Two weeks ago on Thursday was the last day of school for both of my younger boys, Isaiah and Josiah. So they are now out for the summer.
Are your kids out for the summer as well or are your kids still in school?
Now that school is out for the summer, it has me thinking about summer and traveling and I Absolutely LOVE traveling! It is one of my most Favorite things to do and has been since I was a teenager.
I started traveling when I was 16 years old and I went on a mission trip with Teen Missions International for 3 months to Holland.
It was Very life changing! It got me addicted to mission trips, and serving others and helping others and it is where my personal relationship with the Lord REALLY took off.
And so I have Really good memories around traveling and mission trips and I DO miss traveling a LOT, especially since Covid, because we haven’t gone anywhere since February 2020, a month before everything locked done with Covid.
There are really so many different ways that you can travel and explore the world.
You can obviously just drive somewhere....
or fly somewhere and book a hotel and stay the night.
Or you can travel on a train....
So yes, there are tons of different ways that you can travel. But today I want to talk about my absolute favorite way to travel especially when you have a child who has special needs.
My most favorite way to travel is cruising.
I would like to share 8 reasons why I love cruising if you really want to travel and you have a child with special needs.
These are some tips that I have found to be really helpful that I picked up from my own personal experience traveling with my two kids who have special needs.
Because when you are on a cruise, there are Soo many different benefits but number 1 is:
When you get on your cruise, you unpack once and you are good to go!
None of this packing, unpacking, pack up again like every time you stay at a hotel for a night or two and then you have to pack up and go to the next place you are visiting and then check into that hotel and repeat this same exhausting process every time you stay at a different hotel when you are traveling.
Especially when you have a child with special needs and you have to pack a lot of extra equipment or special things for your child. It can be SOO exhausting to have to constantly pack and unpack all of those things every time that you have to move to a different hotel.
On the flip side…...When you cruise, you unpack once you get to the cruise and then you are good to go for the length of your cruise.
2.) Cruising includes all you can eat, so you don’t have to worry about figuring out where in the world you are going to eat at or how long the wait is to get a table or how much the food costs.
With cruising, the cost of all of your food is included in the price of your cruise.
3.) When you cruise, it also includes all of your entertainment so you don’t have to worry about budgeting a ton of money so that you can do something fun while you are on vacation because the cruises always have fun shows to go to every evening and games that they play during the day.
Cruises have a full gym so you can work out and enjoy a beautiful ocean view while you workout.
Cruises also have a library room, incase you feel like reading a good book.
I personally LOVE reading, so I love that the cruises all have library rooms where you can find a book to read for free.
They also have a game room, so if you want to play a game of chess or a card game…….you totally can! 👍
4.) Another benefit of cruising is that you don’t have to worry about lodging.
Your cost of staying on the ship for 7 nights or however long your cruise is, it’s included in the price, so you don’t have to worry about trying to find a good hotel or airbnb for wherever you want to visit. You also don’t have to worry about paying for parking, because some hotels charge you for parking!
5.) You don’t have to rent a car and deal with the stress of trying to drive in an area that you aren’t familiar with.
Nor do you have to pay for gas.
6.) All cruises are ADA compliant. So you don’t have to worry about if they will have an elevator or ramps.
Rest assured.
They all have elevators and ramps! 😊👍
It can be soo frustrating when traveling to a hotel or a restaurant or to anyplace that is not ADA accessible.
When we went to Europe, we were really surprised to learn how many places we went to that did not have any ramps or elevators.
So not only did we have to carry our 2 kids who can not walk up the stairs, but we also had to carry their double stroller.
Now they are too big to fit into a double stroller. Isaiah is 6 years old, so he has a wheelchair now. I can’t imagine carrying his wheelchair up or down any stairs, so I am sure glad that we went to Europe when they were little.
Don’t get me wrong.
Europe is beautiful and I feel SOO blessed that we were able to spend 3 weeks traveling around in Europe, but there are a lot of old and historic places, like castles and other really cool and interesting places to see that only have stairs.
Even several hotels that we stayed at in Europe did not have elevators or ramps and so we had to carry our two boys who can’t walk, as well as carry all of our luggage and the double stroller up and down all of the stairs.
It was Really challenging, to say the least.
So just be for warned that if you have a child with special needs and you are thinking of going to Europe, you want to be extra careful before you book a hotel or make a reservation at a restaurant or any activity that you want to do for fun, be sure and go to their website ahead of time and see if they have any elevators or ramps.
If it isn’t clear, you could also send them an email ahead of time asking if they are ADA compliant.
7. ) All cruises have pools and hot tubs. Not all hotels have pools or hot tubs, but I am pretty sure that all cruises do.
As someone who absolutely LOVES to swim, I love the fact that we can always enjoy a good swim and hot tub time whenever we go on a cruise.
Cruises are extremely inexpensive for all that they offer compared to what they charge. It’s hard to travel any cheaper, considering it covers all of your lodging, food, entertainment, travel from place to place as well as all of your entertainment on board the cruise.
(Quick side note: Just in case you are thinking that I am a travel agent and that is why I am promoting cruising and taking a vacation.) Nope! Not at all.
I am not a travel agent.
But I will tell you what I am.
I am a mom of 4 and a mom who has 2 kids who have special needs.
And I just want to share some tips that I have learned along the way that will hopefully help you whenever you travel with your child who has special needs.
I really hope you have found these tips helpful, for why I highly recommend cruising if you want to travel and you have a child with special needs.
As always…..I would love to hear from you!
~ If you are a parent of a child with special needs, I would Love to have you join my private FB group. It is a safe environment, strictly for parents who have a child with special needs, where you can get encouragement and support from other parents who can relate to what you are going through. The name of my private FB group is called “Special Needs Parenting SOS.” ~ 😇💕