Twas a Few Nights Before Traveling…Tropical Family Travel 12 Days of Christmas Gift Ideas

Travelers everywhere are checking their list and checking it twice to ensure not a gift or accessory is missed in the hustle and bustle of holiday travel. When preparing to spend the holidays away or even just departing to grandma’s house on Christmas Day, there are some perfect holiday gifts not to be missed. These items are perfect for taking along on holiday journeys whether to keep the kids entertained on road and air trips.

Mattel is offering unique and timeless favorites for boys and girls that will entertain when traveling over the holidays. Tropical Family Travel has reviewed several gift ideas that are easy to pack along:

My Meebas™: An exciting new toy brand for girls, My Meebas combines electronic game play with a plush surprise. Each My Meebas is encased in a colored tube - symbolizing one of the six virtues of love, luck, beauty, intelligence, friendship, and happiness. The tube is a portable electronic gaming device (20+ games) with a sliding LCD screen and control panel. Through lots of fun, nurturing game play, girls care for their My Meebas until they are fully grown and then - surprise! The tube unlocks one of 60 different cuddly plush toys. Retail price: 19.99 Age: 6+

Barbie® Peekaboo Petites™ Dolls: A great travel gift for under $20.00, these adorable mini dolls are big on fashion and beauty play, collectibility and on-the-go play. Each doll comes tucked inside a whimsical locket case in fun shapes matching its theme such as hearts, flowers, gems, ice cream cones, ballet shoes, snowflakes and more. Packing two gifts in one, each Barbie Peekaboo Petites doll comes with a whimsical wear-and-share themed accessory for the girl such as necklaces and back-pack clips. Helping the girl on your gift list start her own collection, she will enjoy collecting all of the dolls in different themes including wedding, ballet, ice cream, gems, flowers, tea party, holiday and world travel. Retail price: $4.99 Age: 3+

DC Super Friends™ Basic Figure: The perfect addition to any little superheroes stocking are the DC Super Friends basic figure assortment and are perfect for taking along during holiday travels. Featuring Superman™, Batman™, The Flash™, Aquaman™, Green Lantern™ and Lex Luthor™ figures, DC Super Friends introduces kids to the ultimate Super Hero universe with easy-to-use features. Each basic figure comes with an air-powered accessory so youngsters can play, protect their hometown and capture the bad guys alongside the galaxy's greatest heroes. Retail price: $7.99 Age: 2+

Batman: The Dark Knight™ Battle Stations® Playset: Relive all the action packed adventures from The Dark Knight this holiday season with this unique and action-packed playset. This Batmobile™ transforms into four different environments for Batman™ to battle the villains of Gotham City™, allowing for complete, immersive play for boys to reenact all their favorite scenes from the film. Retail price: $39.99 Age: 4+

Matchbox® Power Scouts™ Vehicles & Playsets: This holiday season, Matchbox introduces a track system and line of vehicles perfect for smaller hands and for packing to grandma’s house. The Power Scouts vehicles are battery-powered, rough-riding and touch-climbing adventure 4x4s, complete with griping tires. They can go from neutral hand-powered mode to battery-powered all-wheel drive with a simple tap on the back of the truck to activate the motor. The Power Scouts assortment includes eight different 4x4s – ranging from the latest licensed trucks to the coolest original Matchbox designs. Retail price for Power Scouts Vehicles: $6.99 Age: 3+

CARS Mini Adventures™ Two-Pack Assortment: The perfect travel companion and playset for your little one’s stockings are the “CARS” Mini Adventures Two-Pack Assortment inspired by the hit Disney/Pixar film featuring kids’ favorite characters in all new scales and proportions. These exclusive mini vehicles are available in a variety of themes kids love, including military, fire rescue and police vehicles. The playsets are available in three different themes, all inspired by scenes from the film. Retail price for the car 2-pack: $4.99 Age: 3+

CARS Walkin' Talkin' Lightning McQueen: Stemming from the kids’ favorite movie “CARS”, this new version of Lightening McQueen lets kids play out all their favorite scenes from the movie as he talks, walks, and fuels kids’ imaginations. This character is perfect to take along for holiday enjoyment. Retail price: $39.99 Age: 4+

Barbie® Party Cruise: If taking a family cruise, Barbie's Party Cruise keeps the vacation alive and provides the most fun and travels for Barbie and friends, featuring three separate play areas, a water slide & poolcuzzi™ with a dolphin; a rotating buffet with "live" aquarium; and a performance deck with lights and sounds. The five-star cabin is equipped with an "entertainment system," mini fridge, two beds, lots of play pieces and a storage area. Retail price: $59.99 Age: 3+

Polly Pocket™ Pop 'N Swap™ Fashion Dolls: Perfect for travels, the Polly Pocket dolls offer an innovative yet low tech twist on fashion. The customizeable Pop 'N Swap Fashion Dolls let girls mix-and-match different styling outfits for Polly™ and friends as they Pop 'N Swap five heads, nine torsos and nine bottoms to create over thousands of different fashion combinations in each of two sets. This one toy provides a large variety guaranteeing countless hours of play time. Retail price: $19.99 Age: 4+

Polly Pocket™ Mega Mall Playset: A different twist on a doll house is Polly Pocket’s Mega Mall Playset. For any young shopper, this new playset allows girls to discover an ultimate shopping destination complete with magical transformation and lots of totally stylin’ new fashions and accessories for Polly™ and friends. Girls can swipe the credit card which opens up the Mega Mall Playset to reveal three levels of stores (including a skating rink, ski shop, pet store and candy shop) for hours of play! The Mega Mall Playset also includes a Polly™ doll and two adorable pets. Retail price: $49.99 each Age: 4+

Little Mommy™ Real Loving Baby™ Gotta Go™ Doll: A classic gift idea for a girl is a baby doll and is one of the most seen products that accompany toddlers and young girls on their travels. Girls will love the realistic, nurturing play elements of the doll and its accessories, which include a complete bathroom area where girls can help their doll learn to go potty and clean up. Just like a real toddler, the Gotta Go Doll goes both “number 1” (and “number 2!”) on her very own small potty, but, unlike real toddlers, there is no mess and no water – just realistic sights and sounds! The doll can flush, knows to wash her hands and loves to do all the things a big girl does when she gets up in the morning and goes to bed at night. When traveling, while the doll is perfect as a traveling companion, the accessories might want to stay home to conserve space unless going via car and room is available. Retail price: $39.99 Age: 3+

Matchbox® Mega Rig® Shuttle Mission: For young astronauts in the making, this inspiring playset takes boys “out-of-this-world” this holiday season with the introduction of the new Mega Rig® Shuttle Mission. This building system starts as one gigantic space ship and breaks down to 30 different combinations of space vehicles for kids to create. Equipped with cool accessories, including a space arm to grab things, an ATV and a UFO with a space alien inside, the Mega Rig Shuttle Mission provides kids with hours of fun and imaginative play. Retail price: $44.99 Age: 4+

These products are sure to provide hours of entertainment both during the journey itself and after arriving at the holiday destination!

What is your favorite toy to give or receive that can be taken along travel adventures?

Holiday Travels: Pack Games for Family Fun

If your holiday plans include a long car ride, an extended stay with family or perhaps a vacation, Tropical Family Travel has looked at a few family and kid-related travel gifts that are easy to pack or might even relate to the actual trip, starting with games.Games are a favorite for evening entertainment or for a rainy/snowy day and result in together time and fun for kids and adults alike.

Pictionary Man™ is the perfect gift for families, offering a contemporary twist on two old favorites – Pictionary and Charades. The new Pictionary Man™ is a 3D-figure complete with accessories that are all made of "dry-erase" material, eliminating the need for paper. The figure digitally displays game clues on the bottom of his foot as players are challenged to bring the clue to life by drawing on "the Man" and his accessories as well as acting out the phrase so team members can guess the right answer! This is truly a great update on a known game and its use of “the Man” makes it the perfect size for traveling. Retail Price: $29.99 Age: 14+

UNO Flash™ is a new electronic version of a classic game to pack on vacations. The element of speed is added now with a built-in timer and resulting in a new level of excitement for this classic game. Either the new UNO Flash or the classic card game provide some great one on one time together adding additional fun along the way. Retail Price: $29.99 Age: 7+

Apples-to-Apples® game is the wild, award-winning party game of hilarious comparisons and is a great choice for group play on vacation. Using the cards to “compare apples to apples,” each round of the game is filled with surprising and outrageous comparisons. This interactive game is easy to learn and fast-paced and is perfect to take along where lots of family members will be together. Retail Price: $24.99 Age: 12+

For the younger kids (both in age and at heart), Rhino Rampage™ provides a frenzy of fun and is a great gift for preschoolers on your list. The object of the game is for players to get their color-matched team of birds to safety atop the rhino's back. However, once players roll a “rhino” on the die, they’ll have to pull the rhino’s tail setting off a “Rhino Rampage” and leaving players wondering which birds will be flying “off course.” This game provides fun and education as it is fast paced and encourages color-matching skills.
Retail Price: $24.99 Age: 4+

Scene It?® Disney Channel Edition is the ultimate gift for any tween girl hooked on the Disney Channel shows. Just like its adult versions, this Scene It game is interactive, entertaining and fun for all. This is one game where the kids might overtake the grown ups! This trivia game features Disney Channel shows, including “The Suite Life of Zach and Cody,” “Hannah Montana,” “High School Musical” and many more! When traveling, another option is to take along the DVD and not the board game for a trivia game version with less pieces, but the entire game is easy to pack along. Retail Price: $34.99 Age: 8+

The High School Musical 3 DVD Game combines trivia, video clips, outtakes, songs and dances from all three of these popular movies. Players are sure to become Wildcats as they compete in different categories and test their knowledge of each of the High School Musicals! For those traveling to Walt Disney World over the holidays, this game will keep the HSM parade alive after your trip ends! Retail Price: $19.99 Age: 8+

Hannah Montana 2 DVD Game features Hannah Montana during her second year of high school with this performance-based DVD game. The new DVD game features real clips, trivia, songs and dance moves from the second season of the hit Disney Channel show. Even moms and dads might show off their Hannah Montana alter egos in this interactive game. Retail Price: $19.99 Age: 6+

The DVD based games are great for car travels too as they can be played in the back seat helping the hours pass during holiday travels resulting in less “are we there yet” questions. When packing up the car and suitcase on the way to grandma’s house, be sure to select a game or two to help provide some interactive family fun together.

What is your favorite game to take along on car trips or vacations?

Travel Anticipation: Creating New Vacation Traditions

Traditions are always nice as they are dependable and you know what you are getting. This is particularly the case when taking family vacations to the same trusted destination or resort. I know for a while an annual ski trip to Whistler or the much anticipated beach getaway to the Outer Banks was something I could not wait to experience.

But, there is something to be said for creating new traditions. So, today I am preparing to try a new tropical family destination with Bill and Kylie. We are in the midst of last-minute travel preparations to escape to Duck Key (about 30 miles North of Key West) via car and we are staying at the family-friendly, luxurious (yes, family and luxury in the same sentence) resort, Hawks Cay for a quick getaway during the business of the holiday season.

Hawks Cay Resort has been on my “wish” list of places to travel to for quite some time. In fact, Bill booked this resort for a Tropical Latitudes Travel client a few years ago and they had two young children and raved about the offerings, not to mention the location. They Keys in general are the closest to that crisp crystal blue and green Caribbean water in the United States you can experience. What is even better is that this destination is within reach via car (a couple of hours South of Miami, Florida) and does not require a passport. In these tight economic times, drivable vacations offer their appeal.

I am in the huge anticipation phase right now. Hoping that the resort is all that I hope it will be and that the location exceeds my expectations. I hope that it chalks right up there with other family tropical vacations we have taken that would be part of our vacation tradition repertoire, such as Atlantis Resort in the Bahamas.

When trying a new resort or location, I always attempt to get a true sampling of its offerings including its fitness center, variety of restaurants, spa treatments, yoga/fitness classes, kids program, and more. With Bill’s business and my travel writing, we also tour the facility to get a behind the scenes tour of the different accommodation offerings so we know what type of client or traveler this resort will appeal most to.

Something unique at Hawks Cay that I am especially intrigued by is its Dockside Dolphin program, which does not have an age requirement so Kylie will be able to see these amazing creatures up close and personal.

I will certainly reveal my favorite vacation elements, which not to be missed, will be part of the drive to Duck Key. If you have not driven from Miami to the Keys, it is some beautiful scenery. Crossing over the bridges is some of the most spectacular tropical views you will ever see!

Do you get as excited as Christmas morning when preparing for your vacation?