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Travelling with Extended Family

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Travelling with extended family can be great. You’ll have built in child care, getting away from your normal routine can make it easier to be together, you can divide up the planning work, and nobody has to play host.

Here are some tips to help things go smoothly:

• Set expectations up front about the children’s schedules and how they will impact the trip
• Encourage everyone to be independent. Everyone does not have to visit every site together (and in fact, you’ll be happiest if you break up and get back together on occasion)
• Bring cell phones or walkie talkies
• You may want to pre-arrange some meals as many restaurants will have trouble accommodating a large group. You may also want to plan some picnic lunches and breakfasts
• We like to rent apartments for family travel. The apartment makes a nice base for breakfast and to gather before going out, and there is a little more space.
• Everyone should stay in the same place. Many apartment rental companies have several units in the same building. In a hotel, you might want to arrange for one family to have a bigger room than others to give you a place to gather.
• Try to make it easy to meet up while you’re doing an activity (e.g. we’ll meet you in the modern art section of the museum) instead of waiting for everyone out front. This will minimize the amount of time you spend waiting and maximize the amount of time you spend doing!
• Where possible, arrange tickets in advance (or send one person to wait in line) to keep everyone in a good mood