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Planning a family reunion trip
IndependentTraveler.com |
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Booking Your Trip
Because booking travel for a large group can be complicated and time-consuming, you may want to consider consulting a travel agent. Some resorts and hotels have reunion coordinators that can also be a big help with your planning.
If you'd rather go it alone, there are a couple of useful Web sites dedicated to group travel booking. Groople stands out for its excellent hotel booking engine, which ranks properties based on popular family reunion amenities like pools, meeting rooms and pet-friendliness. Unlike most booking sites, there's no dropdown menu to limit the number of rooms you can book at once (we put in requests for as many as 50 rooms), and in many cases you can reserve right away without having to wait for your request to be sent to the hotel. Groople also allows users to book flights and car rentals.
Like Groople, the aforementioned TripHub has booking engines for hotels, flights and cars, though there are limits on how many reservations you can make without having to send a special request (up to four cars, eight hotel rooms and/or nine flights).
No matter how you decide to book, don't forget to ask what group discounts might apply.
Handling the payments for your travel arrangements can be the most stressful part of booking a trip, since the reunion leader often ends up hounding the rest of the family for cash or even getting stuck with the lion's share of the bill. Groople provides a good solution by allowing you to reserve a block of hotel rooms and then have everyone pay individually.
(Unfortunately, since Groople's other booking engines are hosted by outside companies like Expedia and Avis, this option isn't available for flights and car rentals.)
Another alternative is simply to have everyone book their own travel arrangements -- this takes pressure off the group leader and allows greater flexibility for individual family members. Keep in mind, however, that you may miss out on group discounts if everyone books separately.
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Activities
Once you've booked your trip, the next step is to decide what to do once everyone arrives. Try to strike a balance between organized activities and down time -- maybe you'll all take a morning hike together but have a few free hours after lunch for shopping, golfing, napping or just catching up on all the latest family gossip.
Family-Reunion.com has tons of fun ideas for activities and games to help break the ice and encourage family bonding. Have everyone bring along their favorite photo albums, home videos and other family memorabilia for sharing and reminiscing. And of course, don't forget to take a group photo of everyone during the reunion!
After Your Trip
Even after your trip is over, you can still share the memories with your family for years to come. Post your best pics on photo sharing sites like Shutterfly or Flickr, or have someone make a scrapbook of mementoes from your trip. And don't forget to write a trip report about your experiences for the whole family to enjoy!
The Independent Traveler is an interactive traveler's exchange and comprehensive online travel guide for a community of travelers who enjoy the fun of planning their own trips and the adventure of independent travel. You can access our wealth of travel resources and great bargains here at www.independenttraveler.com, or at www.bargainbox.com.
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