Traveling With Children Advice and Locations

Plan your flight early so you can get the whole family sitting together. An isle seat is also a priority of course. I once had to fly alone across the U.S. in a middle seat with my 1 year old on my lap. It was a last minute thing�needless to say it was the worst 5 hours of travel for me.

Whether you are traveling across the country or just a few hours to get to a hiking spot, kids in the car can be a challenge. Sometimes kids flip out before you get to the end of the street, and this may discourage many from even attempting longer trips.

Cruising with the Kids

Cruising with children is becoming more popular, especially since cruise lines have started promoting their child friendly ships. Most cruises now offer activities for kids 3 and up. The tricky thing is that all kids are different and their ages will significantly affect how good of a time you have.

Travel with Children

I have found as long as it has got a good variety of activities and something for everyone, the trip will be good. I am willing to spend the day at a theme park as long as we or I spend the morning hiking up a mountain. Likewise my wife is willing to go up some obscure hill if she gets a nice sit down dinner. The kids are happy walking through some boring historic site as long as they know we wil stop at a fun center. Most short family vacations we do include a city and some outlining natural area sites. A mix of both camping and hotels is fun and a good way to save some money. A visit to San Francisco might include 2 nights in a hotel downtown followed by a few nights camped as we sightsee northward along the California Coast. Most locations can be made to work with children but a few trips just will not work. Trekking in Nepal is on the top of my list but I am just going to have to wait until my kids are teens. I suggest making a master list of your possible family vacations from visiting a nearby state attraction to exploring Rome. Put the age you think your kids could handle those trips then you wil have given yourself a calendar of what to do for vacations over the next 15 years.

Most people have done some travel with their children. Some do a good job as I see them in the airports or sightseeing at some monument. On the other hand, I have seen couples at the airport with what looks like the kids entire toy chest. Many parents have confided in me that they have not traveled at all since having children. They really want to go somewhere but the idea of dealing with their kids though the riggers of travel is just too overwhelming. My advice as always is just to do it. Think of a trip you and the kids will enjoy and just book the tickets.

The key to a successful vacation is the planning. With children, the first big step is picking the best place to go given their age. When our first child was one, we wanted to do a big vacation for about a month. Wanting something exotic, we had concerns about conditions and food options for him. We decided a cruise to exotic ports would be our best option. Although we wanted to visit other places, we prioritized this one figuring that when our kids were a bit older, they would not enjoy sites in Thailand and Vietnam as these locations are short on kids activities. We had wanted to go to Australia but what an excellent trip for kids a bit older, beaches, koala bears and kangaroos! More often, you will only have a week or less for a vacation so where to go? This depends on what you want to see.

Car trips with kids

Flying with the kids

Cruising with the Kids

Travel with Children