Vacationing with your family is beautiful — a parade of once-in-a-lifetime moments.
Except when it’s not.
Kids melt down because they’re tired. Then the parents combust because the trip was expensive and supposed to be fun.
So I offer my humble suggestions — born of experience — to help your vacation be memorable for the right reasons.
1. Know your kids’ (and your) limits.
Exhaustion is the great funkiller.
If your kid is pooped, it won’t matter how pretty the view is.
If you know that your children only have the stamina for a 2-hour hike, don’t plan to walk around a theme park for eight hours. If your family is fatigued after a busy weekend, don’t book shore excursions for all six days of that cruise.
Make time for naps or early evenings, as necessary. You’ll see less but enjoy more.
2. Don’t try to see/do everything.
My children don’t remember when they visited Rome.
How could they? They spent the entire day on their feet walking past ruins. They’d hear its name, when it was built, and maybe a fact or two about it. Then it was on to the next ruin.
Meanwhile, my kids often recall the day they spent watching the otters at the Akron Zoo.
It’s better to observe one thing and enjoy it than to see everything and remember none of it.
Prioritize. And be grateful for what you experience instead of worrying about what you missed.
3. Let your children participate in the planning.
When prioritizing, let your kids have a say in what you see. If they help plan the vacation, they’ll feel a sense of ownership toward it.
I’m not saying you need to surrender your credit card and itinerary to the children. If you’re spending a few days in a new city, let them select one place to visit. They’ll look forward to it and be patient when it’s someone else’s turn to pick a spot. (Usually.)
4. Mix the novel and the comfortable.
You travel to experience something new. Yet we all find ourselves searching for a KFC or Subway by the end of our vacation.
Even the biggest thrillseeker has a limited capacity for “the new” before they retreat to the familiar. If your children try pho for lunch, don’t be surprised when they want a burger for dinner.
I’m mostly talking about food here, but this applies to entertainment too. After a week of flamenco shows, museum tours, and spelunking, the kids (and you) may crave a quiet evening by the pool.
5. Remember that your children are still themselves while on vacation.
Yes, sometimes we discover new facets of ourselves while abroad. But — for most of us — we are who we are … regardless of where we are.
So if your children don’t care about art museums, the Louvre won’t move them. That doesn’t mean that you can’t see the “Venus de Milo” Greek statue. You just may need to:
Be realistic about how much time you stay there.
Make a plan to mitigate their boredom.
Remind your progeny that they picked Parc des Buttes-Chaumont park in Paris, France, and now it’s your turn.
6. Plan for the line.
Travel involves a lot of hurry-up-and-wait. In airports. In cars. In lines at the theme park.
Have some moves ready for when your kids get antsy. To be clear, it’s not your responsibility to entertain them every moment of their waking lives. They can be bored for a few minutes. It won’t be fatal. However, if the boredom sours their mood… then your mood will likely turn next.
So I keep a couple of options so the kids can entertain themselves while they wait for the riverboat. Or lunch. Or whatever.
I take sketch pads and sharpened pencils pretty much everywhere. I also stash a book and an Uno game deck in my backpack. Uno’s clutch because it doesn’t take up much space, and it scales to however many people want to play.
By now you’ve already thought about the phone. And, yes, I have given the kids my phone to keep them entertained. I just prefer to do it as a last resort as opposed to the first option.
Here’s my logic: If they’re drawing, they’re noticing something. If we’re playing a card game, we’re at least doing something together. If they’re watching Bluey on my phone, well… hopefully it’s “Pass the Parcel.”
While I’m listing the contents of my backpack, always have snacks and a refillable water bottle. Hunger is even more dangerous than boredom.
7. Allow it to be your vacation, as well.
Don’t spend all of your time making other people happy. Grab a moment for yourself too.
By the way, that advice also applies to when you’re back home.
