Fun family summer vacations

Fun family summer vacations are part and parcel of the American experience. You make reservations somewhere, load up the car with the wife, kids and maybe even the family pet, and hit the road for fun and adventure. It’s the American Dream made flesh, the ability to get away from work and stress for a week or so with the people you love the most. It’s the promise of American freedom combined with the relaxation we all crave.

Of course, not all family summer vacations are the same. An adventure vacation is different from a lay-about, kick it in the sun vacation. A “let’s go see our favorite baseball team” vacation is far different from “Let’s go to Disney World!” vacation. So it’s important then to identify what your favorite family summer vacations of choice are before embarking upon one.

For me personally, a lot of my free time is spent enjoying the game of soccer. Whether I’m watching on TV, playing in pick-up games in the neighborhood, or reading online, I’ve always got soccer on the brain. I’m lucky enough that my girlfriend feels the same way about the game, so in large part our family summer vacations are pre-determined.

This played out very well for us back in May when part of her family was planning a luau for the family matriarch’s eightieth birthday in Los Angeles. The weekend of the luau just happened to coincide with a local game featuring Major League Soccer’s Los Angeles Galaxy against our local club, the New York Red Bulls. We took the opportunity to not only get tickets to the game, but to invite her sister, brother-in-law and their family – two nieces and a nephew.

For both us and them, it was what all fun family summer vacations should be. We met up for an early dinner, then got to the game before the kick-off. This gave me time to calm my pre-game jitter with a beer while allowing the kids a chance to see professional athletes close-up. Then the game started, and everyone had their own brand of fun. For me and my girlfriend, we’re soccer diehards so we watched and analyzed the game. For the kids, it was a chance to yell and scream and do the wave. And for the kids’ parents, I think the best part was that soccer games are less than two hours long – quite a change from baseball and American football where games run between three and four hours.