Welcome to our travel family
Hi! I’m Tara, I’m a mom of 3 kids (12, 8 and 3) and family travel is my passion. I am the friend that you text to chat about ideas for your next trip, figuring out cool cultural and nature activities, finding under the radar, authentic experiences and delicious food. I’m always planning our next trip.
My husband and I have traveled with our kids for 12+ years and that includes pregnant bellies, infants, toddlers, school-aged kids and pre-teens. We know the good, the bad and the ugly and we want to share what our experiences have taught us. We want to help busy people plan beautiful trips. Whether you love the details of planning or want to hand it all off, we are here to help!
At Family Travel, we believe it’s possible to not only enjoy the process but to make planning inclusive, joyful and fun. This guide will walk you through every step so your family trip is organized, joyful, and (as) stress-free (as possible). We aim to help families travel more, truly enjoy their trips and create lasting memories.
How We Travel
We all strive for the perfect trip. You have put time, energy and money into a trip and you want to get the most out of it. We would love to think that everything goes exactly to plan: You get to your destination seamlessly, your transportation is easy, your accommodation is impeccable, your itinerary goes to plan, the food is great, the culture is accessible and you have the best time. But more often than not, that doesn’t happen.
We went to Iceland when our first kiddo was 3 and I was 6 weeks pregnant with the second kid. After our overnight 5 hour flight from the East Coast, we arrived in Iceland at 7 AM. We took the shuttle to the rental car facility. I had all the information in front of me - rental agency, confirmation numbers, car type, everything. We get to the office and they pull up our reservation for a manual car. My husband looks at me, “did you order a manual car?” Me, pregnant and exhausted, “what? Of course not.” Kind Icelandic rental car agent, “I’m sorry, ma’aam, you did. It’s also high season and we have no other cars for rent. You can take this car or leave without a car.” Our accommodations were an hour away in a remote area, only accessible by car.
I looked at my husband and he said, “well I guess we will have to learn.” The kind Icelandic rental car agents spent an hour in the car with a crying pregnant lady, an insanely patient husband and a sleeping toddler. We eventually figured it out (mostly, with the exception of when the car stalled on the highway and another kind Icelandic person had to get IN our car to help us), laughed a lot at the major travel blunder and learned that people are mostly nice and will help you, if you need it.
This took so much fear out of traveling with a kid for us and started a deep love story between our family and Iceland, one of our favorite places in the world.