We always said – traveling with kids is a trip but its never a vacation. Kids love midrange hotels where they can make their own breakfast and go swimming everyday. Bring lots of beach balls – they are a great toy for the pool that is relatively quiet and not damaging to hotel rooms. You will usually overestimate their appreciation of educational experiences (my husband and I still laugh about the level of our children’s disinterest in a Chicago architecture tour/boat ride). Tide pools, mini golf, arcades, gift shops and museums designed for kids (the exploratorium in SF stands out) usually go over big. Eat as many picnic meals as possible – waiting to be served when kids are tired or hungry is about as unpleasant as I can imagine. Disney and legoland are great, but after a few days at the “happiest place on earth” I was exhausted and cranky. Our kids love the motels in Cambria (near Hearst castle) but some don’t have TV.
That area has lots of trails to walk (with or without stroller) and hermit crabs to investigate (annoy) at the beach. I wouldn’t try tent camping – our youngest has issues with getting sandy or dirty so it would be way too much work to be able to enjoy it. Good luck –

I loved camping, sailing, swimming, and hiking when I was a kid; still do. Never gave a fuck about the mass-market Disneyworld type crap. But hey, I got motion-sick easily so maybe the rides just held no attraction. Not sure how much a 1 yo can appreciate, but I’m sure the older kids can.

Also agreeing with CAR.

We did one of our BEST vacations last year – 3 weeks total, Glacier Nat’l park, Yellowstone, Grand Teton. We luxed it up by staying in cabins in the park – vs camping… but there were no tv’s… no wifi… kids mastered life skills like skipping rocks on a lake, watching ant trails, etc.

Swimming was in lakes (brrr)… but they didn’t seem to mind.

My kids are older though – at the time they were 9 and 11.

[quote=paramount]Any recommendations for a campground (tent) in the Santa Barbara area?[/quote]

There are private and a public campgrounds at El Capitan. Haven’t been there in quite a few years, so check all the details as things might have changed. Very nice area, and there’s lots of hiking, beach swimming, etc. to do.

Looks like there’s some construction going on, so be sure to check out the details. Also, not sure about tent camping which they used to have but not anymore(?).

http://www.reserveamerica.com/camping/El_Capitan_Sb/r/campgroundDetails.do?contractCode=CA&parkId=120030

http://www.parks.ca.gov/?page_id=601

We like to go to Cachuma Lake, but that’s a bit inland. You can visit Solvang and do lots of hiking, too. It’s a beautiful area. They have a lake where you can rent boats and fish (no swimming in the lake, but they do have a swimming pool).

http://www.countyofsb.org/parks/parks05.aspx?id=9150

Here’s a resource to find more info on camping:

http://www.santabarbaraca.com/hotels-and-hideaways/camping-and-rv-parks/

+1 CAR. Camping rocks w/kids.

Funny that flu just revived this thread. We just bought a trailer at the RV show at Qualcomm Stadium today. Impulsive buy, even though we’ve been thinking about it for years, and I feel like throwing up (HATE spending money like that), but am hoping we will use the heck out of it.

Traveling in hotels with a family of 5 means we usually have to get two rooms. Otherwise, we rent RVs which can get really expensive, too, not to mention the hassle of spending at least two days at the beginning and end of your vacation picking up/returning and loading/unloading and cleaning the RV. And we’ve acquired a large, hairy, crazy-shedding dog since then, so needed to figure out how to deal with that, too, since we can’t keep him in most hotel rooms. Hate, hate, hate spending money like this, but at least the trips should be a lot cheaper from here on out.

Happy camping, everyone! 🙂

BTW, am LOVING the longer days!