When the leaves on the trees start to fall and the air gets that crisp cool scent, I naturally start yearning for the beach. So on the first below 50 degree day this year, I immediately began googling ways to get my bum out of the cold and on to the sand. Given that we’ve now got a 19th month old son, our first priority is finding a family friendly destination. In other words, we can only consider direct flights that aren’t too long and happen to fall during Ashvin’s nap time. Once we get there, we require a big room for him to run around in plus lots of swimming pools (because swimming is his favorite sport)! While I really prefer 90 degree weather, my husband insists anything over 85 is murderous. He also wishes for nightly entertainment—gentleman code for a casino. I tend to stay home with our toddler on these nights. We finally found the place that fit all our tricky needs: The Atlantis on Paradise Island in the Bahamas.
I tried very hard to convince my mother and father to join us so they could fill in as babysitters on romantic dinners out. Unfortunately I was not persuasive enough. My mom prefers touring new cities by foot and exploring nature and history rather than lounging on the beach. To each their own! My dad, thankfully, a willing warm weather lover, said yes. I thought I had won half the babysitting battle but it turns out my dad prefers to go to the casino than staying in and babysitting. Well, at least my husband Manoj had a drinking and card buddy, while I got to spend some quality time with my little buddy!
On the day of our flight, Ashvin, who usually naps at 12:45 pm like clockwork, decided he wanted to stay up the entire flight. He spent the few hours running up and down the aisles of the aircraft saying hello to each and every passenger. I felt like I had endured an Olympic workout by the time we landed, but at least he made a lot of new friends!
Our hotel, the Reef at Atlantis was truly spectacular. The rooms were spacious with large balconies. Check out the view from my room.
The property is enormous and offers lots of activities for kids and adults. We enjoyed the Aquarium and had a lot of fun just lounging at the many pools and of course, the beautiful beach. Starbucks eggs and cheese English muffins were our breakfast staples and then we tried out the various restaurants at dinnertime. We took a trip over to the One & Only resort to eat Market, the Jean Georges restaurant on property, but our favorite meal was at Bobby Flay’s Mesa Grill. They had a corn side dish with Cotija cheese that was to die for. We liked it to so much that we looked up the recipe in his cookbook and made it for Thanksgiving. It turned out to be the biggest hit of our spread.
I can’t quite call the trip a vacation because chasing Ashvin all day and taking him swimming kept me pretty active. I’ve since decided that all family vacations should not be called vacations but rather “time spent with family.”This is much more accurate. I also had a very good reality check on my parenting style. I’ve read so many studies about not giving your child TV or videos until after they are two and we really stick to entertaining Ashvin with books, toys, stickers and conversation. However, he had daily tantrums when we went to restaurants and he saw all the kids around us glued to iPads and iPhones. It reached a point where he screamed “iPhone!” so loud that I had to give him my phone and allow him to watch a few nursery rhymes to avoid being asked to leave the restaurant! I’ve realized a little indulgence can result in a very peaceful meal for the adults and maybe iPhone time is not the end of the world…especially when I convince myself that he’s learning the alphabet on those apps!
Our arrival back to NYC was a rude awaking with 30 degree weather. The moment I got home, I was already googling locations for our next sunny trip.
What are your tricks for traveling as a family? And where is everyone spending the holidays? Any fun in the sun?