Family Summer Vacations

Fun family summer vacations are part and parcel of the American experience for most people. You make reservations somewhere special, then load up the car with the wife, kids and maybe even the family pet (if you've booked pet friendly motel/hotels), and hit the road for fun and adventure. It's the American Dream made flesh, the ability to get away from work and stress for a week or so with the people you love the most. It's the promise of American freedom combined with the relaxation we all crave.

Of course, not all family summer vacations are the same. An adventure vacation is different from a lay-about, kick it in the sun vacation. Adventure vactions can take the form of visiting mine tour, like the New Jersey Sterling Zinc Mine tour where gem lovers, adventurers, history buffs see a labyrinth of marbleized tunnels gilded by a multi-color glow of fluorescent minerals below the earth.

Sterling Hill Mine Is ''Sterling''

In October, the family visited the Sterling Hill Mine and Museum in Ogdensburg which is owned and operated by their dear old friends, Dick and Elna Hauck.  This place is truly New Jersey's best kept secret and was one of the best day trips they had ever taken.   Underground mine tours, fantastic displays of the world's finest "glow-in-the-dark" fluorescent minerals, extensive outdoor displays of mining machinery, numerous bronze sculptures depicting miners along with exhibit halls packed with oddities like huge Dinosaur skulls and even petrified dinosaur feces!   The real treasure of the place are Dick and the other tour guides who wing out every conceivably interesting fact about mining (or anything else for that matter!) in such a humorous manner.  Check out sterlinghillminingmuseum.org/  to plan a visit.   The family's favorite moment of the tour occurred when they were deep in one of the mine caverns with the tour group.  The lights were put out to show how completely dark it was.  Dick lit a candle and asked the children in front of him why he lit it.  Well, to see, of course.  "No,’' he said, ''It is to honor all those who died in the last mine tour".  Priceless!

A "let's go see our favorite baseball team" vacation is far different from "Let's go to Disney World!" vacation or a cruise to the islands summer vacation. So it's important then to identify what your favorite family summer vacations of choice are before embarking upon one.

Top Family Vacation

Fun family summer vacations

For me personally, a lot of my free time is spent enjoying the game of soccer. Whether I'm watching on TV, playing in pick-up games in the neighborhood, or reading online, I've always got soccer on the brain. I'm lucky enough that my girlfriend feels the same way about the game, so in large part our family summer vacations are pre-determined.

This played out very well for us back in May when part of her family was planning a luau for the family matriarch's eightieth birthday in Los Angeles. The weekend of the luau just happened to coincide with a local game featuring Major League Soccer's Los Angeles Galaxy against our local club, the New York Red Bulls. For us a fun family vacations are different. We took the opportunity to not only get tickets to the game, but to invite her sister, brother-in-law and their family - two nieces and a nephew.

For both us and them, it was what all fun family summer vacations should be. We met up for an early dinner, then got to the game before the kick-off. This gave me time to calm my pre-game jitter with a beer while allowing the kids a chance to see professional athletes close-up. Then the game started, and everyone had their own brand of fun. For me and my girlfriend, we're soccer diehards so we watched and analyzed the game. For the kids, it was a chance to yell and scream and do the fun wave. And for the kids' parents, I think the best part was that soccer games are less than two hours long - quite a change from baseball and American football where games run between three and four hours.

The Cheap Way to Stay on Vacations

Whenever you travel to another country or place, if you’re not going to stay with family or friends then you are going to be hit with a hotel bill at some time or another. To a lot of us that’s not really a problem, however, there is a cheaper and usually a more enjoyable way of seeing the country, staying in great locations and not breaking the bank at the same time. We’re talking about bed and breakfasts here – something of a staple almost everywhere else other than America.

Family weekend getaways

Bed and breakfast vacations are an excellent accommodation– you simply pay per night for your room and breakfast, and that’s all you pay for. The frills and extra’s that you pay for in a hotel – you know, antiseptic yet not clean rooms, knowing there’s 4 or 5 hundred other people all staying in exactly the same style and type of room as you, the ice machine that doesn’t work etc. – are all taken away from you when you are forced to spend less, receive more in the way of uniqueness and quality and receive personal attention instead of been regarded as a walking dollar sign, when you use bed and breakfasts.