Homeschool Travel Help

Comment

Comment by Crystal Listerman on July 20, 2010 at 8:50am

I can't watch the video because our Linux system has started having the problem (since the last update) that about 4/5 of the videos out there wont play online for us, even ones that we upload ourselves. So I have no idea what was said in the video. But I will make some comments on the comments already here and tell a bit about our vacations.

When we go on vacation, which isn't very often frankly because my husband doesn't enjoy traveling and would prefer to stay home and play video games with his time off, I make a list of all the educational places along the way. Because we have a membership at a local zoo, and a membership at a local children's museum, there are lots of "partners" for these which we end up stopping at. Most of them are free, but sometimes we have to pay half price. It's usually worth it.

Once I contacted a place that we had not been to before to ask about their partner discount. They said that with our zoo membership one member of the family got in free, but the rest had to pay. I did not bother stopping there. But after we returned home I had a message from them saying that they had misinterpreted my original message, and that if we had a family pass then we could get 4 people in for free. We have a family of 5. We would have paid the extra for one person, although my daughter was 2 at the time and so she probably would have been free. I wish that they had figured that out earlier.

Besides the zoos and museums, we also stop and see national parks and battlefields that are on the route, reenactments and living history locations. We also like to look for local wildlife that is different from our own.

All that being said, the farthest that we have gone since starting the family is 7 hours away drive time (up to Iowa). I wont fly. Not only am I afraid of flying, it also costs too much to buy tickets for 5 people, and then you have to rent a car once you get there. We did go farther on our honeymoon. We drove to Virginia Beach. I'd like to take the kids to the ocean some time, but it's just too far away to talk my hubby into going on the trip.

As for the overpopulation idea, I'm always amused at how people make comments about that to me when I am out with my 3 kids. Once, when I was pregnant with my 3rd one a lady said, "Don't you care about overpopulation?!" I looked her right in the face and said, "Well, redheads are actually an endangered species. I have to do my part to preserve them!" My family thought that was so funny that they bought me a T-shirt that says, "endangered species" on it. I wear it a lot when I am going somewhere that isn't large family friendly, although I don't think that my 3 kids is necessarily a large family. Many of my friends have six children.

Comment by Paul B - Homeschool Channel on July 19, 2010 at 8:37am

Good point KB. They are hitting the people who likely need the cost savings the most.

Comment by KB on July 16, 2010 at 6:21pm

About zoo/museum memberships: a rather disturbing trend is beginning with these organizations. In some state there is an additional fee for families which have more than four children. At best, the zoos/museums might be trying to "spread the expense" by making larger families pay their fare share. However, given that such family sizes represent less than 5% of the population, I fail to see how the zoos/muesums will recoup any operating costs by making this charge. At worst, they are making a socio-political statement regarding the so-called "overpopulation crises."

Comment by David L. Keys on July 16, 2010 at 5:20pm

One year we purchased a family membership at our local zoo, then we stopped at 3 or 4 zoos across the country that were covered by a reciprocal membership agreement. Sometimes the smaller zoos are more enjoyable for small children and/or grandparents.

Comment by Virginia Knowles on July 16, 2010 at 2:18pm

Great ideas! I just linked to it on a blog post I wrote about trip planning a few weeks ago. You can find it here: http://comewearymoms.blogspot.com/2010/06/tips-for-your-trips-plann...

I also liked the http://www.momsminivan.com/ link that you mentioned in the video. I'll be sure to use some of those ideas when we hit the road this month with 8 of our kids.

Comment by Ardis Kissinger on July 16, 2010 at 1:38pm

I wish I had had helps like these when I was raising children. Really good info.