The staff at Vista Verde Ranch, about 25 miles outside the ski town of Steamboat Springs has obligingly left us an Evening Sky Map for this month.
Nestled in the hills about 10 miles outside the town of Steamboat Springs, Strawberry Hot Springs is a natural hot springs fed by heated underground aquifers that come to the surface to make a number of heated pools
This year, I decided to mix it up—opting to spend half our winter ski week at a dude ranch, Vista Verde Ranch, on 500-plus gorgeous acres about 25 miles outside of Steamboat Springs and as far away from the crowds and tumult of a major ski area as you can get.
By Eileen Ogintz WINTER PARK, CO – Fifteen-year-old Kati Leasure can’t walk or talk very well and has progressive loss of muscle control as a result of a rare genetic disorder. She was treated for cancer last year. But that hasn’t stopped her from skiing, rock climbing, kayaking or river rafting. The National Sports Center…
Who knew that Walt Disney World had so many attractions for the littlest park goers not yet in kindergarten — 80, with more coming this summer when the much-anticipated “Frozen Ever After” family adventure opens in Epcot’s Norway Pavilion.
Head to the New Orleans Museum of Art on select Saturday mornings where authors, actors and artists read or act out a story followed by a family art activity.
Welcome to China Lights, the exhibit of more than 30 bright silk-covered structures that will light up the Botanical Garden in New Orleans’ City Park through May 1.
Welcome to The National WWII Museum’s newest exhibit: The Road to Tokyo which retraces the soldiers’ journey from Pearl Harbor ultimately to Tokyo Bay by many routes in Asia and the Pacific
What to do on one of the coldest weekends so far this winter? Stay in and curl up with some hot chocolate? No! Head out to see the Big Apple Circus’ fantastic show The Grand Tour.
A lot of families are concerned about spring break plans as the Zika virus continues to spread through the Caribbean and Mexico — popular spring break destinations for families, as well as their college students.
on vacation, free is great — a lot better than paying for meals the kids don’t eat, theme park tickets when they’d rather play in the hotel pool or museum entry fees when they are ready to leave in less than an hour.
We were brought together by a volunteer program called Meet the People, which has been bringing tourists and locals together for more than 50 years over a shared interest — in our case, cooking and food. meeting the locals in Jamaica Did I mention the program is free? The volunteers will even come and pick you up.
You don’t want to go anywhere that will endanger your pregnancy. It’s always wise to be somewhere that has top medical care when you need it. That’s also true when traveling with infants who can get very sick very quickly.
Many families who cruise look for the best deal — and this is “wave season” when cruise lines are offering upgrades, shipboard credits and discounts to encourage you to book for later in the year.
What was once called Downtown Disney has just been renamed Disney Springs with new restaurants like the Boathouse, new shopping outlets (ready for some custom painted Tom’s sandals?) and new acts at Cirque du Soleil.
One in five grandparent surveyed by Disney reported they’d taken a Disney vacation with their children and grandchildren and that certainly seemed evident here in Orlando.
Wearing a gray hoodie and sunglasses, a suspicious man was trying to debrief us while also not being noticeable. This was: Accomplice the Show: Greenwich Village.
Seriously. We are at River Bumpkin Farm and have floated down about 1.5 miles of the 75-mile long river.
From the time the Berlin Wall went up in August 1961 till it was torn down in November 1989, thousands of East Berliners made their escape the short distance to the West in the most ingenious ways. At least 2,000 died trying. Today, it’s hard to believe this beautiful city was once divided by an ugly wall.
We are visiting Doris Morgan, who has been welcoming tourists—more than 1000—since the mid-1980s, showing them a bit of Jamaican cuisine and culture through the little publicized Meet the People program. Did I mention she does this for free and that there is no charge to the tourists?
In the early 19th Century, when grand balls were held at the famous courthouse in Falmouth, Jamaica’s oldest seaport, young women would sew fireflies into their gowns so they would literally sparkle.
We are eating dinner on the terrace listening to the ocean, feasting on Caribbean lobster. No we aren’t at a tony restaurant in Jamaica. We are at Serenity on the Beach, one of the 100 private villas in Jamaica managed by Villas by Linda Smith.
John Bartels has no interest in going home. He, his two sisters, and his parents have been spending a vacation week at Half Moon, a Rock Resort in Montego Bay, Jamaica, that has been setting a high bar for resorts here for more than 50 years
There’s nothing more fun than trying something new — wasn’t that one of your new year’s resolutions — especially in such spectacular country? And there’s no better time than January, which is designated Learn to Ski and Snowboard Month.
Welcome to river cruising, family style. If you think river cruising is just for seniors, think again. Uniworld, which has been named by CruiseCritic.com as the “best overall river line,” is tripling its family itineraries in 2016
Maybe you like nothing more than exploring new places and sharing new adventures with the kids and grandkids, well aware that things may not go as planned, though that can happen wherever you go, of course. Wherever you venture in 2016, give yourselves permission to get off the tourist track, at least for a little while. You’ll be glad you did.
Stein Eriksen, a founder of modern skiing, has died in Park City, UT at 88. Meanwhile, Jake Burton Carpenter, 62, is making an amazing recovery from a life-threatening illness.
The result of packing for a safari cannot be the scene of Meryl Streep traveling to the Ngong Hills in Out of Africa, and it doesn’t need to be.
It may be Christmas week, but we’re as far from a mall and city crowds as we can get. We’re hiking the Crawford Trail, the longest continually used trail in the country, snow crunching under our feet
Nuremberg has long been a center of toy making and this museum is one of the city’s top tourist attractions. More than a dozen local toy manufacturers developed model railways and Nuremberg’s toymakers were known for coming up with new ways to make toys move.
Uniworld Cruises has arranged a special way to see the picturesque city of Bamberg for the families on board—a GPS scavenger hunt organized by the company City Hunters that does such tours in cities across Germany.
We’re in Wurzburg in Bavaria, the third day on our Uniworld Cruises family trip in the middle of Germany in a city that was nearly all destroyed by British bombers during allied bombing in 1945.
The 16 kids aboard Uniworld River Cruise’s special Family Christmas Market sailing in Germany are all members of the clean plate club by the time they are done cooking with Chef Peter Tarnok and Senior Pastry Chef Ciprian Ghiluescu. In fact, most of them have seconds… Lorelei George, 8, licks her plate.
It is eight in the morning and we are a few blocks from the hotel at Tokyo’s famous Tsukiji Fish Market, Japan’ largest. More than 15,000 people work here; international tourists line up in the early hours of the morning for the chance to watch the famous fish auctions,
You can’t visit Berlin without considering the horror of the Holocaust–the six million European Jews (600,000 of them German-born) who perished. Countless others had their lives uprooted, among them millions of children. Germany’s capital city confronts the horror head-on at places large and small.
Frankfurt has one of Germany’s 2500 Christmas Markets and one of the country’s oldest, locals claim, dating back to 1393, though those in Nuremberg dispute that.
Berlin cuisine is a mixture of a lot of cultural styles—the Croco Blue bar has gained its own following for its portfolio of old and rare spirits.
The idiosyncratic Mauer Museum at Check Point Charlie that is at the original border crossing between the Cold War American and Soviet sectors of Berlin. The location is no accident.
Westin and Le Meridien Hotels have just introduced new family programs, they say, in response to a changing global demand for family travel. Rather than focusing on a kids club, this idea stresses that playing “knows no borders or language barriers but rather inspires kids to explore learn and build relationships.”
Is paying extra for premium economy worth the extra price? Sometimes, you get a lot for your buck; other times you wonder what you paid for.
I’m speechless. You would be too with a menacing Darth Vader haranguing you behind his black helmet and costume. But then I laugh and we pose for a picture. This is Disneyland, after all, at its immersive best.
What was a room I have only seen on television was a standard NBA Press Conference room. It was open seating, so I sat in a comfortable second row to await for LA Clippers Head Coach Doc Rivers. Journalists were not shy asking about the tough questions.
I walked into the entrance of Star Tours–The Adventures Continue. That was the first ride of the day, yet I wondered, “What galactic troubles can I get into next…?”
This year, I hope everyone gets something they can use on their next trip, wherever they want to go, even if they are simply heading to a nearby city.
For many families, sharing holiday displays, whether at a theme park, a hotel or a nearby neighborhood is an annual tradition that gets everyone away from pre-holiday chores and stress. It’s just these days, you’ll find Santa, elves and millions of lights at the ready long before the Thanksgiving leftovers are gone.
When the two Whitaker teens talk about their holiday trip to Tanzania two Christmases ago, it’s not the animals they saw on safari that proved the most memorable, as amazing as the elephants and giraffes were. It’s how they helped a small unofficial orphanage.
At a time when hotels catered to businessmen, not families, Walt Disney thought there should be a place where families could continue the fun they had in Disneyland. On the same day.
The Force Awakens at Disneyland today, just in time for the holidays –and of course the much-awaited Star Wars movie debuting Dec 18.
I love Yellowstone in winter — no crowds, lots of animals and the chance to see Old Faithful and other thermal features without any crowds. (Did you know Yellowstone has more thermal features than anywhere in the world — 10,000 bubbling mud pots, hot springs and geysers?) Honestly, we felt like we had the whole place to ourselves.
Kids of all ages give high marks to Royal Caribbean’s second Quantum Class ship Anthem of the Seas which will be home-ported year round in Cape Liberty, NJ.