Vacation Planning Tips Guaranteed To Get the Whole Family Involved

One of the biggest challenges about vacation planning is keeping everyone in the family engaged and motivated.  It’s no fun planning a vacation and getting excited about the trip when nobody else cares about any of it. Then they all start complaining about how the trip was planned as soon as you arrive! Read on for some vacation planning tips that are sure to get the whole family involved and excited.

I always begin planning summer itineraries in January. Researching travel and creating itineraries help me get through the long winters in the North East. I have a forever list of places I want to see and sometimes just researching them creates enough wanderlust to keep me happy. This also gives us lots of time to gear up and get excited. Once we have chosen a destination, we can focus on getting ready for the big trip. The challenge for our family, is choosing the destination!

I consider myself fortunate that my love for travel is shared by my husband and my kids.  When the kids were small, Tom and I planned the vacations. The kids tagged along with very little say (or complaint) about the result.  These early family trips were generally domestic, kept fairly simple, and were typically beach focused. When the little one reached 5 yrs old (they are now 12 & 14) we experimented with more exotic places.  We learned, to our pleasant surprise, that they were pretty great travelers!  They carried their own bags and were always excited to go somewhere new.

Vacation Planning Tip 1 – Note each personality

With each passing year we began to solicit their opinions just a little bit more.   In fact, our upcoming trip planning now typically begins even before we finish the vacation we are on. Then, discussions continue through many dinner table conversations throughout the winter.  It a constant analysis of what we like, what we don’t like and what we would do different the next time we are on the road.  Differences in opinion abound during these discussions for sure. Therefore, it’s always challenging to try to create an itinerary that pleases everyone.

The littlest one has the most wanderlust in the family and wants to see and do everything there is to see and do in the world. In addition, she wants to learn “all the languages” along the way.  She loves nothing more than tackling a new city and responds best in cultural environments.  A big fan of all things water, she also loves vacations that include a lot of swimming.

The older one, prefers either English or Spanish-speaking countries. She is an artist and she really appreciates a good art museum. She carries her sketchbook wherever she goes just in case inspiration strikes. In addition, she really likes the great outdoors.  A rigorous mountain hike is right up her alley!  

The husband loves the idea of travel more than the logistics of travel so a solid plan is important with him.  He loves exploring the personality of a new city and believes some beach time is an absolute necessity.  Like the older one, he is happiest on a good rigorous hike.

I am the grown up version of the littlest one. While I do want to see all of the places in all of the world, I understand the realities of travel (cost, time, safety, etc) and can now narrow down the potential destination list a bit better than she can.  I also prefer cities and culture (and nice restaurants!) over countryside but can enjoy a good backwoods exploration on occasion.

Vacation Planning Tip 2 – Make it a Game

With 4 strong and varying opinions about travel, I decided this year we would play a game. The goal was to get everyone involved in the family travel plans before they happened.  I hoped there would be fewer complaints if each person got to have a say in the outcome.  We thought about just letting the kids spin the globe, but feared we would end up in this town in Russia!

I began by creating 5 different high level itineraries of places Tom and I had talked about visiting. So at least we were guaranteed pre-approved family adventures.  The itineraries included high level information only. For example, cities, towns, or general regions we would visit. In addition, the approximate number of days in each place.  For example, one itinerary was Tuscany. We would spend 3 days in Siena, 4 days in Florence, 2 days would be available for day trips to other places and 5-7 days in Cinque Terre.

The kids were then charged with doing the research on each of the destinations. Sometimes they knew a bit about the place and sometimes they didn’t know anything at all. We spent at least one wintry Saturday at a bookstore researching guide books together. The rest they preferred to do on the internet. We asked them to look for and jot down landmarks or activities that would be most interesting to them.  

They were given one month to complete their research projects and results were to be due by the end of their winter break.   Then they were required to rank their top choices using a points system:   10 points to their #1 ranked spot, 8 points to #2, 6 points to #3 and so on.   In addition, they needed to include some notes about what attracted them to that spot. My husband and I also ranked our own choices during this process.  After break was over, we would tally the results, and the itinerary with the most points would be the winner.

Lessons Learned

Why we liked it:

• It’s a super fun bonding experience!  Everyone working together enthusiastically toward one goal is a rarity in a family and this felt good.
• They learned a little bit about research.  Some of the cities were just places on a map to them when they started.
• It taught them to really think about what they like and don’t like.
• Having everyone involved in the decision making process, dramatically reduced the opportunity for complaint on the road.
• What better way to amp up the excitement about a family trip!

Things we learned:

• We should have weighted the average points giving the grown ups a slightly higher weight than the kids. Here’s an example, total up each kids points and each adults points.  There are 4 people in our family, so instead of giving each person a 25% weight, grown ups get 30% weight and kids get 20% weight.
• We began our planning in December for a trip in July and there have been some world developments since then that have caused us to think twice about certain destinations.  We realized we needed to build in a clause for the grownups to override that..  The oldest really wanted to explore parts of South America, but with the combination of the Zika virus and the Olympics in Brazil, we felt these would create some complicated issues that could be avoided.

Our result:

After much discussion, and a few missteps along the way, we have finally settled on a destination that everyone seems happy about.  We are all super excited to be heading to Iceland, Amsterdam, Copenhagen, Norway & Sweden this summer.  See our post on Eleven Awe-Inspiring Things We Did Last Summer for the highlights. We will definitely play this game again next year!