What are some of your summer vacation memories as a child?  Were they good
experiences for you [or horror stories?]  Where did you go and what kinds of
things did you see?

14 responses total.

Some of my most fond summer vacation memories revolve around the cottage and
trailer on Lake Huron.  My grandmother owned the property and all of her 
children [3 of my aunts and their families, my uncle andhis family, along with
my dad, mom, and the 7 of us kids].  Sometimes we'd just go up for a weekend
[the property being a little north of Port Huron and Lexington], sometimes for
a week or 2 at a time.  It was most fun when the cousins were there, too.  We'd
go on long beach walks, swim and play all day, camp out, have bonfires on the
beach, all kinds of fun stuff.  And kids being kids, I'm sure we had spent a
fair amount of time fighting and such, but those memories are not the memories
that I have.  I remember being close to my cousins during those growing up
years and have regretted losing touch with them during my adult years!

Most of my childhood vacation memories involve camping.  My father sang
with the Barbershop quartet, which meant that for 2 weeks each summer,
our family would go camping with a 100 other Barbershop families from
Michigan.  The camp grounds was always in Harrisville, MI.  The neat thing
about it was that you got to see the same kids each year and you'd only
see them while on the camping trip.  The parents also always had planned
activities for all the kids, such as parades, costume shows, and an 
annual ghost walk.  The ghost walk involved gathering in a large group in
the woods, just after sunset, to hear the same scary ghost story each year.
After the story, the hike through the woods began.  Ghosts and monsters
would jump out at appropriate spots throughout the hike.  I later found
out that they used the teen-agers as ghosts and had quite a time coming
up with props and special effects to play on the younger ones.  Some
of the younger kids (not innocent me) would pelt the ghosts with rocks.
It made being a volunteer ghost a dangerous job.  All in all, it was fun,
but when I go camping now, it feels weird not to hear constant Barbershop
singing all hours of the night.  

John's grandmother owns a cottage on a little lake about 5 hours' drive
north of Toronto.  Since I was 16, we've gone up there most summers
for at least a week.  No telephone, wood-burning stove heat, and
sometimes even running water.

   (That cabin sounds nice.)

   We didn't go camping--its too bad, as I would have liked to have seen
my father trying that, sigh.
   I remember trips to places like Iowa and Texas.  I remember being hot
in Texas, and looking at all the dead land.  I think I had nightmares
about being left in the motel, and running out to see the road, the endless
road, hot and dry.
   Iowa w much better.  I remember going to Des Moines and playing in
and around my Aunt's house.  I remember not being allowed to play downstairs
myself; images of grey-painted basements still are with me, holding secrets.

I remember we visited Oklahoma alot.  My mothers sister lived there.  what
I remember most about it is I remember wind and sand and nothing green and
no hills. I had to hang on to the car really tight when I got out or the wind
almsot knocked me down.  My sister Bonnie hated it, when she was 16 she 
talked my parents into letting her stay with her boyfriend while they went.
Boy.  Was I mad about that.  That meant that i would have no one to hang
around with except my stupid cusin Terry.

Ok, what about some vacation memories, not just when we were kids??


I'm currently on vacation, here in MI [from NC].  Part of this trip was spent
up north with my brother and his family; we had a cottage on Torch Lake,
NE of Traverse City.  Driving up there and also up to Macinac Island for
the day definitely reminded me of how gorgeous and diverse of a state MI
really is.  I was impressed [and wanted to quit my job and move up north!!]

as a child me and my cousins traveled extensively with my grandparents dureing
the summer we visited allmost every state in the union at least once and if
i would have none as a child what i now know as an adult i would have savored
every minute of it i a'm 28 years old now and try to take my godson places
and we realy have a ball

We went everwhere when I was a kid... my dad had the notion that kids should
see as much of the world as possible. I've been to the Bahamas (twice), Cayman
ISlands, Bermuda, US Vrgin Islands, Puerto Rico, England, and about 30 states.


Some cool places were Gatlinburg TN and Mouth of Wilson VA... where my uncle
is a president of a boarding school... we just called it "the Hill". Total
trees and sky and horses and ducks... I haven't been there since I was 14 or
so. O'd like to go back

Sounds like y'all had a fun time growing up, beeswing!!  :-)

I've been going thru some old photos recently [and am uploading what I
can to my  computer, editting, and sorting them all].  And it was cool
looking through the photos up at   the cottage we used to have; I'm
going to have to put together some kind of album-with  the photos as
well as a bit of writing, some time soon.

Besides going to 'the lake' [to the cottage on Lake Huron], we didn't
get to take many  vacations--because of the expense of having a family
of 9 [sometimes 10 when a cousin  lived with us for a few years] plus
the family dog.  But the photos [that my dad had  converted from slides
and then put on a cd] did show the few vacations that we did go on. 
Like going up to the UP, to Niagra Falls [though I was too young to
remember much], and  to Washington DC [where we stayed with relatives in
nearby Virginia].

During my childhood/school years, I was in Girl Scouts--and just loved
being able to go on  camping trips and such with friends instead of with
family.  I do wish I had some more  photos of these trips, though I do
have a few [I started my interest in photography when I  was 10 but
didn't have a camera of my own back then, so there were many events I
have  only photos and memories in my head.  Some day [who knows when],
I'll have to do a bit  of writing about these trips/memories.

In my adult years, the only trip I took with my ex was on our honeymoon
[and we had  problems even then; a sign of things to come!] so this
wasn't really much of a vacation.  Though the summer before I left my
ex, I had met an old HS friend [who lived in CO]  at the time and we
went out to CA.  [I have relatives out there so I/we were able to  stay
with them to save $$ as well as to visit and sightsee. Though the friend
ended up  leaving sooner than expected.]

During my 15 years in NC [June, 1991--March, 2006], I was able to take a
few trips,  mostly with friends but a couple on my own.  During that
time, I've camped at the  beach [as in the ocean's beach] a couple
times, plus camping in TN and in the  mountains of NC and camped locally
at a nearby lake that was a little bit outside of the  city.  It helped
that I dated someone for awhile that lived near this lake and he loved
to  camp and fish.  I also went with a good friend and her kids to one
of the beaches along  the NC Atlantic Coast and another time a bit
north--to Virgina Beach.  Also, I met some  friends in Myrtle Beach for
a weekend; another time I met a brother and his family in  MB.  Have
been to the Outer Banks a couple times [once with family, once on my
own]  and to another coastal town with another brother and family.  And
a trip to the coast  when my sister-in-laws and nephews came down for a
visit right after my move to NC.   Do you get the picture that I like
beaches and coastal areas??  :-)

It appears that I've taken more trips than I thought I had to places
other than 'just'  coming up for vacations/trips to see family here in
MI [which I trekked up here at least  once a year--in the later years,
but much more often in the earlier years before I had  many friends down
in NC to do stuff with].

Now that I'm back up here, I'd love to take a break and go somewhere for
a few days  [or at least over night] but that really isn't in the
budgetary plans at this time. And  probably won't be in the near future,
either.  I'll have to make due with an occasional  afternoon or day trip
to one of the more local lakes here in the AA/Ypsi area.

I think you'd be surprised if you went to a local campsite like Silver
Lake or the other state park, and camped for a weekend.  You don't have
to get very far away for it to feel quite different.

A friend and I took his niece and nephew on a weekend canoe trip once. 
I'd always gone waaaay up north, but we wanted to be close to home so we
could bail out easily if the kids were too miserable (they'd never been
canoing or camping).  

We started at Kent Lake, and canoed the Huron River to Ann Arbor.  We
camped at a Metropark canoes-only camp just south of Brighton.  I was
amazed that much of the trip was as wilderness-y as the Pere Marquette
or the Pine.  

I've been thinking about checking out area campgrounds where one could
rent a cabin... I  no longer have a tent and camping equipment. Plus,
I'm getting old enough where I really  don't like sleeping on the ground
any more.  The time I camped in TN for 4-5 days with a  friend [at a
state park along a river], she had loaned me a cot that her SO often
used on  trips, but I really didn't like the cot. At least not that one.
 It was so narrow that, when I  turned from side to side in my sleep, I
occasionally would tip the cot over and end up on  the ground. I finally
gave up the cot.

Does any know if there ARE places to camp that rent cabins? If I do go,
though, especially  if I did a solo trip, I'd probably could stay only a
night, depending on how expensive it  would be to rent...

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