What was the best vacation you ever took with your family when you were a child ?

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1. My parents had this almost habit of going all out for special occasions and “first times” to make up for the fact that we otherwise had no money and couldn’t do cool things more regularly. (Example: first football game was in box seats… Because my dad got the tickets from work.)

   So the first time we went to Disney World was for the Millennium celebration because they got some kind of huge package deal. It was incredible. So much so that we bought the CD of the soundtrack (what they played during fireworks shows, etc) and just listening to it filled me with joy for years. A few years ago I had a client at a job whose hold music was that soundtrack and it almost brought me to tears the first time I heard it.

2. I never got to go on big trips when I was a kid. My favorite memories were the camping trips we took. Those were great times.

3. Rafted from the Yukon into Glacier Bay, Alaska on the Tatshinshini river

4. Road trips from Chicago out to CA and back. Visiting anasazi ruins, going on hikes, eating weird food, etc.

5. Not technically a vacation, but …

   I grew up in Indianapolis near the airport. My dad would often take me to the end of the runway and we’d watch the planes take off and land (born in 76 so this was a thing back then). Often times he’d say, “one day we’ll be on one of those.”

   A year or so later when i was around 4 or 5 he took me to the airport and we went to the ticket counter. There he purchased a round trip ticket to Louisville, KY for the both of us. It was the first time either of us had ever flown. The flight was like 30 minutes, perfect for someone my age, and when we got to our destination dad bought McDonald’s at the Louisville airport while we waited for the flight back. I have flown many times since then but that is one of my earliest childhood memories and one we still talk about to this day.

6. I went through my parents’ books when they passed away (I had an estate-related reason; I wasn’t just curious). The best income year they had was in the mid-1990s. They passed in 2005. It was $28,000. Gross.

   We didn’t take vacations. We went to a boardwalk for the day, once. Occasionally, usually when there was a special or coupon, we’d go out to eat. Going to a flea market was a holiday activity I remember.

   I had 2 vacations as a teenager, both at the expense of a relative or friend’s family. I had one as a college student, helping a friend move their car cross-country since there was no way to ship it.

   That’s it. I worked 18 years at a job that gave 3+ weeks per year, and I stayed home or used it for personal business exclusively. That job was very much like an abusive marriage. You don’t dare leave, and you know something isn’t right, but they manage to convince you that *you’re* the source of the problem.

7. Went to western Canada. Drove a bunch and got to see amazing views of nature. It is still the most beautiful place I have ever seen.

8. We went to France a lot, but one year we did a couple of days in Disney, tried to save money on hotels and stayed in an apartment “off site”. It was tiny we were a family of six, my parents were stressed trying to drive everywhere with four tired kids, and we left that place in a mood with each other. That was only half the trip, we then spent a week in the countryside in this converted barn with a vineyard. It had a pool and a games room, and a cat (the owners rented it out for the summer season, so it was their cat). It had a little pool house that I got to stay in (felt like I was living by myself for the week, as a 15 year old that was pretty cool, I had my brothers “over” for movie night one evening). There was a man that would come to the gate every morning and sell us fresh baguette. We we arrived our fridge was STOCKED with goodies. Not just some bread and milk to tie us over until the next day, but there were cheeses and meats and multiple gateaux/flans. There were bikes we could borrow rent free and spent hours cycling the French countryside with our little packed lunches for picnics. The whole week was absolutely idyllic. Especially after the first few days at Disney.

9. Olympic National Park.

   I grew up outside of DC so my idea of “nature” was a few acres of trees and a big sledding hill.

   We moved from DC to Seattle and hit a bunch of places along the way, including Yellowstone which was awesome. But for some reason my idea of “nature” didn’t really change until Olympic National Park. It’s been 31 years, I’ve been to 15 national parks, hundreds of other parks/wilderness areas, and still nothing comes close. The intense green of everything out there was amazing. I’m hoping to finally get back next year.

10. Hands down it was my first trip to England and Ireland. I think I was 11 or 12. It planted the travel bug which has since bored itself quite deeply into my soul.

11. I came from a big family of 6 (4 kids) and parents were pretty middle class so we didn’t do anything crazy. The usual disney world which was memorable, but other road trips were usually to smaller state/national parks like niagra falls, mammoth caves, or things within driving distance of the US. Lots of simple lake house/cottage type visits in Michigan.

    I didn’t travel internationally until I was like 28 and on my own.

12. Devil’s Head Ski Resort just outside of The Dells, Wisconsin

    I can’t pick exactly one, because we went there every year, but just the culmination of memories. I learned how to ski and snowboard there. I still remember the sounds of everyone clomping around in ski boots, and drinking hot cocoa in styrofoam cups at lunch time.

    My dad died recently, and now that I’m in my 30’s (around the age he took my sisters and I on these trips), I am blown away by how much drive and energy that guy had. He paid for his kids to have fun skiing every year.

13. I used to love going to long beach island, NJ every summer. This was in the 80s and early 90s btw. There’s no boardwalk there so it wasn’t terribly crowded, there were arcades waterparks and mini golf around, and it was just a generally slow-paced vacation where we could go to the beach or relax at “home”, ride bikes around, whatever.

    And occasionally you’d find cool stuff on the beach like horseshoe crabs and big seashells.

14. Never went on big vacations as a kid. But went camping in Northern NM a lot, my favorite was a really secluded campground near Taos where you had to go up a winding one lane road on the side of a mountain, it later opened up to a stunning mountain valley with a small river running though the middle of it. To a kid that road alone was high adventure!

15. Maui. Almost every other “trip” I can remember didn’t really feel like a vacation. It was usually driving hours and hours to meet some extended family that had no kids and therefore no toys or anything to do. Maui was different – we went with my cousins, stayed at a condo across the street from the beach and really just got to see everyone in the family have a good time without the normal stresses of life.

16. We would always do road trips in the western USA but to different places and sometimes 1 week but usually two. Once we did a southern western road trip for three weeks. Best would probably be 05. We took the Zephyr from Emeryville in CA to Denver in a sleeper car and then explored Colorado, UT, AZ, and NM.

17. We were too poor for vacations. The most we did was go camping because back then, has was cheap enough that you could drive from Edmonton to Jasper or Banff for about $20.

18. I was a pretty fortunate kid. I’d say either Honduras when I was around 12, or a cabin in Maine when I was maybe 7 or 8. Unforgettable vacations, both of them.

19. Grew up in India kinda lower middle class (basically lived month to month). Dad arranged a month long trip through South India with my extended family of around 10 people on Indian Railways. This was in the 70’s, so no real instant communication. He arranged for all this over mail! Meaning all the train tickets, accommodations etc. Still beggars my imagination how much planning this took. It was around 40 years ago, and I still remember it. And since the family was strict vegetarian and religious, we did all the cooking ourselves, meaning the places of accommodation had to allow for this!

20. When I was 16 we went on out first family holiday to lanzarote. Myself and my older brother got to share an apartment away from our parents. The apartment was equipped with a living space and 1 TV. And at that time the TV was run with a coin slot. 1 peseta got you a few hours tv.

    I discovered that the TV showed hardcore porn! For 2 weeks I wanked myself into oblivion!

21. Missed out on the typical “amerixan summer camp” experience when I was growing up in the 2000’s, so any summers that werent spent in comm ed classes or summer school were planned for family trips, which was sparse but overall fun!

    Best trip was the time we went down to Orlando and Tampa. My sis and I planned out a week long stay at Disney, to which my dad said “un, fuck that. We have sux flags at home so anything other than Epcot is a waste of time abd we spending just 1 day.”

    Tears were had because WHAT THE FUCK BRO!? How we gonna visit Disney World and NOT see Magic Kingdom?? Once the shock waned, we went down sulking to Universal Studios and had the time of our life. The Mummy Ride and Jaws were core childhood memories. Then Epcot had that space mission, which milked my “i wanna be an astronaut when I’m older@ sentiments, and ofc, lil chubster me loved the food stations throughout Epcot. Busch Gardens and The Kennedy Space Center were also really fucking cool bcuz I loved aerospace shit then.

    My parents dont rly get along but that trip was a very pleasant surprise for all of us bcuz we started out pissed off and ended getting some REALLY good pictures of us all individually and as family. As insecure as we were abt being immigrants in a mostly white society, the way these 3-4 parks and attractions reminded me that of all the places in the world, fun and good vibes know no color, creed, gender, etc. So i loved how we all got along and my parents felt like kids again riding away from Bruce the Shark, Imhotep, and many other cool shit during that 7-10 day long summer break!

22. We didn’t have any money so we went camping. We’d go with neighbors and get 3-4 sites right next to each other and it was a blast.

    We went to the beach a couple times when I was older, 13+, but without money we could only stay in big places with a lot of people and crowds make me uncomfortable. Also my parents hated each other by then so that ruined the vibe a bit.

23. My dad would take me camping every summer for a few days at this camp site a few hours away with his friend and his friend’s kid who was my age. It was really the only time I had with my dad 1:1 growing up and I really appreciated it looking back. He told me a lot about my grandpa’s war stories around the camp fire.

24. When I was 8 my dad took us all to a ‘dude ranch’ in Montana for a couple of weeks. The family did ranchy stuff and rode horses and wandered around rural Montana. Dad fished some amazing trout streams. There were square dances and ice cream socials. It was old-timey and ‘wholesome’ and it’s definitely the happiest vacation of my life to date. 1978.