At Mascola, we do a lot of research on the vacation planning habits of the female Head of Household (HOH), but I figured since I am a female HOH (no sophomoric jokes please) who just got back from a joint trip to Maine and Lake Placid, I’d give a more qualitative synapsis.
So here’s how it went down.
After four fun-filled days at our friends’ cabin in Maine, we hopped in the car and headed toward Burlington, VT (hotel booked one month beforehand via CheapHotels.com). We checked in, then headed downtown in search of food. Each time I saw a restaurant that looked good, I pulled out my phone and looked up the review on TripAdvisor, searching for a restaurant that had delicious food and was suitable for families with hungry, whiny children. Finding none that met our criteria, we took a gamble and went to a random Italian restaurant. It was a good gamble. If I could remember the name of it, I’d recommend it to you.
During the meal, we focused on making an important decision – whether or not to believe the forecast of scattered thunderstorms over Lake Placid for the next evening, the very evening we were supposed to take our 5-year-old camping. We asked the waitress if she could recommend the best local TV station for weather. You’d think we asked her to solve global warming.
“I just use the weather app on my phone,” she said. Very helpful.
The hotel TV told us what we needed to know. We canceled the camping reservation and found a hotel through a site recommended to my husband called Trivago, which you may be familiar with because of the love-hate relationship audiences seem to have with its spokesman (shown below – I did not see the commercial until after my trip):
Because it was so last minute, we called up the hotel directly and asked if we could get the deal. They said yes. Perfect – now we could sleep well.
The next day we got up early to catch the ferry to New York. Both onboard and at the ferry terminal, they had brochures galore. I was in my glory. Mock if you will (my husband certainly does), but my favorite thing to do when I get to a destination is spread out all the literature I’ve collected on the way there and figure out what to do. When we arrived at the hotel, I got out the trusty local map (below), my iPhone, my new brochures, my list of recommendations from an acquaintance, and my Sharpie, and went to work.
I sifted through reviews on TripAdvisor, Google, Chowhound, and Yelp to determine the attractions and restaurants we would go to. I looked up schedules for fun things to do on the attractions’ websites. I scoured online restaurant menus for excessive use of tree nuts to avoid a trip to the hospital with my highly allergic daughter. I posted an embarrassing amount of photos of my family at Olympic attractions on Facebook.
Do I feel relaxed? Not one bit.
But somewhere in between all that last-minute planning, I managed to have a great time.