Pregnant And On The Go?
Family Travel Forum offers travel advice to mothers-to-be for safe and comfortable travel during pregnancy.We all know that airline seats have been shrinking over the years. It's an annoyance...
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Rovos Rail Across South Africa
Explore Cape Town, then journey across South Africa to Pretoria in utter comfort on the luxurious Rovos Railway custom train. Chamber music and champagne on the station platform is the welcome to passengers...
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Arrg, Piracy On The Rise: Tips For Smooth Sailing
From the coast of Peru to the South China Sea, acts of piracy have been a fear of cruisers since about 2009, when these incidents were widely reported. How likely is it to happen to your family? Fortunately,...
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How Travel Brings Social Good to El Salvador
Michael Jackson’s song, "Man in the Mirror," a retro anthem of the social activist movement, is playing as I disembark my Avianca flight in Sal Salvador. I am here because El Salvador, almost as big...
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Sustain and Develop: India Tourism
Tourism is big business according to the UN World Tourism Organization (UNWTO), accounting for about one-third of total world trade in services. It’s also important at the global policy level, because...
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Flipped by Mountain Fork
My parents were singing to old rock songs on the radio. My younger sister Emma and friends Rose and Ella were in the back seat with me laughing at ridiculous pictures on Instagram.“Look at...
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Eastern Canada And New England Cruises Star Fall Foliage
Want to cruise, but not interested in the Caribbean -- fall is the time of year to visit ports-of-call between Baltimore and Quebec, Canada. Last year, Cruise Atlantic Canada reported...
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Expo 2015 Promises Family Fun in Milan, Italy
The latest Universal Exposition, Expo 2015 in Milan, Italy will run until October 31, 2015 with the theme: “Feeding the Planet, Energy for Life.”...
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10 Perfect New York Moments
Summer in the city's hot, lazy and humid days can drive away tourists quicker than a rising dollar, but that leaves the rest of us to enjoy...
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Junior Adventurers – As They Grow Guide
Here are some simple and useful guidelines for travel and activity planning with infants, toddlers, pre-schoolers, school-age children, and tweens... your own or someone else's.Once adults hit...
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Exhilarating Moments in South Africa!
I believe that traveling is meant for exploring things outside of your normal, everyday life. In September 2011, my family visited our friends in Johannesburg, South Africa, and we decided to...
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Dancing in a Dream
The mountains beckon. No, wait. Not just them. Green blades of grass pressing flat...
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Pink Marble Urn
Warszawa’s crimson and white, Narodowy Stadium—National Stadium—flashed past the window as I was overcome by a shallow slumber. When I awoke, we were nearing the Polish periphery. Our intercity...
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The Palouse Sea and Everything In Between
In 10 hours, my view changed from a sea of blue to a sea of green, yellow, and gold. Green hills of potato plants, gold fields of wheat, and touches of bright yellow mustard in between surrounded me...
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Don’t Rock the Boat
An hour and a half north of Seattle, in a town called Anacortes, lies a tourist trap that comprises of a gift shop full of whale memorabilia and a dock along which are a slew of...
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Fulfilling Her Wish
I slowly drift out of a light sleep and glance out of the plane window as we descend into Managua. I notice the endless expanse of Lake Managua that could easily be mistaken as ocean. The volcanoes,...
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The Art of Living: An Effortless Community
I almost cried when we stepped into our room in the Ashram.HONORABLE MENTION 2015 FTF TEEN TRAVEL WRITING SCHOLARSHIPThe Spartan room held four cots, each laden with a sparse cotton...
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Trial and Error in the Guatemala Markets
During the summer before my freshman year in high school, I went on a mission trip with my mom, bother, and a few members of my church to Panajachel, Guatemala. We traveled down there to help an organization...
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The Old and the New
This past summer of 2015, I joined my Japanese class from my high school on a short exchange program in Japan, a beautiful country very different from my familiar America.SEMI-FINALIST 2015...
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Left Boston a Teenager; Came Back a Soldier
June 16th, 2015, the day my life changed forever. My mom tried to hide the tears in her eyes as she told me how proud I make her. It was the last time I would see my mom and sister...
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Superfamily
“Caution: Trail not maintained. Use not recommended.” I think that is an accurate representation of my family vacations. My mom has...
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Cruising through the Mediterranean
The imagination of a child can go to great extremes. I always imagined myself exploring castles and going out on adventures while riding on a unicorn, going through streets...
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Cliff Jumping and Conversations
Have you ever been on vacation abroad and become frustrated because you can’t find a Starbucks or a fast food joint? So have I. But through my travels with my family I have realized that sticking...
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An Unexpected Treasure
QUARTER-FINALIST 2015 FTF TEEN TRAVEL WRITING SCHOLARSHIPSpacious greenery surrounds me on all sides, dabbled with dots of civilization. We are distributing food atop a short but broad mountain...
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It’s a Long Way From the Cook Islands
Sprint Canoeing might not sound like the most engaging Olympic sport to spectate, but every event has some element that captivates the audience. For example, water polo is possibly the only sport played...
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Sometimes All It Takes Is Applesauce
I love Disney, and I was rather...
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Open Your Eyes and Let Yourself Fly
We arrived at the La Casa Del Arbol in Baños, Ecuador. I was overwhelmed with beauty as I gazed over the mountain...
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A Metropolis at Your Fingertips
I suppose it begins 8 hours into our first day there. Stumbling out onto the streets of New York City with only five hours of sleep, we certainly looked the part of clueless tourists—my camera was...
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Wildfire
There is a strange, painful beauty in watching the forests burn. This must be why so many others have pulled over to the side of the highway, entire families leaning against their dusty cars, staring...
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From Textbooks To Reality
I stand on the beach of Colleville –sur-Mer in lower Normandy, France feeling the chill rise from the ocean. The longer I stand upon the same sand that over 2000 men died fighting for, historic stories...
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Becoming a Global Citizen
In the summer of 2014, I had the opportunity to travel to Europe with People to People Student Ambassadors, a study abroad program created by President Eisenhower. With a group of 36 high school students...
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Discover Yourself: One Journey At A Time
A gust of warm spring air strikes the open windows of the 768-step tall cathedral. The soft breeze sweeps beneath...
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Arizona is a Long Ways Away
I have always wanted to visit the Grand Canyon. I imagine it would be beautiful to hike part of its 227-miles of length or to camp in the valley and stare up at the mile deep walls of rock. Instead,...
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Eau de Grasse
As a perfume fanatic and aspiring perfumer, I have wanted to visit Grasse ever since I learned it was the perfume capital of the world. I have had wild dreams featuring colorful meadows with rows and...
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In the World, Not Of the World
Breathing in was like breathing in a new culture, adventure, and life - taking it all in at once. Here I was, along with twenty-one adults and students I’ve known most of my life, experiencing this....
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My Home is the World
We rumbled down the worn dusty road passing families on mopeds, donkeys carrying bundles of grass and battered taxis. The silhouettes of rocky hills and desert dunes stood...
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A 6 Month Journey
At first I thought my parents were joking. Leaving school behind for six months to travel across...
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A Lesson Learned, A Perspective Changed
This past summer I was fortunate enough to be awarded a scholarship for a trip to Bolivia and Peru for 24 days. It was with the Youth Ambassadors program sponsored by the...
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Divided by Borders, United by Blood
Paved roads turn into gravel roads and gravel roads turn into dirt roads; the pickup truck leaves pavement behind, entering an abyss of pebbles and mud and ditches. I hold onto the metal handle bars...
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Musings on My Father While in Moscow
My Dad always loved Russian literature. Every once in a while he’d plop down one of his books on my bed for me to read, but I never would pick it up. The books’ slow,...
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