It’s been a big year since Father’s Day last year and there’s more to come.
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More New Experiences, And More To Come
With a nine-year age gap between my daughter and son, it’s like starting all over again but with the added benefit of a supportive daughter who can assist with our infant son. Still, it’s been a lot this year and will be a lot next year too. But there’s something invigorating about getting back into the swing of foldable strollers and managing expectations.
But with the travel challenges of a new infant and a pre-adolescent daughter comes new lessons, new stories, and greater growth for all of us. The great news is that like our daughter, Lucy, who has been a champion traveler since birth, Frankie is following in her footsteps.
We still have some very big destinations near and far that need to be added to the list. Places like Southeast Asia that are near and dear to our heart we haven’t been back to since before the pandemic and never for Frankie. We love South America too, but haven’t made it back yet. That will change.
Some Highlights From The Last Year
Since Father’s Day last year we have started to widely vary our travel experiences. During Frankie’s first long-haul flights, Lucy toughed it out with me in coach on one of those segments. That turned out to be a great bonding experience as we suffered for eight upright hours in the middle of the night.
We had two multi-generational trips, including one with my parents. My father got to spend some quality time with Frankie as well as Lucy.
My wife, Lucy, and Frankie all had their first cruises. We went from none together as a family to four in three months.
On The Horizon
In a year that’s been full of travel sprints, we are circling around one that will truly initiate Frankie into a rapid travel lifestyle and add some new countries and experiences for Lucy, my wife, and me. One such sprint we have on our radar will take us to England, Italy, Croatia, Montenegro, Tunisia, Spain, Albania, and Greece. We haven’t secured it just yet but it’s experiences like that that have made my daughter a highly competent, patient traveler and give both of us the greatest joy as parents to see the world together.
We still have to catch Frankie up on destinations that are repeated for the rest of us.
Reflecting On The Past
I’m reading Nomadic Matt’s book at the moment, 10 Years A Nomad, and he remarks about one of the first tourists and subsequent traveler writers, a man who climbed a mountain purely for the joy of doing it. He remarked that the traveler was just looking for a new perspective and that’s what travel has meant for me as a father and as a son. Some of it is, yes, about premium experiences and letting my kids experience a life that wasn’t available to my parents. But most of it, as Matthew pointed out, is about the little moments. Trying new foods with my son for the first time, or my daughter taking her first steps at the Grand Hyatt Erawan in Bangkok. But mostly, it’s because traveling makes us all better. We have to be more agile to a changing environment, more accepting of things around us that are different than what we know at home. We learn faster, we let someone else speak first, we are a little more understanding, and we understand the need to forgive as we need to be forgiven for the mistakes we make when we are abroad.
My daughter, now 10, doesn’t remember every trip we took, or country she visited. That’s fine. Because she has a greater sense of place and purpose than I ever could have at her age and that will last her a lifetime.
The photo of Rome shows an Eiffel Tower .
Happy father’s day! It’s not often one reads about Albania being a sought after destination. It would be great travel writing to read how Lucy spends time doing activities with local kids and learning their culture.