Planit Adventures: 2024’s Best Family Travel Moments
As we reflect on 2024, one thing stands out—each of us experienced the year a little differently! I asked each family member about their favorite travel moments, beaches, food, and activities. Here’s what everyone had to say:
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Emma’s Picks
- Favourite Travel Destination: My favourite place that we visited in 2024 was Pender Island. I love the West Coast in the fall, with its damp beach walks, sunshine reflecting off the ocean, and beach fires. I enjoyed adventuring around the island and finding lots of interesting food spots. My favourite was Pender Chocolates. I also loved searching for fossils on the beach beside our camping spot.
- Favourite Beach: I enjoyed all of the beaches on Maui but my favourite was Baldwin Beach. We ran along the beach with the wind blasting us with sand and came across a group of turtles swimming and getting warm in the sun. Because of the wind, there were hardly any other people on the beach that day and it felt like we had the whole place to ourselves.
- Favourite Food: Vashti Rose in Port Moody had the most amazing ice cream that I’ve had in my life, don’t quote me on that. It is dairy-free so I could eat it without feeling sick and it was so flavorful -I loved the raspberry chocolate, it was so good I couldn’t try a new flavour on any of the THREE! times I went there in 2024.
- Favourite Activity: I really enjoyed our camping trip to North Vancouver Island, I loved backpack camping and swimming at San Josef Bay but my most favourite activity from that trip had to be getting lost when trying to find Little Huson Caves while driving on an awful gravel road. Once we got there and hiked in, I could not resist going for a swim (in my clothes). The caves were beautiful, huge, and the water wasn’t even West Coast cold. I can’t wait to go back with everyone next time and maybe even get Jack in the water.
- Funniest Travel Moment: When we were in Whistler, our group was in its own gondola coming down the mountain and we started yell-singing songs and everyone joined in. I’m not sure if anyone else could hear us through the open window but it definitely would have made people think twice about getting in our gondola.
Jack’s Picks (a teenager of few words)
- Favourite Travel Destination: Maui. My favourite part of that trip was probably the road to Hana, which included several stops for banana bread. A close second was seeing Haleakala as the sunset and having a picnic above the clouds.
- Favourite Beach: Baldwin Beach in Maui. I loved the feeling of walking into the wind with the sand whipping against me and seeing a big group of turtles on the nearly empty beach.
- Favourite Food: We weren’t on a trip for this one but trying the Thanksgiving turkey pizza at Peninsula Pizza was it this year. While you wouldn’t think gravy and mashed potatoes on a pizza would work, it did.
- Favourite Activity: Skiing with friends and family at Mount Washington and watching how fast the little kids would fly down the hill.
- Funniest Travel Moment: Emma hit herself in the head with her golf ball at the new mini-golf spot on Quadra Island when she attempted to do a cool trick. Yes, golf balls do bounce, needless to say, she didn’t try it again (=
Shelley’s Picks
- Favourite Travel Destination: San Josef Bay – while it does surprise me that I picked a spot without running water – camping on the beach here was fantastic. I’m already planning a trip back next summer.
- Favourite Beach: While the Maui beaches are hard to beat and we did find a couple of new ones to visit on our trip – I loved Hidden Beach – San Josef Bay on the Northern tip of Vancouver Island still takes the favourite spot. The beach reminded me a little of Long Beach, without all the people. Accessing this spot is challenging both in terms of distance North on the island, logging roads and then a 40-minute hike in but I promise it’s worth it.
- Favourite Food: My two favourite foods are at the opposite end of the spectrum. We finally got to visit the Richmond Night Market this year and sampled some delicious street food-still dreaming about that mango sticky rice. For my birthday, and to round out my post on the best places to eat in Victoria, we finally made it to Marilena Cafe. It lived up to all the hype and was one of the best meals I’ve eaten (try the lobster avocado tacos if you go).
- Favourite Activity: Emma’s surprise day was pretty spectacular. She came up with the idea on her own, planned and paid for the day as she navigated us around Victoria. It was pretty amazing to see her take an idea we used to do with the kids when they were little and carry on the traditions. My second runner-up was the Peak to Peak at Whistler, I loved riding the gondolas and hiking up at the top of the mountains.
- Funniest Travel Moment: On our trip to Maui, we got to try Flytographer for the first time. The experience was fantastic, we got camera-ready, set off to meet our photographer at the beach, and captured some amazing photos, all with the plan to go out for a nice dinner near the beach afterwards. You know what they say about best-laid plans. The end of our photoshoot devolved into a water fight with the kids successfully throwing one other into the ocean. Wet and sandy we headed back to the car to sit on the single towel we had before driving home and hosing off outside at our accommodation. Out the window went the idea of a fancy dinner with the family and we ate pizza while we cleaned the sand from our car, off our clothes, from our shower, and pretty much everywhere else. Of course, the photographer captured some beautiful photos but she also captured some pretty awesome post-shoot pictures as well. These are the ones that made everyone laugh the most and still take us right back to that moment as the kids argue about who got each other wet first. Ahh memories.
Robin’s Picks
- Favourite Travel Destination: My favourite destination this year was Quadra Island. Taku Resort is a lovely relaxing place to stay. The tranquil location looking out at the water and the easy walking trails across the bay on the Rebecca Spit is a perfect spot to connect with the land, slow down and reset. I enjoyed connecting with family and getting out of our routines.
- Favourite Beach: Was camping on San Joseph Beach. It is a beautiful beach with lush west coast forest, sea stacks, and caves to explore. The remoteness of this location combined with the hour-plus of logging roads make this a less busy spot to enjoy the beauty of the beach.
- Favourite Food: My favourite food this year was discovered while on a school back-country canoeing trip. It was a lunch wrap that consisted of avocado, garlic cream cheese and smoked salmon. It was delicious and provided lots of energy for the long days of paddling.
- Favourite Activity: Although it was short-lived this summer with boat troubles, one of my favourites was getting out fishing with my daughter and father this year. It was nice to be out early on the water in the quiet of the morning.
- Funniest Travel Moment: While driving the Kahekili Highway, the northern road on the island of Maui, I had my funniest memory from this travel year. This road is even harder to drive than the famous road to Hana, windy and one-lane. After traversing most of the scary roads we made it to the little town and stopped for shave ice at Lorraine’s Shave Ice (actually in her carport). She was a great host and warned us of the last bit of bad road as we left her little town; she said that if we saw someone on the far side of the mountain to stop and wait five minutes for them to come through before setting off. So we did this, with no one coming after five minutes we headed out. As we started down the longest narrowest part of the road on the edge of the mountain, I asked Shelley to film it from the passenger seat. As she got the camera rolling, out of nowhere, a little car appeared and I locked eyes with the driver, I am sure both of us were thinking – what now? I then proceeded to back up the narrow road for three minutes with the cliff on one side and the rock wall on the other. A little frightening at the time but it made for a good trip story.
Your Turn!
What were your family’s favourite destinations, beaches, foods, or activities this year? And what was your funniest travel moment? Share them in the comments below—we’d love to hear your stories and laughs! For more of our 2024 family adventures check out this post.