3 Keys Thursday: 3 Keys to a Vacation that's Really a Vacation

Photo: Dodgerton Skillhause via Morguefile

Although I knew this post would be late, I was optimistic that I'd get to it sooner than 10:30 PM. Still, one of my favorite parts of coming to the beach is writing outside on the screened-in porch. Consequently, since I knew we'd be here tonight, I was saving my post. I had it all sketched out this morning, but now I'm tired, and so I'm going another way. 

And so, without further ado, I give you my 3 Keys to a vacation that's really a vacation.

Destination. Choose a place that enthralls or restores you. For me, the beach is the latter. I don't even have to be on the beach to feel a sense of calm and, when I sit out on the screened-in patio with my laptop, I'm a happy camper.

Travel with your favorite people. As parents of an only child, we elected to take family trips more often than not and so now, my husband and I are slowly adjusting to trips without our daughter. They're not bad by any stretch of the imagination, but they are different. I suspect that trips with other couples and even tour groups are in our future but, for now, trips for two, interspersed with the occasional vacation for three are just what I want.

Know when to say "enough." My husband used to be the sort of traveler who wanted to fill every second of vacation with things to do. Over the years, my daughter and I have converted him to our way of thinking: some days are the kind of days you fill, others are the kind of days in which you languish. There are exceptions, of course -- one day stopovers in places you're unlikely to get to again any time soon, for example -- but too much scheduling makes a trip seem more like work than a vacation. 

How about you? Do you agree? Disagree? What are your three keys to a vacation that's really a vacation?