A Successful and Fun Family Vacation

Last year, my wife and I were thrilled that our videogame-loving son learned how to ski and loved it. It was great to see him learn something active that he could enjoy. This year, we decided to capitalize on that enjoyment and get the family a vacation to Sugarloaf Mountain in Maine for Christmas.

Last year, my wife and I were thrilled that our videogame-loving son learned how to ski and loved it. It was great to see him learn something active that he could enjoy. This year, we decided to capitalize on that enjoyment and get the family a vacation to Sugarloaf Mountain in Maine for Christmas.

When we told our son we were going to Maine to go skiing for a week, he could hardly contain his excitement. I was feeling the same way. My wife and I had agonized for weeks over the perfect rental house in our tourist destination. Should we rent a house on Sugarloaf Mountain and get quick access to lifts or should we rent off the mountain and get a better deal? We went with the house on the mountain and it turned out great. To get ourselves excited, we bought new skis and snowboards for the three of us before we left.

We left for Maine in the afternoon and planned to be at Sugarloaf Mountain within four hours. By the time we got there it was dark and we had a little trouble finding the rental. We did find it eventually and it was worth the wait. There was a room with three bunks for our son, which was perfect because my sister and her three kids were going to be spending a night there with us later in the week. There were also two master bedrooms and a hot tub on the patio. We were too tired to bother with the hot tub the first night. We wanted to get to bed and be ready for our first day on the mountain.

The next day we woke up to see that we had stunning views of Sugarloaf Mountain from virtually every window in the house. Eating breakfast, while we enjoyed that view, was a pleasure. After breakfast, we got dressed and up the lift faster than I had previously thought possible. We spent the entire day laughing in the snow together. In the evening, we sat in the hot tub and went swimming at the health spa. The six days and nights that followed were all as successful and fun as the first. It was even more fun when my sister and her children arrived.

The kids decided they wanted to try everything there was to try on the mountain. That meant going on zip lines, jumping on indoor trampolines, super tubing and snowshoeing. There were a lot of laughs to be had and not one person felt sour during the whole trip. That is quite a feat when you have teenagers with you and two of them have to share a bathroom.

Ty Cobb is an avid blogger and traveler. He loves music, art, people and how the three intermingle. He can be found on Twitter @bloggingcobb.