First vacation you can remember

[LibraryLady]

I grew up on a dairy farm, so we never had vacations. We could not leave home for more than a few hours. Our "vacations" were something fun on Thursdays.
I have no idea why my parents picked Thursday, but that was the day we visited the beach, zoo or museums.

However, when I was 6, my uncle (who lived in Odessa) was seriously injured in an oil derrick accident. So, my oldest brother was left home alone to handle "the milking" and everyone else piled in the borrowed sedan and we drove to Odessa, stayed a few days and came home. It was a stunning trip for me and my siblings as we had never left the Gulf Coast area before.

My siblings have confirmed things I remember from the trip.
We saw mountains. I am sure they were just sand hills, but to us they were mountains. Daddy stopped and we got out and climbed to the top of that mountain and then ran down the side.
When we went downhill, we asked Daddy to make the car coast, and he did. We thought it thrilling that the car would go with the engine off (simple pleasures!).
We stopped in Austin and went inside the state capital bldg. I can still remember seeing the rotunda.
We ate at drug store counters. Daddy said we could order whatever we wished, and banana splits were the choice of more than one of us.

We drove from Alvin, Texas to Odessa in one day. I would not want to do that on today's highways with a car full of kids, but we did it. I looked up the mileage and it is 500+ miles. I can't imagine making it in the roads of the 1950s or in a Studebaker.

Can you remember your first family vacation?

[Orphie]

My Aunt and Uncle and cousins lived in Odessa for a while also. I can remember hitting big fat spiders on the hwy at night while we were driving there.
Ruidoso have been an early trip but I remember the Odessa trip and Arkansas.

[Red Oak]

When I was a Kid we visited relatives, and went hunting and fishing; I guess these were sort of weekend "vacations" as sometimes we would incorporate a visit to a local attraction.

The first 'real' vacation was when I was about 12 years olds, and we spent a week in the mountains around Las Vegas New Mexico.

One other thing; when I was a kid we "ate out' maybe once a month at the most; and that was a big deal.

[Jami]

My Dad's Aunt and Uncle lived in Colorado. Visiting them was probably the first vacation I remember. One one visit, we also drove up to Yellowstone Park, that's the first destination vacation I remember. I was probably around 8 years old.

[crocmommy]

The first trip I remember is a trip to the Texas Coast with my mom and dad. Baby brother stayed at home with my grandmother. We went to Aquarena Springs (now closed) and Corpus Christi. It was just before the hurricane that hit Corpus in the late 60's I think.

[GFB]

Cape Cod

[crocmommy]

The first trip I remember is a trip to the Texas Coast with my mom and dad. Baby brother stayed at home with my grandmother. We went to Aquarena Springs (now closed) and Corpus Christi. It was just before the hurricane that hit Corpus in the late 60's I think.

Picture of mom and I at the dunes on the beach.

[BigTex]

San Antonio.

We got about 40 miles from the house and my dad realized he had forgotten to pack the suitcases.

[crocmommy]

San Antonio.

We got about 40 miles from the house and my dad realized he had forgotten to pack the suitcases.

uh oh....did he turn around and go back for them?

[LibraryLady]

Big Tex---that would be a mood killer!!

Crocmommy--like the sand dune photo.

[glenn/dallas]

Galveston, It must have been very inexpensive to spend a week there, seems like thats what we did when I was very little. Circa 1949 or so. It was all very fun then for a six year old and I had no idea it was not a great sandy beach.
Our car then had the window unit that attached to the drivers side window and blew in cooled air.

[crocmommy]

Galveston, It must have been very inexpensive to spend a week there, seems like thats what we did when I was very little. Circa 1949 or so. It was all very fun then for a six year old and I had no idea it was not a great sandy beach.
Our car then had the window unit that attached to the drivers side window and blew in cooled air.

My girls like to go to Galveston. They don't really know there are lots better beaches. We stayed on the cheap in a 3 bedroom condo with at least 12 other people last July. Once again, the girls didn't care once they realized sleeping on the floor with the rest of the kids could be fun. Mommy said no to doing it again this year. There was too much drama going on amongst the adults and older kids.

[BigTex]

San Antonio.

We got about 40 miles from the house and my dad realized he had forgotten to pack the suitcases.

uh oh....did he turn around and go back for them?

He kind of had to. And if you knew my dad, the rest of the trip was probably pretty quiet.

[planosteve]

Our vacation was always to leave the hot dusty Kansas plains in July or Aug and head for the Colorado mountains. Usually, about 6 or 7 families who were close friends traveled in a caravan. Most years we stayed at a resort called Lake Isabel in the San Isabel national forest. They had a lake and rented rowboats. We would row around the lake with fishing poles trolling for trout. We turned then in to the lodge and the last night they cooked them for us in a big fish fry. Those kids are still my oldest and closest friends.

[jellowrestling]

When I was 6, we drove up to Montana for my uncle's wedding, then came back through Yellowstone and went to Carlsbad Caverns. On the way up, we stayed at a Holiday Inn near a river. When we left and crossed over the bridge, I noticed that people were piling sandbags everywhere, and trees were floating towards the bridge. On the way back, I noticed (hard to miss) that in one of the towns we went through, there were cars piled on top of each other. According to my parents, that was the result of flooding due to Hurricane Beulah. We had initially planned to go through Rapid City on the way up, but the flooding from Beulah had discouraged that; I don't think it would have been a factor, because it turned towards the Northeast, but, of course, we didn't know that was going to happen.

Thanks for bringing this up. I'm going to ask my dad to fill in a few details I was too young to know about (like the exact route). I think we spent four or five days in Yellowstone, which was amazing.

[Jim Jack]

We only had one family vacation, a road trip to Missouri, probably 1966 or 67. Seeing mountains in Arkansas for the first time was quite a sight for us.

We went to Silver Dollar City in Branson, and we saw the play, "The Shepherd of the Hills" as well. No idea why I remember those two details.

I also remember my dad cautioning us that since we were going on a long trip, we had to use our seat belts for this event.

[GRANDPA]

The earliest one I can remember had to be sometime before 1959, is driving up to Norton KS to see my maternal Grandfather in the TB sanitarium there. After that, we would usually alternate going to Colorado for a week one summer, Grand Lake, Table Rock or Keystone for a week the next.

[John in Plano]

I was 6 or 7 and we camped at Yosemite. I remember watching the firefall and wadding in a cold pond where I cut my foot.

[crackertoes]

Vacations our family had were not really vacations as they were obligatory family visits or in conjunction with a business trip or convention. The concept of visiting some place just for fun was foreign to me. I think the first family vacation just for fun was when I was 8 or 9 and we went to Concan for a few days to float the rapids. We did that a few times and it was almost always a fun time.

[ann jusko]

I think I've already told how our neighborhood packed up (except for two elderly couples) and went to Conneaut on Lake Erie. I'm sure the elderly couples enjoyed their vacation from all the kids. I used to feel bad that they didn't go with us. Now that I'm elderly, I understand. The funny thing is that the cabins were mostly aliened with how our houses were. That was back when everyone had and used their front porches to listen to Pirate baseball games and visit back and forth. It was a very close group of people. Most of us went to the same church. Now it sounds sufficating, but there was a security that we kids had. One father worked at the post office and when the snow was significant, he'd pile us all in his car (no seat belts then) and drive us to school.