by Hope
We’ve just returned from a long weekend road trip that was really a combination of picking up History Buff from his Judicial camp and dropping off Sea Cadet at his Boot Camp and Princess at her Basketball camp. It was three days of 4-7 hours of driving each. At the last minute I decided to turn it into a little mini vacation and try to do some fun things along the way instead of just drive and drop as originally planned.
So I reached into the monies saved for our second big road trip of the summer (coming up end of July) and we did a couple of unique things that we cannot do near our house.
First, after picking up History Buff I determined that the Virginia Safari was on a different route but really only added about 15 minutes of drive time (and we didn’t have to be at our next destination til the following afternoon.) I chose this adventure for two reasons….you have to understand that the first time my 15 year olds had been to a zoo was last year. Can you imagine that? I cannot. So I do my best to squeeze in as much life into our time together as possible as they are nearing independence and I want them to have had these life experiences. And two, how cool is it to see exotic animals, tough exotic animals AND feed exotic animals.
It cost just under $80 for our admission and 4 buckets of food, but the experience PRICELESS! The kids literally took hundreds of pictures as they traded off sitting in the front seat, so here are a couple of my favorites.
History Buff taking a selfie with ???
Little Gymnast feeding a ???
Sea Cadet holding a bird
After leaving there, and knowing this was our last day as a family for at least two weeks, I discovered that Hershey, PA was just 20 minutes from our drop off point for Sea Cadet and a very short detour from our route. So, of course, we stopped there we visited Chocolate World! Tell me the name doesn’t make you want to check it out!
The little ones and I had been there years ago, but the older ones hadn’t so while we were in the area I decided that we had to do it. Entry was free, parking was free and the only money we spent was on the Create Your Own Candy Bar attraction $75 for the 5 of us.) We did some of the free things and walked around a bit too.
Here we are at Chocolate World getting ready to make our chocolate!
So in all, I borrowed about $155 from our big road trip fund, but I think the experiences and memories will last a lifetime. Now to figure out where that money is going to be repaid from in such a short amount of time…
Hope is a creative, solutions-focused business manager helping clients grow their business and work more efficiently by leveraging expertise in project management, digital marketing, & tech solutions. She’s recently become an empty nester as her 5 foster/adoptive kids have spread their wings. She lives with her 5 dogs in a small town in NE Georgia and prefers the mountains to the beaches any day. She struggles with the travel bug and is doing her best to help each of her kids as their finish schooling and become independent (but it’s hard!) She has run her own consulting company for almost twenty years! Hope began sharing her journey with the BAD community in the Spring of 2015 and feels like she has finally in a place to really focus on making wise financial decisions.
I love squeezing in little activities on road trips! They really help create memories and experiences you definitely can’t have at home. I remember on a trip many years ago my dad decided we had to stop at this “mystery spot.” It was billed as your typical creepy, ooky, “what’s going on here!?” place. Please appeared taller in some rooms and the floor, while not looking slanted, certainly was! It was such a fun little stop and we still talk about it to this day, like 12 years later!
Sounds like you had a good time and are really helping your kids create memories and have experiences they will remember forever!
Holy Cow!!! I have lived in Northern Virginia for several years and have never heard of this safari place!! And, upon checking it out, it is not too far to take the kids for a day trip! We usually look to the DC area for our entertainment (and so much of it is just the cost of the metro ride) that I don’t usually look to the south for entertainment. We will definitely be planning a trip there!
Oooh if this wasn’t so spur of the moment, I would have given you some great suggestions for Hershey that are pretty cheap as well as possibly get you free tickets to the admission park. I know quite a few people who work there, that can get me tickets any time I want.