gail

I too am short on suggestions but long on curiosity how this all turns out. May I suggest a long weekend only - long enough for parents to feel the togetherness but short enough so it does not begin to look like a Steve Martin movie.

Miami Beach, Bermuda as far as places by air. But I think your best bet is really the boring condo resort - bring a book, a big bottle of whatever alcohol you consume, some paperwork for work, etc. Not just kosher family but family with little rugrat will be more comfortable in condo-type place.

Please write a trip report - situations like this make me happy I have a very small family.

mclaurie

I agree this is sounding very expensive. On the condo/resort within driving distance, what locations were you thinking about that you thought would be boring? Have you considered Nantucket? The Berkshires? Bucks County? None of those would be boring to me. BTW, you can now rent a big house in the Hamptons for a week or a weekend. Pricey yes, but it can be done.

emd

dhm49: There are some good last minute specials/discounts on vacationhomes.com, if you can wait to plan this til like two months before you go.

mclaurie

BTW, did you ever check out that URL I gave you totallyjewishtravel.com? There's a link to a Kosher 4 bedroom villa rental in the Dominican Republic that looks fantastic.

http://www.totallyjewishtravel.com/f...feature=iu7Nsi

I happened to find a review of the resort on Fodors. Here's what they say

SEA HORSE RANCH

Internationally known celebrities frequent this luxury residential resort. All villas -- each about 4,000 square ft -- have three or four bedrooms, a pool, and sit on sites from half an acre upwards to four acres (the largest has its own private beach). The beach club is nestled in a cove with vistas of rugged cliffs. Prices decrease dramatically when renting by the month. Inquire about special rates for couples and for Miami weekenders. www.sea-horse-ranch.com. 75 villas. Dining room, kitchens, 5 tennis courts, beach, snorkeling, horseback riding, bar, babysitting. AE, MC, V.

jor

mclaurie, at the expense of sounding really uninformed, but also being sort of an average Joe what is a Kosher rental? I thought Kosher referred to food.

LN

Hi

This is really good reading!! And I've come up with a couple thoughts on it.

Parents are probably in the 70's age group so my thoughts are to get to them to a location in as short a time as possible. With that in mind I'd check where non-stop flights can take you in two-three hours and start planning there. Tampa, Fort Lauderdale, and Miami are in that time frame and at those you can easily rent some beach condos and have a great family getaway. There's much to do or simply laze around the pool/beach.

While there simply order a large table or room at a nice restaurant and have a family anniversary dinner.

Good luck!!

gyppielou

Curious? If the kosher family is that strict, won't they need a properly outfitted kosher kitchen in which to prepare meals or would they be travelling with all their own cookware/dishes etc.? Good luck

mclaurie

I'm not an expert jor, but gyppielou has sort of answered your question. Not only should the food be kosher, but the kitchen in which it's prepared should be as well. So I'm assuming this rental happens to have a kosher kitchen which involves 2 sets of dishes-(one for meat, one for dairy etc.). I think they were also offering the option of prepared kosher meals as an extra charge. And evidently the Dominican Republic is a 3 hr non-stop plane from NYC. I've never been, but it looked good to me, if somewhat expensive.

dhm49

Thanks again everyone -- just to answer some of the Kosher questions --

Everyone has different levels of observance and with our particular Kosher relatives, they enjoy traveling and have a "set=up" for when they do (largely using disposable stuff and bringin along a few neccesities. Living in a multi-dietary family (how's that for coining a new phrase), we have all learned how to be adaptable -- the joke is that my parents have three sets of silverware -- meat, dairy and trafe (non-kosher). At times it presents poblems, but most of the time we all roll with it.

sart29

Happy to see that my parents are not the only ones who wanted a family reunion trip for their 50th. I offer a fairly long winded response as we've done 3 different types of family travel celebrations.

We went to Sedona, AZ for my parent's 50th(which worked well, as most of the family is somewhere in southern California and the rest in New Mexico. The group included my parents, 5 'kids', 4 spouses, 12 grandkids aged 2 months to 24 yrs, and one great-grandchild age 6. We had a great time!! We all had breakfast in the hotel coffee shop at roughly the same time each morning. My folks had planned for one fancy meal at a nice resturant and one dinner at a 'wild west show'. We had a large enough group to charter a trolley tour the first day, which gave us all a taste of the sites and the lay of the land. May parents had also sent us each a package of brochures in advance, so we had all chatted in the months leading up to the trip to plan shopping and site seeing and such -- we split into different groups each day for waterslides and art galleries and craft shops, etc. I think we all look at it as one of the best vacations ever. And though the cousins (the grandkids) have always gotten along well, we all noticed that they are all closer to their aunts and uncles since the Sedona trip.

Since we 'kids' had done our own saving for a gift for the 50th, mom and dad requested that rather than send them on a trip somewhere we get together for a big 'family only' party. We chartered a harbor dinner cruise out of San Diego for the big event (we were a group of 30) and hired a photographer for pix of the event as well as group photos of all the families before-hand. We had enough money to book a block of rooms in San Diego for the weekend, so we spent the weekend together and we went to one of those speed-circuit raceways where we all (including my 70 something parents) raced against one another. Another great family celebration.

I will also mention that we took a family cruise with all my husband's family to celebrate his mom's 70th birthday. It was on one of the Carnival "fun ship" budget cruises and, again, we all enjoyed it. That trip involved grandkids aged 4 to 17 and everyone of the kids loved it, although we didn't see much of them -- they all made lots of friends and there were activities for them until late into the night. Yet we all had dinner together each night and caught up on the day and the various activities available allowed us to just spend time together in small doses, which is as much as we can stand of each other (obviously not quite as close as my side of the family)

I would recommend any of these destinations. For dhm49's family I can second the suggestion of Palm Springs. It's a great place to be in the fall or winter and would seem to suit all the needs of your diverse group.

No matter where you go or what you do, leave plenty of time for sitting around telling stories and sharing memories. Our best time in Sedona was one night with all the adults in the jacuzzi recalling stories from our childhoods.