Travel Discussions

We're pretty strapped financially and all three of the children have MULTIPLE food sensitivities so I have to pack all of our food for the entire trip. We have gone on a camping trip once each year for the past two years. If we do a hotel, we have to find one with a kitchen. I'd like to do 2-3/year once things settle down around here, but for now I have to take a vacation during relaxation in yoga four days/week!

Well, we have two kids. A "vacation" to us is basically spending an evening alone! But to answer your question, we go on two small trips a year with the kids and a small trip just as a couple. We also plan large trips for the future - in 3 years, we're headed to New England. In 5 years we're headed to Martinique.

 I think it really needs to be something that fits into the budget. I mean, our small trips involve visiting our family farm! It's nothing huge and only a 5-hour drive (we only drive a max of 5 hours away from the house - gas prices and all), but the kids LOVED it!

Katrena, yeah I get that!  Sounds like it's difficult but camping is fun, I enjoyed it as a kid :) 

Angi I've never even thought of long term planning!  Haha, I have places I want to go and our version of long term planning is "someday".  It would probably make sense if we start saying "in 2009 we'll go here and 2010 we'll go here".  It's difficult to do though b/c we haven't figured out when we want to have kids yet, won't be 2009, I doubt 2010, but then again, you never know!  And we also don't want to spend all our money because of that.   I planned my honeymoon a year in advance but that was about as far out as I went.

5 hour drive is about my max too, which is why we choose Chicago (4.5 hours) for our next trip :)

The long-term vacations are really nice. For example, I'm learning French for the Martinique trip (my husband is fluent). II think for us it was easier to plan it around our major anniversaries, like our 10th will be spent at Martinique. Lord knows things change - kids, life, financial situation, etc! We know that the Martinique trip will cost around $7000, so we're putting away about $1000 each year into our vacation fund.

Well, at first 8 hours was our max (about the time it takes to reach Minneapolis and Chicago). We took a trip with our son to visit relatives in Denver. That was miserable. If I never have to listen to "Upside Down" by Jack Johnson, I will be very happy!

 The 5 hours was just enough for the kids to sleep, stay entertained and keep quiet. Oh blessed quiet!

We take a vacation every 3 months - either a 3 day weekend nearby or a 7 day full week vacation.  The amount of time you take is NOT the important factor.  What you do and how you feel about the vacation is.

I take a short vacation 1 week every year and a longer vacation 3 weeks every other year.

If I would have answered this a year ago when you first posted this, my answer would have been very different.  We used to take 2 vacations a year - one in May and another the week of Labor Day.  But due to the economy and being low on money, we haven't gone anywhere in about 18 months.  OK we took 2 overnight trips within the state for family weddings but that's all.  We're off this week and are camping for 2 nights.  Not my ideal vacation but all we can afford right now.  Would have loved to get away somewhere nice but I'm just too nervous about money.  I'm hoping to go to Florida or the Bahamas in April or May and maybe ease back into one nice trip a year.  Getting away somewhere nice when the weather is still not great here is good for my mind. 

We take one 1-week vacation each spring--whenever my school district has off for Spring Break.  We've been going to Cozumel, Mexico so it is expensive with airfare, meals, fishing trips, shopping, etc.  I'd like to say that the reason we only go away once a year is because my husband only gets that much vacation time... but the reality is that, even if he did have more time off, we can only afford to go away once. 

RRT and seeker, I wish I could go on vacation every few months.  It's too bad that (even if we had the money) I only get 2 weeks vaca right now.  We do get xmas break but since my husband works in retail we can't go anywhere!  So we try to make the most of our holidays by doing something local since we can't go anywhere all the time.

Bugg save up for the Bahamas, it's worth it, very pretty :)  Even if you decide to go with the cheapest room at the resort, it's such a pretty view you would never see in Florida.  My friends have been to other islands and none had as easy a time as we did.  Getting in and out of the bahamas is a snap!  You go through customs in the bahamas unlike other islands which make you wait in lines once you get to the US.  Very easy travel, I will ONLY go to the bahamas now that I've been :)  Plus from MI it was just 2 short 45 min flights (b/c of the layover)

njchica, Yeah we could do one more expensive vaca but we've choosen 2 cheaper vacas so that we could do two.  I would, for example, love to go to the bahamas every year but it was more expensive so that's why we went to northern MI earlier this year (it was like 1/3 of the price of our past vacations).  Sometimes staying close to home can be just as enjoyable as going to a foreign country :)

OH and here's a tip for everyone, since most of us are writers.  Earlier this year I really kicked up my writing on sites like AC.  My goal was to pay for my whole vaca with writing money.  Well, I paid for about 1/2 of it, but still, that's pretty good!  I'm trying again to earn for my next vaca :)  We'll see if I can earn enough to say that it didn't cost us any of our savings.

Vivasuzi - We stopped in Nassau on our last trip 18 months ago and loved Atlantis.  We were just there for the day so my goal is to save up enough to stay for several days. 

Ah we didn't stay at Atlantis but actually did take a boat ride past it.  They told us about the one room that was like 2500 (or was it 25000??) a night!  I doubt you can save up for that one, but it's nice to dream :)

We were at Sandals Bahamas which was actually not anywhere near Atlantis, it was very private where we were and great views :)  Next time I would try one of the other hotels/resorts by Sandals.  Sandals was nice, but I think there might be something nicer.  Here's some photos if you need even more motivation to save up ;)

http://good-times.webshots.com/album/563372330OHlBJr

Vacation? What is a vacation? Is that when you get to get away for a little while and take a break. That would be nice. I'm afraid I haven't had a vacation in..... a long time. One would be nice.