Family Travel

One quick look at your average guidebook will tell you about the “museum biggies” like the Field Museum in Chicago or the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, but what about those smaller places that might be less overwhelming for kids?

I have an educational travel article up on education.com that gives a brief description of some low-key U.S. museums that are family-friendly, including these gems:

** The California State Railroad Museum in Sacramento, California.

** The Lower East Side Tenement Museum in New York City.

Check out the article for more info.

As long as we’re at it, here are two museum-related roundups from the Family Travel archives:

** 7 museums where history lives: Bunratty Castle & Folk Park in Ireland, Edo-Tokyo Museum in Tokyo, Old Sturbridge Village in Massachusetts, Bokrijk in Hasselt, Belgium, Indian City USA in Anadarko, Oklahoma and the Norsk Folkemuseum in Oslo, Norway.

** 8 cool European museums you’ve never heard of: the Chocolate Museum (or Schokoladenmuseum) in Köln, Germany, the Viking Ship Museum in Oslo, the Cluny Museum of the Middle Ages in Paris, the Thermenmuseum (of Roman baths) in Heerlen, the Netherlands, the In Flanders Fields Museum (of WWI) in Ypres, Belgium, the National Maritime Museum and Royal Observatory in Greenwich, UK, the Foynes Flying Boat Museum in Ireland and the Eyeglasses Museum in Amsterdam.

Of course, if you have a teen as I do, you’ll hear, “Oh, why do we have to go to another dumb museum?”

Just forge onward — they’ll thank you someday!

Technorati tags: travel, family travel tips, family friendly museums

              

Happy Holidays from Sheila and the family behind Family Travel.  We wish you and yours the very best of the season, and may your suitcases be filled with maps, guidebooks, strong (and free!) hotel WiFi, plane tickets and updated passports.

To kick off your Christmas Web surfing, here is this week's roundup of great travel links and tips.  I'll be back to regular posting on Thursday, December 27th.  Happy Holidays from around the world! **  Holiday ... [Continue reading this entry]

I have a new article up ... [Continue reading this entry]

The San Francisco Bay Area is second only to Hong Kong as a place I'd love to live....if I could afford it. :) Fisherman's Wharf is basically a tourist spot today, not a gritty fishing boat area, ... [Continue reading this entry]

This is a guest post by Mommy Poppins, a great blog for family-friendly info about the New York City area. [Continue reading this entry]

It's mid-December and I'm sure "the holiday crazies" have set in for many of you, so kick back with a cup of your favorite comfort and surf some family travel tips for awhile.... ** The International Herald Tribune's Globespotters ... [Continue reading this entry]

Earlier this fall we had a spirited discussion here on the blog about [Continue reading this entry]

This week I've included some limited-time travel offers in the Thursday roundup of events around the globe: **  The Chicago Tribune/Baltimore Sun has a dandy list of travel packages with good prices for this time of year, including family-friendly ones in ... [Continue reading this entry]

I've posted previously about my stop in Independence, Kansas in summer 2007 to visit the Laura Ingalls Wilder "Little House on the Prairie," which was reconstructed on its original site using traditional materials and layout. As I played with my ... [Continue reading this entry]