Adventure Starts Here.
Every journey brings you closer to new places, to people you love, to family, and to yourself. Let’s make your next escape unforgettable.
Wherever you are this winter or wherever you’re planning to go for spring break (check out our ideas for Spring Break 2013, take time to visit a museum exhibit that would especially interest your family.
Video from our second Family Travel Conference in Dallas last November. See you in Niagara Falls later this year…
Jetlagged, hungry, and in need of a bed, we found our way to our hotel for the night — Chateau de Goville–an old manor in the Norman countryside. I kept saying the château would be Downton Abbey-esque, but it wasn’t until we settled into our room and found a plaque on the wall stating that the Duchess of the Estate had lived (and died!) in this very room nearly seventy years ago that we really felt the chateau’s history.
When you are after an adult’s getaway, you don’t want a lot of kids around to either spoil your tranquility or make you feel guilty. If you wanted to be with kids, you would have brought your own.
Snowbasin is more than just a mountain to me, it’s my home. I have many sweet memories of my life on skis here. Like when I first got onto a pair of skis at the age of three.
In the summer this working ranch, which has welcomed guests since 1919, is famous for its family riding programs and kids’ programs that guarantee families a memorable vacation. There is a herd of 175 horses, but no more than 100 or so guests, and families return year after year.
My kids would have loved the chance to hike along the ridge and drop into the resort’s famous Honeycomb Canyon, so named because 19th century mining trails are honeycombed under the snow covered mountains. The view from the summit—10,035 feet is spectacular—the Wasatch Mountain Range in all its glory without a condo or mega mansion in site.
Eileen urges you to embrace your inner snowman and attend a nearby winter festival — they’re everywhere.
No, we’re not in Paris or a big city patisserie. We’re in Park City, Utah at Deer Valley Ski Resort, one of Utah’s 14 ski resorts. At Snow Park Lodge, besides the freshly baked French pastries and muffins, the breakfast offerings include eggs benedict, home-made granola, house-smoked salmon omelets and challah French Toast.
Truth be told, it was only my second morning on skis this season, it was dumping snow and I wasn’t feeling too confident. But two runs later from the top of the mountain—I loved that the gondola kept us warm—I was smiling— and still smiling after I got pulled out from where I’d fallen off the trail.
All the times I’ve been to Utah to ski—there are 14 ski areas to choose from—I’ve never stayed in Salt Lake City, but I could turn into a convert. You can get discounted gear and lift tickets at www.skinsee.com downtown and get discounted lift tickets at the Salt Lake City Costco.
I wish I were at the beach.I’m guessing so do a lot of people right about now when it is freezing across the country. At least I can think about the fun times on the beach in recent months:
Locals are quick to tell you Anguilla, a British territory, isn’t only about the beaches, though their motto is “tranquility wrapped in blue.” “I have lived in Anguilla for 20 years and the thing that never changes is the people,” says children’s book author Jo-Anne Mason, originally from Brooklyn.
Eileen quoted in Travel Weekly article on the most recent Family Travel Conference, of which TakingTheKids was an organizer.
Even in the most terrific locales, nothing goes as planned. Someone gets sick (we’ve had lots of ear infections). Someone ends up in the ER (me, here three years ago after a bad fall). Someone has a meltdown. And someone just doesn’t want to spend that much time with mom and dad.
No we’re not at a ski resort –there isn’t even a ski lift or any other skiers anywhere in the vicinity. That’s because we’re on some of the 8,000-plus acres at nine thousand elevation at the C Lazy U Ranch in Granby CO.
Dog sledding, is just one of the ways you might not have thought of to have fun in the snow here in New Hampshire’s Mount Washington Valley that includes 27 towns surrounding Mount Washington, the pinnacle of the 6,288-foot White Mountains
“The people are what make this place so special,” said Hearon. In fact, much of the staff is culled from young people who came here for vacation with their families. No wonder more than 60 per cent of the guests return to this 8, 500 acre ranch that is about 20 miles north of Winter Park.
The Hotel Jerome has just reopened before Christmas in the heart of downtown Aspen after a multi-million dollar renovation (every one of the 93 rooms and suites has its own luxurious bathroom, of course) and its not unusual in ski season for room rates to be over $800 a night.
Taking the Kids feature on Learn to Ski and Snowboard month — on NBC’s “Today Travel”