“So different than traveling with friends”
By Eileen Ogintz
Traveling with kids is like raising them—expensive, frustrating and wonderful.
“So different than traveling with friends,” said Grace Fong, traveling from Singapore with her daughter and granddaughter who is nine.
“There is stress… you get angry, and you have to be patient,” she said.
Aboard the Hurtigruten MS Trollfjord traveling up and then down the Norwegian Coast, there are a lot of families — from a multigenerational group from London with an eight-month-old, to teens and young adults with their families from Australia and Mexico City, to women in their 30s traveling with parents from the US and Korea.
“This is great,” said Rebecca Wesson, traveling with her partner Ande their two daughters aged 19 and 25 from Australia. “We can drink with them. When they were younger, we didn’t drink because of them,” she joked.
“We don’t have curfews anymore,” added Brittany Nicolas, 25. “We have a lot more rope to play with.”
But there certainly is a lot of adjustment involved. “I’m much more a fly by the seat my pants traveler,” said Laura Stump, a physician in her 30s traveling with her family from the United States.
Sometimes it requires an adjustment of expectations. Emilio Garcia Villoa,18, traveling with his parents and sister,12, from Mexico City, opined that there wasn’t much for them to do on board as would be the case on a Caribbean cruise. The lectures did not really appeal to him. So, it’s about spending time together and enjoying the spectacular surroundings–the snow-covered villages, the fjords—and then the activities off the ship, like snowshoeing in the moonlight, for example that he did without the family. “It was amazing,” he said.
On a trip like this, with older or grown kids, it’s possible to have time apart and then come together to recount your adventures as well as to share once in a lifetime experiences—like seeing the Northern Lights streak across the sky.
“We were all on deck together, all taking pictures. I loved that.”
Grace Fong noted that on this trip, as on others, anticipation can heighten the appeal. “First we had to chase the lights for several days,” she noted. “Then we saw them several times, and that, of course, was exciting, especially for the many on board whose impetus for the trip was to check seeing the Northern Lights off their bucket lists.”
It’s also important to remember that the kids’ viewpoints won’t be the same as yours. For Isabelle Shee, 9, from Singapore, seeing the lights was a distant second to the chance to play in the snow. Nor was she as impressed as her grandmother or mom by some of the pricey excursions. But her mom and grandmother were having fun seeing her experience new things.
“The time together is worth it,” said Fong, “And the love grows.”