In less than 72 hours my family will board a plane for Dallas to start a 7 week holiday in the US. I'm so excited! This is our itinerary & if you have some suggestions I'd love some last minute fine tuning & ideas of 'must dos'.
Nov 18 Dallas to 4 days Austin (visiting daughter at UT for Thanksgiving)
Road trip to NOLA (not sure if we'll go via Memphis or just through Houston)
Nov 30th Fly NOLA to Tampa
Road trip- Tampa- Sanibel- Homestead- Key West- Cape Canaveral- Orlando (4 days of parks)
Dec 14th Fly Orlando- Washington DC
Dec 17th Fly DC - Boston
Dec 20th Amtrak Boston- NYC
Dec 27th Fly NYC - Phoneix
Road trip-Phoenix- Sedona- GCNP (Dec 30 & 31)- Anaheim - (maybe squeeze in san Diego) LA
Jan 8th Fly LA- Melbourne.

Sounds like a great trip you have finally arranged - and please do try to "squeeze" in a trip down to San Diego - only a little over an hour from Anaheim.

That will hopefully give you another reason to return to the States.

It's hard to reco must dos without knowing who/how many you are - and what your interests area.

I will reco that for Christmas Dinner - assuming you want a traditional one - you make reservations ASAP. Try opentable.com and it will show who is serving when - and you can look at menupages.com for ideas of prices. I would reserved immediately after Thanksgiving. Or, if you provide your price point and area where you will be staying plus what type of place you are looking for - people can make recos.

Do realize that a lot of places are closed - and many that are open will have set seatings and set or limited menus.

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Why would you go through Memphis? It's nowhere near NOLA or Houston.

NYC doesn't close down as much on Xmas day as London or Paris. You can go to Chinatown or get Chinese food somewhere with little problem. Just Google "Christmas Time for the Jews" for the SNL song - it's funny. No better place than NYC at Xmas time.

Depending on snow conditions in the Northeast, I would consider taking one of the Silver Service Amtrak trains from Orlando to Washington DC. Amtrak is more likely to get you there even if they are late compared with hundreds waiting out late planes in an airport. The Northeast Corridor trains between Washington DC and Boston are a good alternative to the airports when most flights are delayed or cancelled.

IMHO the train between DC and NYC makes a lot of sense no matter the weather. I wouldn't take from Orlando to DC unless there were no other choice.

I'm not sure about Grand Canyon (Dec 30 & 31). It could be closed by snow. Perhaps someone else could clarify.

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Vic's travels: http://my.flightmemory.com/vogilvie

Grand Canyon South Rim is open year-round (North Rim closes for the winter). That said, be prepared for winter driving conditions (usually ok, but there may be snow and ice if you hit a storm), and it will certainly be cold on the rim for New Years. The rim will be a relatively quiet place to spend New Years. The nicest place for a NYE dinner will be the El Tovar hotel dining room - if there are any reservations left to be had.