Vacation – Page 2 – Travel Plan Mom

Zealous for Zion

June 14, 2017 by TravelPlanMom, posted in Planning, Travel, Utah, Vacation

“Once a year, go someplace you’ve never been before” – Anonymous

Hey y’all! Can you tell that I had to break out the dictionary for that title? I needed something that started with Z that would adequately convey my emotion for Zion National Park. Oh, there are plenty of adjectives to describe the appeal of that bewitching, resplendent locale, but how many start with Z?

Anyhow, on our recent jaunt to southern Utah, Zion National Park was at the top of my list. As I mentioned in a previous post, even though I didn’t really know exactly what to expect, I knew by reputation that it is supposed to be beautiful. As I prepared for our trip, I started searching Google images for some ideas of what we would be seeing and I was amazed. I called my husband over to the computer while he was watching a basketball game or something, and I was actually able to grab his attention away from the tube while we oohed and ahhed at all of the lovely pictures.

But, let me tell you, pictures never do a place as majestic as Zion any justice. And, even though I just said that, I am compelled to share pictures with you. Below are a few pictures from the Canyon Overlook Trail.

By the way, there are hanging gardens in quite a few places in the park. They are formed when water drips down through the rock and creates a wet environment for plants to grow. You can see some of that in the picture above, left.

My favorite views in Zion National Park were seen as we departed the long tunnel and entered the canyon in the eastern part of the park. The cliffs were massive and soared above our heads in beautiful hues of red and cream with the contrasting green of the vegetation.

I found it interesting that the views east of the long tunnel were somewhat different from the main canyon.

And, part of those views were big horn sheep! We were all so excited to see them, although they only showed themselves to us once. Tip – look around the east side of the long tunnel close to dusk.

And while I will be sharing more pictures of individual hikes inside Zion in future posts, the last thing I would like to highlight today is the amazing petroglyphs that we found inside Zion National Park. It’s actually really amazing that we found these ancient creations at all. There’s no sign on the road letting you know that they exist (that I could see, anyway), and no parking area for them. The tour guide from Mild to Wild Rhino Tours is the one who told us about them and how to see them. Even with his directions, we were pretty unsure as we picked our way through a wash and under a road.

Seeing the petroglyphs was one of the items on my own personal “bucket list” for our vacation, and even though we were at the end of a long day that had been full of activity, and even though it was starting to get a little dark, my family humored me and went along for the journey. I am so thankful!

While I am talking about Zion, I would like to point out that May is a fabulous month to visit the park. Unless, that is, you want to hike the Narrows. Usually, during the month of May, the Virgin River runs too high due to snow melt, and the park closes the Narrows hike. But the temperatures are really nice for hiking most of the month – not too cold, not too hot, and you don’t have to worry much about flash flooding in the slot canyons because it is not the rainy season. Of course, you always have to watch the weather, because with mother nature, anything can happen, but the odds are in your favor in May. We were there May 20^th – 27^th and had absolutely gorgeous weather, although it was getting pretty warm at the end of our trip. Also, the kids aren’t out of school yet, so it’s less crowded than the summer months. If you can get there in May, it’s a great time to go!

So, if Zion National Park isn’t on your list, then get your pencil out right now and write it down! Make plans to visit. You won’t regret it!

Until next time – happy traveling!

Why Take a Pricey Tour When You Can Make Your Own Agenda?

June 10, 2017 by TravelPlanMom, posted in Planning, Travel, Travel with groups, Vacation

“I haven’t been everywhere, but it’s on my list.” – Susan Sontag

On each vacation we take, I like to build out a plan ahead of time that serves as a guideline for our adventures. Creating an agenda can seem like a buzz kill if you like to live spontaneously, but I see it as something that gives us freedom to see and do without getting a last-minute disappointment. Like when something is closed on the day we drove an hour each way to experience or see it. This doesn’t happen if you plan a little ahead of time.

I am a planner. I obsessively plan before we go on vacation. Sometimes I drive myself crazy planning. I buy guidebooks of the area we are visiting. I visit TripAdvisor.com and:

I read the top 10 things to do in “insert destination name here”
I read the forum pages for the place or places we are visiting
I find the top restaurants in the area

I also Google the places I am going and find blogs that give advice about what to see and what to do. I look at Google images. And I like to get input from my family members as to what they would most like to do or see.

After gleaning information from all these sources, and taking notes, and highlighting, and noting the things that are most appealing to me (or what my family would like), I start paring it all down into a workable schedule.

How?

First, I write out all the days we are traveling, from the day we leave the house until the day we return. I include the details for getting there, including flight information, if we are flying, and rental car info, including reservation numbers and expected times of pick-up, etc. If we are driving, I include drive times and expected arrival times.

Second, I include all lodging information, including reservation numbers, addresses of any places we are staying, and phone numbers. And, if we are going to be purchasing food to prepare during the week, I make sure to schedule in time to hit a grocery story on the way to our accommodations.

Third, I look at all of my travel research and begin writing down activities we want to experience, including the costs, grouping them together geographically for each day and noting the drive times between each thing. This is when it is good to look back at your travel research, or do a quick Google search to double-check the hours and days that an activity or destination is open.

Fourth, after deciding what area we are going to be in on a particular day, I then move on to figuring out our meals. If we are staying in a place that has a kitchen handy, or in a hotel that offers breakfast, the first meal of the day will usually be there. Vacations can be expensive if you eat out all the time, so I am definitely a fan of saving money where we can.

Also, can we pack a lunch for several of the days we are out and about? Even when we stay in hotels, I will usually bring a soft cooler in my luggage and pick up grocery items so that we can make sandwiches and have fruit, snacks, and drinks in our hotel room. Just about every hotel has free ice! A picnic lunch can be a nice, restful part of a trip, especially if a cool, shady park to enjoy it in can be found. Dinner is usually out, although if we are staying in a house with a kitchen, we will try to prepare and eat dinner there a couple of times.

So, where will we eat when we do eat out? This is where TripAdvisor.com comes in handy once again. And Yelp. And for me, this is one of the best parts of any vacation! I love trying new places and great regional specialties. Mexican food in the southwest is a little different from Mexican food in the southeast, and I want to experience it! And I would much rather have a meal at a hole-in-the-wall diner that is highly recommended by other travelers than a $50-a-plate ritzy restaurant that has good, but pricey food. But that’s just me. You may like spending all that money – to each his own! That’s the beauty of planning and doing your own thing.

After I’ve got it all down on paper – travel arrangements, lodging info, daily activity schedule, meals info, etc, then I usually go back with a critical eye and start slashing some things. Because I generally want to do way more things than we actually have time for. And if we did every single thing that was written down on my very first draft, we would be exhausted and vacation would not be fun, and we would probably want to kill each other at the end of each day because we would all be very grumpy.

When I am finally happy with the final draft that is typed on my computer, I send out copies to my family members for their approval and ask for input. Is it too much? Are we doing stuff you will like? Once everything is approved by everyone else, I take a picture of each page of the agenda with my phone, so I can easily refer to all the details while we are adventuring.

The Final Word

The most important thing about making all of these plans for a vacation that includes other people is flexibility! You have to be flexible! Things are never going to go exactly as you have planned them. That is just a fact of life. And you can’t treat an agenda like it must be followed. The goal of an agenda is to have a guideline, something that will help you see amazing sights and do a lot of fun things. People get tired. So go with the flow. And please, enjoy the experience!

I hope this has been somewhat helpful and informative for you. I have more to share, so please stop by again soon!

Until next time – happy traveling!

Beautiful Utah

June 9, 2017June 9, 2017 by TravelPlanMom, posted in Travel, Utah, Vacation

“Traveling – it leaves you speechless, then turns you into a storyteller.” – Ibn Battuta

Today I would like to share a little overview of our trip “out west.” My oldest son had been saying for a while that our next big family trip should be to Utah. We had both heard amazing things about the beauty and majesty of southern Utah and the national parks there. But I didn’t really know. Since I’m from the southeast part of the states, anything west of say, Missouri, is just a jumbled mess in my mind – location wise. I mean, I know where California and Washington are located, and I have vacationed in Arizona, but other than that . . . . hmmmm. Oh, yeah, Texas – I know where Texas is. It’s in the middle, at the bottom, right above Mexico.

Anyway, I don’t know what comes to your mind when you hear the word Utah, but it didn’t really conjure up anything geographically special or spectacular to me. What do you think of when you hear Utah? First of all, without looking at a map I thought it was like, up near Oregon or something. Secondly, it made me think of Salt Lake City, and a really big salt lake, and the Mormon Tabernacle, and their amazing choir, oh, and the really cool, huge library in Salt Lake City that has all the genealogy records that I really want to visit someday.

So, despite all my lack of knowledge (or my ignorance, which is not as nice to say about yourself) – other than the great things we had heard about the parks there – we set our sites for Utah. After booking our flights and setting up our lodging for the week, I finally got around to doing some visual research on the places we would see by using Google images. Wow. Wow. I really had no idea. I’ll share some of my own with you.

The picture at the top of the page is a shot of lower Zion Canyon in Zion National Park. Below is a picture from our journey along the Canyon Overlook Trail in ZNP:

Here’s another one from Zion – it’s from the Riverside Walk (spectacularly beautiful, by the way):

Simply amazing, right? Now I have to show you one from Bryce Canyon. Bryce was also beautiful with lots of red rock, but also a lot different from Zion. Here it is:

The keyword for Bryce is hoodoos. Yep, that’s right – hoodoos. I personally think that word is a lot of fun to say. Hoodoos! Hoodoos are those happy rock formations that look like lots of little (or big?) statues all over the place. Even though Bryce is called a canyon, it’s really not, but I will get to all of that in another post.

And, since this post is supposed to be an overview of Utah stuff, there’s one more picture I will share. This one is from the hike to Lower Calf Creek Falls in the Grand Staircase Escalante National Monument:

I have a confession to make. We didn’t make it to Lower Calf Creek Falls. We didn’t have enough time to make the whole hike, but that’s okay because look at the eye candy here! It was such a beautiful hike even without the falls. Well, they are like the number one thing to see in the national monument. And they are beautiful (from what I hear) ~sigh~ oh well, next time.

So, to wrap things up, we spent a week in Utah (mostly), and didn’t get to see that much of it! But what we did see was incredible. I really wanted to focus on Zion, and immerse ourselves in it, because there is just so much to do and see in Zion National Park. We visited Zion for a few days, Bryce Canyon for part of a day, the Grand Staircase Escalante National Monument for basically a day or two, and then popped down to Arizona for a day. We only got to two of the national parks in Utah. There are several more to visit, but we just didn’t have the time.

Seriously, one week in Utah is not enough! It is so beautiful, it is like a feast for your eyes. I told my hubby while we were there that it’s almost like beauty overload. You are overwhelmed with spectacular scenery and your mind just can’t comprehend it. I’m not exaggerating, here! Okay, so I will stop raving about the beauty of Utah. But you really need to see it for yourself – you won’t regret it!

I hope that my overview has been a bit informative and has whet your appetite for your own trip to this beautiful state. I have more to share, so I hope you visit again!

Until next time – happy traveling!

Deciding Where to Go and Using TripAdvisor

June 6, 2017June 9, 2017 by TravelPlanMom, posted in Planning, Travel, Vacation

“Oh the places you’ll go.” – Dr. Seuss

Where do you want to go? This is the question at the beginning of every adventure. To answer this question, you have to decide:

Who is going? Is this trip going to be for adults? For families with grown children? For families with small children? A group of friends? Solo? Answering this question is the most important for deciding what type of trip you want to take.

If you are a family with young children, and you are taking them on your adventure, then that obviously can limit what type of vacation you take. Now, I know that some people will say that you can take your young’ns anywhere you want to go with no problem, but I, for one, believe in keeping my sanity. I would not, for example, take small children on a hike up to Angel’s Landing in Zion National Park because I would probably die of anxiety in the process. With drops of over 1000 feet on either side of a narrow path, I wouldn’t even want to take a teenager on that hike. Heck, I wouldn’t even want to take myself on that hike. But, you get the picture here, right? In my opinion, if you are taking small children on your vacation, you want to choose a place where small children can have a good time, and mom and dad don’t pull their hair out.

What type of vacation are you interested in? Do you like adventure? Do you like to be physically active? Do you need to relax and unwind? Do you want to explore unknown lands? Do you want to float in the water for a week? Are you a foodie? Do you want to discover different restaurants and cuisines? Do you want to go someplace where everything is planned for you – like an all-inclusive resort? Do you love roller coasters? Are you sick of the heat and want to go somewhere chilly, or are you “over” the winter cold and want somewhere tropical?

Unfortunately, my husband and I don’t usually totally agree on the type of vacation. He is in a high stress job with lots of work hours, so his ideal vacation consists of floating in calm blue waters and having drinks with little umbrellas delivered to his float.

I, on the other hand, having my adventurous spirit fed by great books that take you to unknown lands, love to explore new places. I also like to make sure that the other members of our family are entertained and have hands-on activities. I also really enjoy finding great restaurants in the area we are visiting, and sampling regional specialties. For example, on our recent trip to Utah and Nevada, we tried some local Mexican restaurants, which were a pretty different experience than Mexican food in Virginia.

Anyhoo, after deciding who is going, and what kind of adventure you desire, the next step is to decide where.

Where do you want to go? Is there someplace that you read about in a novel that piqued your interest in that country? Have you always wanted to visit the land of your ancestors? Have you heard about an amazing national park? If you are heading for a beach, do you want to be domestic or international? Somewhere in the Caribbean? British or American Virgin Islands? If you have young kids, is there a city with hands-on science or children’s museums? A beach resort with playgrounds and lazy rivers?

If you have an idea of the who, what and where, then that info is your springboard to start your research on the web. If you know you want to visit a national park, use Google to find out which one works the best for you and your particular situation. If you know you want a beach resort somewhere in South Carolina, put some key words in the search bar and look for “best family-friendly hotels South Carolina” and see what you find.

While we are on this subject, I have to mention TripAdvisor. I have used TripAdvisor for every single trip that I have taken in the last several years. It is a phenomenal source of information. You can find info on just about anything that is travel-related.

For example, if you are traveling to a particular city, and want to find a nice hotel, you just go to TripAdvisor.com, select Hotels from the very top of the page, and then type the name of the city you will be visiting in the search bar and click “Find hotels” or hit enter.
One note – TripAdvisor, in the past, was purely an advisory website. Now, when searching for the most recommended hotels, the website sort of pushes you to use their booking system. I totally understand why, but you DO NOT have to use their booking system to take advantage of all the traveler advice that is available. They do have some cost-savings if you use their booking, but you can choose to use it or book directly with the hotel. Anyway, once you get the hotels list, look up near the top where it says “Sort by:” and click on “Traveler Ranked” and you will see the hotels listed by the highest rankings. Usually there will be one “sponsored” hotel (which means a paid ad), followed by the list. On the far right of the listing it will have the rank, for example, “#1 of 263 hotels in Las Vegas.”

You can also use TripAdvisor to find top-rated restaurants in a particular city. They have an over-all list, but you can also find something in a particular category. For example, when we were in Las Vegas, I searched in the “Cheap Eats” category to find a really good restaurant that was easy on the wallet. You can also search based on the type of food, like Mexican or Italian. So, go to TripAdvisor.com, select Restaurants from the options at the very top of the page, then type in the city you are visiting (example – San Francisco, California), then click “Find restaurants” and the list will come up on the next page.

Once you have decided on a destination for your next adventure, you can also find out a lot of information about the area by once again using TripAdvisor and going to a forums page. This one is a little more tricky. As much as I have used this website, I usually can’t navigate through the pages to find the forums very easily.

But first let me explain. Just about any place you want to go, you can find a forums page for that destination on TripAdvisor. When we traveled to Ireland last year, I visited the forums page for Ireland many, many times, and I found out so much excellent information there that helped me with my trip. There will usually be posts on the right hand side of the screen that are answers to frequently asked questions. Those posts will be there all the time. There’s also a list of posts in the center of the page that are always changing, as new ones are always being posted at the top and moving the older ones down. You can also ask questions and some fantastic people will answer them for you! These are people that are so nice and they take time out of their day to share their expertise with you. It really is amazing.

So, the easiest way to get to the forum pages is to just go to good old Google and type into the search bar “forums Ireland” or “forums Las Vegas” or “forums (insert your destination).” This really is much easier than trying to go to TripAdvisor and trying to navigate around to the forums page you are looking for.

Well, I hope that the information that I have shared is helpful to you. Some of it is pretty basic, and you might be thinking, “I already knew all this stuff!” If so, please come back around! And if you learned something new, please come back and visit again. I have a lot more to share and will be adding much more in the days ahead.

Until the next time – Happy Traveling!

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