How many summers do you have left with your kids? How are you going to make the most of that time? (Hint: Don’t relegate family time to summertime.)
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What’s special about FAMILY travel bucket lists is FAMILY. The main goal is the memories, bonding, togetherness, and collective experiences. Not merely checking things off a list. So, even though we’re looking at travel-related bucket lists, you can still achieve all that without venturing far from home.
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Travel gets you out of your comfort zone and daily routine. It’s a transformative experience. Traveling as a family is a unique opportunity to foster strong bonds and create amazing memories. We all have our “bucket list” items, some travel related and some not. But not all our travel related goals are appropriate for families—especially those comprised of kids of various ages and stages.
There are so many different types of travel buckets lists. Let’s explore a few and how they can be adapted for families. But remember, a bucket list is very personal. Make it your own. Our Family Travel Bucket List combines aspects of all of these. And, it’s always a work in progress.
Embracing the Power of a Family Bucket List
Family Adventure Bucket List
Some of your kids may be naturally more timid and others may be of the adrenaline junkie variety. But the Family Adventure Bucket List can be more than just a litany of thrilling escapades. You can take the adventures to some great locales. Rather than just ziplining at the local amusement park, do it in a rainforest! Go snorkeling in a coral reef rather than at the local beach.
However, the Family Adventure Bucket List can also be a great option for busy families that only have random days to spend together and want to focus on activities. Scuba diving, skydiving, stockcar racing, bungee jumping, rock climbing, hiking and more can all be done within a couple hours of wherever you live. Admittedly, things like shark diving, glacier climbing and sleeping in an igloo or ice hotel may not be locally accessible.
One of our kids was terrified of heights. She literally froze on a ropes course, and it took 2 hours for us to coax her down without freaking her out. It was a great opportunity for our other kids to come give her support and encouragement. They took the time to support their sister; they didn’t just go about their own climbing. A couple years later we found a “kid-size” ropes course and climbing wall. It was completely empty, so we convinced her to give it a try. It took her a while to warm up. But then we couldn’t get her down—this time because she kept going again and again and again! She loved it!
Don’t give up. Keep exposing your kids to new adventures. Don’t give into their discomfort.
Destination Specific Bucket List
Do you or your kids have a running list of places you want to go? The Destination Specific Bucket List should not only include places you want to take your kids, but places they want to go. My son wanted to go to Carlsbad Caverns, my daughter wants to see the guards at Buckingham Palace and another daughter wants to see the Swiss Alps. We wanted them to explore the Little Rock Central High School and the Rock of Gibraltar.
Keeping in mind that most kids just want to fit in, you’ll want them to see the major sites that they and their friends have heard of. So be sure to include places like the Eiffel Tower, Yellowstone, and the canals of Venice. But they’re young. So, they may not have heard of some of the world’s great destinations. Use the Destination Specific Bucket List as a place to dream and also a place to learn. Write down places like the Great Wall of China, Fallingwater, Iguazu Falls, and Tuktoyaktuk. Let them figure out what and where all those places are. And in so doing, they’ll discover more to add to the ever-growing list!
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The Cultural Experience Bucket List
The world is a tapestry of cultures and the more you immerse yourself, the more you’ll start to notice the similarities rather than just the differences. “Cultural Experience” means different things to different people. Some feel they had a cultural experience by visiting a festival or eating some traditional cuisine. Others want the full immersive experience by going to live in another culture for a year or more.
But this is your family’s Cultural Experience Bucket List. So, make it yours! What does it mean to you? And why is it important to you? Do you want to visit local markets? Learn traditional crafting and cooking techniques? Participate in a festival? Live with the locals? Do you want to focus on one specific culture to learn more about? Or a different one every year?
We’ve taken our kids to small town county fairs, rodeos, lumberjack festivals, and Civil War reenactments; they’ve met mayors, police chiefs, and l’havdil Roshei Yeshiva, Gedolei Hador, and Rebbes. But, we’ve also taken them to live in the heart of the Jewish Community in Mexico for a month. A month may not seem like a lot for immersion, but our son was able to become part of several of the local Batei Medrash and our girls went to sleepaway camp with one of the local Bais Yaakovs. They made lifelong friends, are regularly on the phone, and have been back to visit.
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They’ve learned to be confident in who they are and what they represent since they are often the only Jew many people have met. They’ve learned that we don’t have to compromise who we are and how we live regardless of where we are and what we’re doing. And they’ve also learned that there are all different types of Jewish Communities and are able to fit in while still maintaining their individuality.
The Road Trip Bucket List
There is a plethora of epic road trips around the world. Some, like South Africa’s Stellenbosch Wine Route, for example, are not necessarily family friendly. But many are great for kids or can be adapted for families.
One thing to remember with the Road Trip Bucket List is that the joy is in the journey. Whereas the Destination Specific Bucket List focuses on the destinations themselves, the Road Trip Bucket List focuses on the route itself. You’re not going to hit the road on a motorcycle with the kids, but get into a car/camper van/RV/etc. and you’re on the way!
Depending on your list, you can hit the road from home, or you’ll have to “get to your trailhead”. Some roads are more about the view and others are about the activities. So, pick well based on your family, and be prepared to make adjustments on the way. Route 66 is fun for younger kids but might be too corny for older kids. California’s PCH is really beautiful—my husband wanted to stop around every bend for a picture. Icefields Parkway is a top drive and you can take the kids on a glacier. Iceland’s Ring Road? Australia’s Great Ocean Road? Scottish Highlands? Pan-American Highway? Ireland’s Wild Atlantic Way?
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Spontaneity on the open road is the name of the game here. Any of the famous routes are a good jumping off point for your planning, especially because many of them have their own guidebooks and apps. But, when traveling with kids, remember that it’s not about the road but the camaraderie. So, get the guidebook but get off the beaten path!
You can also turn any Sunday drive into a “roadtrip”—it’s all in the mindset.
The Community Service Bucket List
While this post is about family travel bucket lists, I think that in order to raise well-rounded individuals we have to teach them to be givers. It needs to be part of who they are not just something they do. So, add community service activities to the itinerary of any trip.
Some ideas can be visiting the sick, volunteering in a soup kitchen, joining a run/walk for charity, or helping to build a school. Your kids can even volunteer to babysit for local families where you’re visiting.
When we travel to smaller Jewish communities, we always ask if there’s anything we could bring that they can’t easily get. We’ve been asked to bring cases of tuna or grape juice or even just challah “just so my wife doesn’t have to bake for one week”. We also usually bring kosher candies and snacks that aren’t readily available in the local area.
At the end of a trip, we find people who can use things that we have “left over”. It can be half a bottle of baby shampoo that we don’t want/need to pack in a suitcase. Or a few packages of kosher meat or cheese that can be put to better use by someone without easy access.
On one trip to Israel my 9-year-old daughter hand delivered her hair that she was donating and we got a full personal tour of the organization. A few years later, my next daughter donated her hair to the same organization (by mail). And now they’re planning to volunteer with the same organization.
On a cross-country summer road trip, we took our kids to a police station in every state we drove through. We just went in to say “thank you”. The kids saw how much the officers appreciated being appreciated. Grown men cried! A few years later we were back in one of the cities and returned to the local station and the kids saw how touched the officers had been because they remembered us!
That same winter we drove past a Cal Fire station and left a note in the mailbox (since nobody was there). A few months later, a handwritten letter with stickers arrived in the mail.
Any of this can be done in your local community too. Bake cookies for the fire station, pack food boxes for the needy, really anything! We are raising kids to be active and integral parts of society.
So, I suppose the goal of the Community Service Bucket List is to make itself obsolete. If daily acts of kindness are second (first?) nature, do you really need to make a list?
The Journey to Genius Bucket List
This is really an “Educational Bucket List”, but you can’t tell your kids that!🤫 The Journey to Genius Bucket List, together with everything else, is really the way to ensure that school doesn’t get in the way of education.
There is a movement called “World Schooling” which sees the world as your classroom. This can include famous and not so famous museums, landmarks, archaeological and historical sites.
Our kids have learned about desert irrigation while bottling olive oil, how bees make honey while harvesting their own, and how a distillery works while [their parents were] participating in a tasting. They’ve baked bread like the ancients, made paper by hand, slept amongst World War II fighter jets, seen where President Kennedy was assassinated, and visited the actual Plymouth Rock (it’s smaller than you would think).
But in truth, anything can be an opportunity to foster a love of learning and curiosity. We see this most often in small children, so our job is not to snuff it out as they get older. Right now we have a construction site behind our house and our son is fascinated by the “snort” (it’s really just a crane, but he used the word from the book “Are You My Mother?”). He’s also excited by the neighbor’s cat, being able to jump off the front steps, and the swing in the park.
Make lifelong learning a part of your everyday life and you’ll have no problem incorporating it on your travels.
The Nature Exploration Bucket List
No family travel bucket list would be complete without appreciating Hashem’s (G-d’s) beautiful world. This can be found in the big and the small. There’s a quote attributed to 19th Century Rav Samson Raphael Hirsch. When asked by his students about the effort he was making to travel to Switzerland in his later years, he explained “G-d will surely ask, ‘Shimshon, did you see My Alps?’. How will I respond?”
Even if you live in a big city, you can still get out and explore nature. It doesn’t just have to be a local park either. A recent study found that, even with urban sprawl, most people in the world still live within 10km of nature. (And even countries with the highest distance still average 22km.) But even so, most kids continue to think that apples, milk, and chicken come from the grocery store!
A Nature Exploration Bucket List can include big things like all 7 Natural Wonders of the World (Aurora Borealis, Harbor of Rio de Janeiro, Grand Canyon, Great Barrier Reef, Mount Everest, Victoria Falls, and Parícutin Volcano), all the national parks in your country, the highest peak on each continent, the Amazon, spotting the Big 5 on an African Safari, and so much more.
But, there is so much benefit to the more “mundane” as well—not that anything in G-d’s World is mundane! Find a local hike on a Sunday afternoon, plant a vegetable garden, visit a farm, go camping in a nearby state park, or even just in your own backyard—as we did during the COVID lockdown.
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A few years back we joined with another family for a Sunday afternoon guided hike. The guide taught the kids—and adults—about the edible and medicinal properties of everything along the trail. We also learned some basic wilderness survival, like identifying poisonous plants and how to find water. The younger kids got to run around, and the older kids got to appreciate how everything can be found in nature. It was free and it was within a half hour of home!
When we go on any outing, my kids are always on the lookout for a “MaRMaH”. And they get excited to be the first to call it out! It’s the term our family uses to reference the verse (Psalms 104:24) that begins “Ma Rabu Ma’asecha Hashem”, loosely translated as “How Great are Your works, G-d!”. (The entire verse is “How great are Your works, G-d! You have made them all with wisdom; the earth is full of Your possessions!”)
In full disclosure, I got this term from my college biology lab partner who gave this name to our dissection specimen. And she got it from her high school principal, Rabbi Naftoli Hexter.
So, get out there. And let me know what MaRMaHs you find! And, if your kids are up to it, have them keep a journal of all the ways they see Hashem in their lives—not just in nature!
Family Travel Bucket Lists provide a roadmap (pun intended) for unforgettable shared experiences. The lifelong memories and the growth opportunities are unimaginable. So, get out there and explore. You’ll be surprised what you discover when you least expect it!
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