Family Adventures
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Seeking Balance in New York City
I recently took a weekend girl’s trip to New York City. (And no, that is not a misplaced apostrophe, because there was only one girl on this trip – me.) That’s right, I did New York solo. I did visit and spend time with friends, but much ...
SATW Convention in El Paso: VIDEO Reverbs Storytelling – From Russia With Love
This is the story of my family’s journey through Russia, the Soviet regime and escape into the New World. In 2019, I became a member of the honorable writing organization, Society of American Travel Writers or SATW. These are a group of ...
An Oasis Adventure in Irvine
Until recently, Irvine, California has only existed as a blip on our family road-trip map – between the freeway drive from Los Angeles to San Diego. We’d see high-rise buildings, malls and hotels whiz by. Nothing to draw us in. ...
Attraction Review: Hagrid’s Magical Creatures Motorbike Adventure
Universal Orlando’s perfectly named new coaster is definitely both magical and an adventure. When the Wizarding World of Harry Potter first opened in 2010 at Universal’s Islands of Adventure Park, a visit to Universal Orlando Resort immediately ...
What to Expect at Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge
I consider myself to be a mid-level Star Wars fan. I’ve seen all the movies, but I’m not familiar with the other mediums in the Star Wars franchise. Still, since I saw the first movie as a kid, I’ve loved the adventure, triumph, humor, and even ...
Adventures by Disney SoCal Escape: How To Get Behind The Scenes at Disneyland
I love Disneyland, so when my son and I were invited to experience the 4-day Adventures by Disney: Disneyland Resort and Southern California Escape, I was beyond excited. But even I could never imagine the amount of pixie dust that was about to
Hop On – Hop Off Bus Tours: The Affordable Way to See a City with Kids and Teens
I’ve spent a good deal of time on the top of a double-decker bus – and not just in London where that sort of thing is expected. In quite a few different cities, double-decker bus tours have allowed my family to see the sights, get around ...
A Magical Family Adventure in India
The following post was written by Jennifer Spatz. Jennifer enjoys combining family travel with the opportunity to give back as much as we do. She also values getting to know local cultures in authentic settings. We are hoping to join her ...
Winter in Lake Arrowhead (VIDEO)
For some reason, our Santa Monica beach family always went looking for snow and winter fun in Big Bear Lake, never Lake Arrowhead. In the summers, it was always back to Big Bear, to try our luck at fishing, which never seemed to change. I ...
The ABC’s of Food Tours with Teens
Whenever my sons and I travel to a new city, we always take a food tour (at this point, we’ve taken at least ten). It initially started because we wanted to try a famous food from a specific area, like beignets in New Orleans, BBQ in Austin, or ...
Cave Kayaking with Kids! Santa Cruz Island in Ventura, California
It’s not something I thought could happen so close to the urban sprawl of Los Angeles. Yet, here we were, looking through a rainbow of ocean mist as dolphins below escorted our Channel Islands ferry to our cave kayaking adventure. Their long ...
Cutting the Line: A How To Guide For Your Fav Theme Park
We’ve all told our kids a thousand times not to cut the line because it’s rude and selfish. But what if there was a way to cut a line that was neither rude nor selfish? Intriguing, right? One of the biggest – and most consistent – ...
A Volunteer Vacation Every Family Member Will Love
Guest blog post by Jennifer Spatz, CEO & Founder of Global Family Travels The most memorable family trips are ones that offer experiences beyond just relaxing or spending time together. A vacation that combines a bucket-list adventure with ...
Walking the Streets of New York City
Two Great Walking Tours in NYC New York City is a walking city. Now, the idea of a “walking city” may seem strange to anyone from L.A. because we have a reputation of never walking anywhere. Ever. But one of the coolest things about New York is ...
Extreme Family Vacations: Beekeeping (VIDEO)
This Thanksgiving, we took a turkey break and went in search of bees. Rather, we had heard about a bee tour we could take at the Westin Mission Hills Golf Resort & Spa (which, by the way, looks to be a very family friendly resort, we ...
Cruising the San Francisco Bay with Teens
a kayaking adventure San Francisco’s nickname is The City by the Bay, so when I traveled to San Francisco last December with my two teenaged sons, we decided it would be fun to see the city from the bay. “San Francisco is a great place for ...
Crashing the President’s House with Kids
Traveling To History with Teenagers Visiting the home of our current president in Washington, D.C. is not as simple as showing up and knocking on the door. The advanced planning necessary (which includes contacting a member of Congress in ...
Aulani, A Disney Resort and Spa : Seeing the Real Hawaii
A Cultural Guide For Adventurous Families (VIDEO) I was pretty certain, at that special age when everything is mortifying, that attending a luau in Hawaii is a type of embarrassment specifically reserved for tourists. I was 14 and I knew it all.
A Spooky Adventure in Baltimore: Walking the Poe Trail with Teens
October is the Perfect Time to have A Spooky Adventure with Edgar Allan Poe in Baltimore - https://go.shr.lc/2NNtcMo @lafamilytravel @BaltimoreMD @Samdfriedman226 #familytravel #travel #Halloween
Making History Cool: Philadelphia with Teens
Thanks to Lin Manuel Miranda and his Broadway smash hit “Hamilton,” U.S. History has never been cooler, so now is the perfect time to hip-hop on the bandwagon and take teens (and pre-teens) to Philadelphia to see “the room[s] where it happened.”
Grab a Bigger Piece of this World With Your Kids – Global CommUnity
Wouldn’t it be great if Pancho Villa could step out of a history book and shake your hand on your first trip to Mexico? What if he told you tales of his revolutionary escapades? (Or his stint in Hollywood while they filmed them?) Or sang folk ...
A Summer Staycation – Hyatt Regency Westlake
We’ve never done a staycation. I’ve never seen the point. Our house is fine. We have a pool. We have a grill in the backyard. We have a great view of some pretty hills (ok, they’re often brown but they’re better than ...
A Long Weekend In La Jolla Shores with Kids
This is more than just a travel story. It's a love story that takes place on the road. Its latest chapter took place in La Jolla Shores, California. It's a tale of two families who used to live in the same town and spent a lot of time together. ...
Finding Your Alternate Universe
A shorter version of this article first appeared in the Acorn. I recently had the chance of sitting down with prolific yoga master, Shiva Rea, for a fireside chat. OK, maybe she was driving on the freeway and talking to me through her cell phone
7 Tips For A Fun 11th Anniversary…or…how not to mess up a romantic weekend
If you've been married for longer than a minute or are even dating someone for more than 6 months, you know. Relationships take effort. You have to really work at "Happily Ever After"
Flying Over Trees
We didn’t know my son Kaleb was scared of heights until we rode the Ferris wheel at California Adventure. When our pod started climbing and swaying, he threw himself on the floor and hid his head between his father’s knees. No amount of ...
A Spooktacular Howl-O-Ween at the Great Wolf Lodge
It started in the lobby of the Great Wolf Lodge in Garden Grove. A big, black spider clung to the ceiling, its sharp fangs hovering over the little guest’s heads, an eerie spiderweb covered the entire front window. This sight alone would ...
2 Moms, 4 Boys and an RV: 7 Tips on Survival
An abridged version of this post first appeared in Outdoor Family Magazine. What could possibly go wrong? Four boys jostling in a small space, no husbands to pawn them off on for a few seconds of peace? Well. This. This could go wrong. And it ...
Glamping in Ventura
Before children, camping was an adventure. We got dirty. We drank during the day. We slept on the dirt with only a thin layer of stuffed polyester protecting our bodies from the rocks. We cooked on grills powered by fires we painstakingly built ...
Giving Mothers the Gift of Peace
(This article originally appeared in YogiTimes Magazine – I just added all these groovy pictures) One thing no one ever tells an expectant mother is the arrival of her beautiful, cooing little bundle of chub will be the departure of her ...
Splashing Around at the Great Wolf Lodge
Recently, LA Parent offered my family a trip to the Grand Opening weekend at the Great Wolf Lodge in Garden Grove, CA. Even though I had never heard of this family resort, I was pretty confident we’d have a great time: a weekend away ~ not
The Zoo – A Walk Through the Wild Side
I’m not really a zoo person. I want to get excited about the animals and the obscure, rare anacondas crawling around the other creepy bugs ~ but I know if I actually encountered those things in the wild, I’d probably step on them. Or