scientists are mostly under the age of 10. Welcome to the new “Treasures of the Earth” exhibition here at the Children’s Museum of Indianapolis, launched in partnership with the National Geographic Society and world-renowned archaeologists, at the largest children’s museum in the country, which draws well over a million visitors a year to Indy.
How much would you pay for a memory? I was thinking about that looking around at the parents, grandparents and hoards of young children—especially little boys—at the Foxwoods Theater on Broadway where Spider-Man: Turn Off The Dark, the most expensive production ever mounted and one fraught with problems and delays, has recently opened.
The Continental Army. Here in the heart of historic Philadelphia on a steamy summer day, we’ve time traveled back to the heady days of the American Revolution, the drafting of the Declaration of Independence and the making of Betsy Ross’ famous flag sewn at the request of General George Washington — all right where it all happened — thanks to 30 terrific costumed “History Makers,” as well as 40 first-rate storytellers from the nonprofit Historic Philadelphia organization .
Which party are you going to? Across the country on July 4th weekend, everyone will be slurping ice cream cones, waving flags and having a good time — hopefully. If you want to do more than attend — or host — a BBQ in your backyard, you certainly have your pick. Here are five picks guaranteed to please without busting the budget