How much do you travel?

[Liberty Belle]

We are starting to plan next year's travel. I feel that we traveled too much this year and would like to scale back. I have reached the point that I feel as though our time at home is fractured and that we are always packing, unpacking or getting ready to pack. My husband disagrees.

Here's what we have done since last December:

3 Disney trips
1 Kyoto trip
1 Seoul trip
4 Colorado trips
18 (or 19 - I am unsure) weekend trips to Austin
1 Grand Canyon trip

We have another Disney trip planned for December and I am heading to Austin this weekend. We also have a family wedding to attend in Louisiana. There was a Glacier trip planned, but the burning down of the Sperry Chalet killed that one for us.

My husband started talking about next year last night, and it made my head hurt.

How much does everyone else travel?

My goodness! I haven't traveled that much in the past 20 years, I don't think.

We typically do 2-6 weekend camping trips each year. Some years we do a weekend non-camping trip. We did that this year, but hadn't in the past 4 or 5. We tend to do a week long (or a few days longer) trip every 2 to 5 years. I've never been out of the country as an adult.

If money and time off work were no object, I believe the perfect amount of travel for me would be two 7 to 10 day long trips, 4 or so non-camping weekend trips, and 6-10 weekend camping trips, and 1 week long camping trip a year. Then maybe every 3 years, a 2 week trip overseas.

 

[marcyleecorgan]

... not since the Disney trip we returned from in January...

And we won't get to go on another vacation likely for 2 + years. Yeah I know what my ticker says... that's wishful thinking.

We don't get to go on vacation very often.... maybe once every 3 years or so?

 

[lifesavacation]

We take 1 big overseas vacation trip a year. And then there's usually a couple of overseas trips (Manila, Hong Kong, China) for business, which I don't really count. We have trade shows each year in Vegas, Florida, and we have one next week in Canada. And then we travel all around the west for my daughter's volleyball team--Wa, OR, CA, NV, CO, AZ. We just bought an RV so that we can drive to these places and make it a better experience. I'm so excited. We pick it up in a couple of weeks. We also flew back east in Aug to watch our son's summer baseball team. We watched games in Michigan, IL, and WI.

We usually take a spring break vacation but I'm not sure we can fit that in this year with my daughter's travel schedule.

I'll be so happy to get the RV. I'm tired of staying in crappy team hotels. It gets overwhelming for me to travel every weekend so to have a pseudo home base will be really nice. And we can take our dog with us

 

[mousefanmichelle]

This year we have spent:
5 nights at WDW, 1 at Coco Beach
7 day cruise
many wknds at our cabin in northern MI (3.5 hour drive)
a camping trip to the upper penn of MI for 3 nights then back to our cabin
Thanksgiving at our cabin.

My dh and I get 5 weeks of vacation a year plus holiday's. We spend a lot of it up at our cabin but next year I have talked him into another cruise so we will probably spend sometime in Miami before the cruise then 8 days in the southern carib. That's our big trip. I want to camp some more next summer and maybe plan a wknd trip to Chicago if time allows.

 

[Liberty Belle]

Wow, some of you guys are making me feel seriously inadequate. We consider ourselves a 'traveling' family, but we really don't have the available vacation days to travel as much as some of you. This was, in particular, a very boring travel year:

1 week FL (not WDW)
Weekend in Columbus, OH
Weekend in Chicago
1 week Traverse City
Weekend 'up north'

Next year is going to be Disney, Disney, Disney (?), Disney (??), and Kentucky. What can I say? I invested in an AP for once.

Tentative 2019 plans include 3 weeks in the British Isles.

Don't feel bad. You could be me. lol

Our vacation this year was 2.5 days in Louisville, Ky. We also did two camping weekends.

Last year had no vacations and 2 camping weekends.

 

[scoutie]

December: St. Pete's Beach, Florida
March: Weekend trip into Chicago
June: Grand Haven, Michigan
July: Curacao
July: Charleston, South Carolina

I'm hoping to go to Italy next June and Arizona in March. I'd love to travel more, but my husband started a new job and he doesn't get much vacation time. There is also college to save for and retirement, and so that's always in the back of my mind. I have three kids who are in sports. My daughter is in competitive gymnastics and can't miss the two weeks of practice before a meet, so it makes travel difficult during meet season. I'm a teacher, so I can't travel during the school year aside from Christmas break or spring break, but that's meet season for my daughter. Traveling feeds my spirit and definitely cheers me up, so it's always a struggle to balance my want of travel with realities of life.

 

[calypso726]

We are in the same boat with the packing and unpacking. Here's my list since last October:

October - all 5 weekends in WDW for Food & Wine and MNSSHP
November - first 2 weekends in WDW for F&W
November - Thanksgiving long weekend in Las Vegas
December - weekend in WDW
December - Winter in Wyoming 5 day trip with Adventures by Disney
February - Long weekend in London to see the Harry Potter play
March - 10 days at Aulani followed by 4 nights at DLR on the way back
May - 3 night DCL Dream cruise over the long weekend
June - weekend in WDW
July - 4 nights in Scotland over 4th of July
July - weekend in San Francisco to see Hamilton
August - weekend in WDW
August - 9 days in Italy with Adventures by Disney
September - 3 night DCL Dream cruise over the long weekend
October - one weekend in WDW so far, 2 more weekends planned this month for F&W
November - one weekend in WDW for F&W
November - Iceland during Thanksgiving week

We do squeeze in as much travel as we can and try to utilize holidays to maximize our time off allowed from our jobs. We live in Florida so going to WDW over many weekends is just a 3 hour drive away and I don't really count them as vacations but they do involve packing and unpacking. We have also made travel hacking a favorite hobby and are able to mitigate the costs of our vacations quite a bit.

 

[nancygirl1]

We went to Florida (Ft. Lauderdale) 2 years ago for a wedding. Other than that we haven't traveled since or years before that. We had 3 kids in college at the same time so could not afford a vacation. I have been in 2 serious auto accidents in the past 2 years and haven't been working. No vacations in site. I dream though.

 

[Disneylover99]

We went to Florida (Ft. Lauderdale) 2 years ago for a wedding. Other than that we haven't traveled since or years before that. We had 3 kids in college at the same time so could not afford a vacation. I have been in 2 serious auto accidents in the past 2 years and haven't been working. No vacations in site. I dream though.

So sorry about your accidents. That's terrible!
But take heart. Some of my best vacations have been in my dreams.

 

[ronandannette]

25 - 30 nights a year away from home, 7 - 14 of which we actually consider vacations.

 

[MIGrandma]

We travel about as much/often as we want to, which seems to be less than it used to be. It seems like the older we get the more "homebody" we are getting, but yet we still do enjoy traveling but just maybe not for as long at a time as it used to be. A few days is fine, up to about a week, then we're both ready to be home.

Last February we took a two-week trip with our DS and DDIL, spent a few nights in Nashville on our way to New Orleans for a couple of nights, then a 7-night Caribbean cruise, followed by a 3-night cabin rental just outside of Nashville. It was a great trip, loved spending time with family, but we were glad to get home.

We took a long weekend trip to Frankenmuth for my birthday in August, and we took a 7-night upper peninsula camping trip last month with our truck camper followed by a 3-night stay at the Lilac Tree Hotel on Mackinaw Island. Again, great trip but good to be home.

And we spent several long weekends at our place up north from May - September too.

Next up we're planning another cabin rental (7 nights) and 2-3 nights at the Hampton Inn in Gatlinburg at the end of March. Then in November 2018 DD has asked me to go to Disneyworld with her again so it will be 7-nights at Port Orleans Riverside and 1-night in a hotel in Detroit before we fly to Florida. Then in February 2019 we have a 7-night Royal Caribbean Oasis of the Seas cruise booked, and while we're in Florida we'll probably take another week or so to visit his Dad and spend some time in Cocoa Beach/Daytona Beach as well.

Eventually we'd like to take an Alaskan trip but haven't decided if we want to stay in hotels there, rent a cabin, or take a cruise so those plans aren't final yet.

We're planning to trade in the truck camper for a 20-22' tow behind camper and eventually we want to take a trip out west. DH has been out there but I never have, so that's planned for the future.

Would love to do some overseas travel, but I don't want to do a l-o-n-g plane ride so probably will never see some of the places I would like to.

I'd love to see the New England states in the fall, we saw them in August of 1981 but with DH being a farmer and fall is harvest season we'll probably never get to do that.

 

[disykat]

Wow! I'm envious of everyone's travels, but it also sounds exhausting!

*Both our parents have needed more help recently so we're taking turns making maybe 8 four day trips a year to our "home" state - whenever one (or both) of us can extend a weekend. DH and one of our adult sons are there this weekend - I had to work.
*We did one weekend in Colorado
*A weekend for our son's college graduation
*One weekend at the beach
*3 weeks in our home state helping our folks (it was in lieu of a summer vacation this year - just our current reality because we live far from them.)

My husband has a lot of time off accrued at this point in his career. I left my teaching job and just started a part time job with minimal responsibilities hoping that would ease things a bit, but the scheduling of my hours is still problematic. (I'm hoping this will ease a bit with time and make the short trips easier, but I'll no longer have summers free so long trips will be harder)

I know some of you are retired, but how do you all manage to find the time if you are still working?

 

[Pacolovestacos]

Wow! I'm envious of everyone's travels, but it also sounds exhausting!

*Both our parents have needed more help recently so we're taking turns making maybe 8 four day trips a year to our "home" state - whenever one (or both) of us can extend a weekend. DH and one of our adult sons are there this weekend - I had to work.
*We did one weekend in Colorado
*One weekend at the beach
*3 weeks in our home state helping our folks (it was in lieu of a summer vacation this year.)

My husband has a lot of time off accrued at this point in his career. I left my teaching job and just started a part time job with minimal responsibilities hoping that would ease things a bit, but the scheduling of my hours is still problematic. (I'm hoping this will ease a bit with time and make the short trips easier, but I'll no longer have summers free so long trips will be harder)

I know some of you are retired, but how do you all manage to find the time if you are still working?

I think quite a few folks on this thread get quite a bit of time off due to sweat equity. I left corporate last year to work for myself, mainly with the purpose of being able to travel more. So that's what I'm doing!

 

[DawnM]

I don't know, I don't really count weekend trips within driving distance.

Dh and I both work full time and we have kids in college and high school, so we don't travel as much as we did when I wasn't working and the kids were little and we could just pick up and go.

This past year we did a month long trip to California and Arizona. We also did about 5 weekend trips to the beach, the mountains, and Savannah. And last summer we did a 2 week trip to Michigan, but that was to see family.

We will go somewhere next summer. If we move back to CA, that will be our trip as we won't have much time. But if we don't, we will figure something out.

My son will prob need to go to summer school to finish up his degree, so that will limit us somewhat.

 

[calypso726]

I know some of you are retired, but how do you all manage to find the time if you are still working?

Not retired and DH and I still work full time. DH gets 5 weeks and I get 4 weeks PTO from our jobs. We also try to utilize the front end and back end with weekends for our trips and have them fall over a holiday. For example, we are going to Iceland this Thanksgiving to chase the northern lights, go ice caving and try a glacier hike. We both get Thanksgiving and Black Friday off from our jobs. We leave for our trip the Saturday before Thanksgiving and come home the Sunday after Thanksgiving. That is 9 days but we only need to take off 3 from work, the Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday that come before Turkey Day.

 

[melanielll]

Not retired and DH and I still work full time. DH gets 5 weeks and I get 4 weeks PTO from our jobs. We also try to utilize the front end and back end with weekends for our trips and have them fall over a holiday. For example, we are going to Iceland this Thanksgiving to chase the northern lights, go ice caving and try a glacier hike. We both get Thanksgiving and Black Friday off from our jobs. We leave for our trip the Saturday before Thanksgiving and come home the Sunday after Thanksgiving. That is 9 days but we only need to take off 3 from work, the Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday that come before Turkey Day.

Yeah - my husband does that, too. Plus he has a lot of vacation, the every other Friday off thing, personal days and he gets comp time. He once used 10 days of vacation combined with all of that other stuff to get the entire month of December off.

 

[The Mystery Machine]

We are starting to plan next year's travel. I feel that we traveled too much this year and would like to scale back. I have reached the point that I feel as though our time at home is fractured and that we are always packing, unpacking or getting ready to pack. My husband disagrees.

Here's what we have done since last December:

3 Disney trips
1 Kyoto trip
1 Seoul trip
4 Colorado trips
18 (or 19 - I am unsure) weekend trips to Austin
1 Grand Canyon trip

We have another Disney trip planned for December and I am heading to Austin this weekend. We also have a family wedding to attend in Louisiana. There was a Glacier trip planned, but the burning down of the Sperry Chalet killed that one for us.

My husband started talking about next year last night, and it made my head hurt.

How much does everyone else travel?

WOW. You must make a lot of money. We don't have that kind of time or money.

We just started traveling and we are in our 50's. We take 1 vacation a yr. I would do more if I could for sure.

 

[AnnaS]

We usually take two main vacations per year (7-10 nights). We take a few 3-4 nights getaway also (Upstate, Toronto, VA, NJ, PA, etc.). I work PT and should be retiring (early retiring) end of year. We plan to travel a lot more. Hubby has been retired a few years now. Next year we already have 3 main trips planned!!

Happy Planning everyone.

 

[dish rag]

Sitting in an airport now. My wife vacations a lot. Maybe 5 months worth a year. I don't like to go that much and I enjoy working. So I meet her on long weekends, sometimes longer. This time for 8 days. Then I go back to Orlando or Ontario for a couple of weeks and she'll end up meeting me there for awhile then we do it all over again. I do get tired of sitting in airports and it does feel like I'm always packing or unpacking although she does travel with the bulk of my clothing along with hers. It's just always packed. . We are lucky and fortunate that we can do this but for me it gets tiring. Wife doesn't seem to mind at all she enjoys it but she is at the location much longer.

 

[Snowysmom]

We are now empty nesters and getting older. We consider traveling to be something we want to do more of now. We do 2 big trips a year and one close to home trip. This year we did 4 nights at Disney, a 7 night bus tour to see the total solar eclipse and some national parks, and our annual trip to North Conway (driving). I told DH we have to go to Disney once a year now while we still can and he humors me. He does have good time too. I have a bucket list including an Alaska land trip, Canadian Rockies, and Prince Edward Island. Next year is Disney and a cruise to Bermuda along with North Conway. I am already looking at 2019 which looks to be a Disney trip with kids and grandkids (hopefully) and maybe the Canadian Rockies tour. We are both still working full time, retirement is most likely 5-6 years away but you never know. I get 4 weeks vacation and DH gets 4 weeks, 2 days.