Vacation - What's the best thing about it?

**Denvergirlie** · 06-30-2009, 09:22 PM

I thought I might start a fun thread.

Subject at hand: Vacations

What's the best thing about vacation?

A certain "pampering" you allow yourself?
Coming home? The actual part of traveling?
Eating special meals? A certain activity?

No matter small price tag or big price tag, what' the best thing about vacations?

**elphie** · 06-30-2009, 10:40 PM

Great question!

For me it is the chance to do something new. I"m happiest when I'm having a new experience whether its reading a new book, tasting a new food, or visiting a new place. I rarely return to the same destination twice (unless I'm visiting someone) and the adventure is the best part. Incidentally once I figured this out about myself I started finding small ways to incorporate it into my daily life- vacations are still lots of fun and something to look forward to but now I have little things to look forward to all the time instead of one week out of the year.

**Michelle68** · 07-01-2009, 12:26 AM

Just like Elphie, I also love the aspect of experiencing new things, seeing new places and meeting new people. It's the best thing about our vacations, IMO. Coming home after being away for awhile is wonderful, too.

**ladykemma2** · 07-01-2009, 07:27 AM

Originally Posted by Denvergirlie

I thought I might start a fun thread.

Subject at hand: Vacations

What's the best thing about vacation?i like to travel to places of history, like colonial williamsburg or england. i like to study ahead of time so i understand what i am looking at. i enjoy "feeling" and experiencing what happened there. For example i was at old sarum in salisbury. i had to sit down at the enormity of what happened there. i was moved to tears and so was my ex-husband both at durham cathedral and st albans cathedral. another time i was at bess harwicke's house Harwicke hall. there was a tiny embroidery on the wall that i would have missed if the docent hadn't pointed it out. she said Mary queen of scots embroidered that. i had to sit down. the docent let me get close practically my nose touching the glass. she let me study the textile with a magnifying glass. another time i was in castle rising (or was it castle acre) and this was the place where the pretty queen from Braveheart, isabella, married to gay prince edward, was banished when her son came of age and she stopped being regent. she was the one who killed her gay husband by sticking a red hot poker up his and took over ruling the country. apparently she was a real piece of work.

A certain "pampering" you allow yourself?
Coming home? overcoming jet lagThe actual part of traveling?grueling british airways flight
Eating special meals? A certain activity?

No matter small price tag or big price tag, what' the best thing about vacations?

studying history

**Momto2Boyz** · 07-01-2009, 07:30 AM

For me it is doing something new too. Our vacations usually consist of going to somewhere "unusual" and seeing what we find. We don't hit normal destinations spots, we find a small town somewhere and we camp and then explore the nearby small towns and hit the shops, restuarants, farmer's markets, festivals...things like that. I'm always amazed at what we find in the "out of the way "towns!

This year, we actually decided that instead of taking one big vacation, we were going to spend the summer taking "day-cations". We've set aside 2 saturdays each month, and we just take off and see where the day takes us. We do things that we normally woudln't have the time to do. The great part about it, is we get to have lots of short adventures, we're not spending tons of money, we don't spend a week eating and regret it later, and there isn't tons of traveling involved. Vacations always wear me out, so the day-cations are nice, becuase I don't have to spend a week recovering from them!

Last weekend, we spent our day-cation at the Taste of Chicago. Something we normally don't do. We spent a total of $50 for the day which inlcuded, food, beer and train tickets. We got to see Counting Crows in concert (my favorite band of all time) for FREE, and the whole family got to go along with some friends! It was better than any vacation I've ever had!

**Shelli_wnj** · 07-01-2009, 11:27 PM

Right now it's simple... not having to cook 3 meals a day, clean up after those meals and fight with three kids about eating said meals! LOL We are going on "vacation" to see my mom this month and this is exactly what I am looking forward to. Oh, that and seeing family!

In days past it was always seeing something new, something I had never done or somewhere I had never been. Now it's much more simple.

**elphie** · 07-01-2009, 11:42 PM

Shelli- I would look forward to that too! We always stay in condos or vacation rental homes instead of hotels so we have a kitchen- we do usually eat out at least once a day but for the most part I'm still cooking and cleaning up.

I hope you have a fun visit with your family.

**frugal is fun** · 07-02-2009, 10:16 AM

I like the planning part and having something "good" to look forward to. Once there I just like enjoying what we had planned to do, whether it be a ski vacation, beach vacation or camping. AND not having to get up to an alarm and running out the door to work.