Planning a vacation with the whole family means you have one primary consideration: keeping the kids happy. If planning a beach vacation, it seems you already have taken care of that main consideration, but not completely. You want to be sure you choose a kid-friendly beach that will also keep the adults happy.
Dr. Beach, otherwise known as scientist Dr. Stephen Leatherman, chooses the top beaches each year, always with an eye toward the kids as well. All of the following selections are made with the family in mind. These were Dr. Beach’s selections for 2006.
1. Fleming Beach, Maui. This beach, of which part is the Ritz Carlton beach, is a popular destination for families. Here, you can surf, swim and picnic. Since the kids are with you, you’ll appreciate that there are restrooms, showers and picnic facilities. If you’re visiting in the winter, stay out of the water, as the surf is dangerously high then. Families also like the location – it’s on the west side of Maui and is backed by a forest of trees which provide abundant shade.
2. Caladesi Island State Park, Florida. This beach makes a wonderful complement to a Florida vacation with kids. Head to Florida’s west coast (this beach is near the St. Petersburg/Clearwater area) and visit this park, which offers a marina, picnic pavilions, shelling and fishing, as well as nature studies. There are also three miles of nature trail here. The beach is a family favorite due to the myriad of activities that complement your visit, as well as the beautiful sand beaches perfect for sandcastle making.
3. Ocracoke Island, North Carolina. Located on North Carolina’s Outer Banks, Ocracoke Island is a popular destination for families. There’s something here for everyone: the kids enjoy watching the “banker ponies”, the wild ponies that live there, and parents enjoy the quaint shops, historic lighthouse, and darling homes. The village of Ocracoke is on the National Register of Historic Places. There’s a free ferry service from Hatteras Island to Ocracoke Island. It’s a 40-minute ferry ride that can end up taking a lot longer in the summertime, as the wait for the ferry can be a long one.
4. Cooper’s Beach, Southampton, New York. Southampton was the first settlement in New York State, in 1640, and this beach is the main beach in the Southampton area. Of course, Southampton is known as the playground of the rich during the summer months, so be sure to prepare yourself for that if you’re not normally part of that moneyed crowd. But don’t let that scare you off – the beach is also a favorite playground of kids everywhere. You should carry some cash: non-residents pay $25 for weekday parking and $30 for weekend.
5. Hanalei Bay, Kauai, Hawaii. This beach, located on the north coast of Hawaii, is a quiet oasis of fun beach activities. There are many vacation home rentals in the area, so you can head from your condo or house rental right to this beautiful beach. Kids love it because the white sand beaches are prime for sand play, there are restrooms, picnic facilities and a lifeguard on duty. Kids can play in the water most times of the year and surfing and boogie boarding are also popular here.
Top 5 Family Fun Beaches
Comments Off
President Hu Orders Rescuers to Reach Every Quake-hit Village by "every Available Means"
Chinese President Hu Jintao on Sunday asked rescuers to use “every available means” to reach every village affected by the May 12 earthquake in southwest China.
“We must try every method to send rescuers to every quake-hit village, instead of just working in towns and cities, since a large number of soldiers have entered the quake-hit regions,” said Hu, while visiting Yinghua township of Shifang city, Sichuan Province.
More than 32,000 people have been confirmed dead in the 8.0-magnitude earthquake hitting northwest Sichuan. Shifang is one of the cities seriously damaged.
Hu asked local officials to dispatch rescue teams and materials waiting in the cities and counties to towns and villages as soon as possible to collect damages and real situations at grassroots.
“We must send rescue teams, carrying food and drinking water, to the worst-hit villages, even on foot, as soon as possible,” Hu said, traveling on bumpy roads to visit one quake-hit villages to another, comforting victims and encouraging rescuers.
He was surrounded by wailing women when he visited a temporary shelter camp at Yinghua.
“I know you lost family and property. I share the pain with you,” he said. “We will try every effort to save your people once there is the slightest hope and possibility.”
Hu also hugged an 8-year-old boy when visiting a family in the camp and told him, “You must learn to be brave and not to surrender to difficulties even if you are a child. We shall have confidence, courage and strength.”
The president told people living in the town that more than 100,000 troopers of the People’s Liberation Army and armed policemen have been assembled and on their ways to each quake-hit villages.
Hu Jintao arrived in the quake-hit province on May 16 to oversee disaster rescue, relieving Premier Wen Jiabao who had stayed there for about 88 hours after the quake.
Walking over the rubble of a fertilizer factory building, Hu told the rescuers working at the site that every trapped person was counting on them and they should seize every second to work as time was limited.
“I truly believe that the heroic Chinese people will not yield to any difficulty!” he shouted to a group of rescuers.
Â
Â
Comments Off
Satellite TV for the Best Family Entertainment
If you are looking for something to keep your family entertained, that is both wholesome and educational, while at the same time, fascinating and entertaining. Then the place to look is satellite TV and the people to turn to are the great folks at DirecTV. With every programming service provider claiming that they are the leader in the business, they can’t all be right.
So who is telling the truth? With DirecTV, the facts speak for themselves and they make no claims that they can’t substantiate with real numbers. Twenty-five channels of sports programming, makes DirecTV the industry leader in sports programming and this is a fact. DirecTV even has some sports channels that they have exclusive broadcasting rights to, that you cant get from anyone else.
This means that when the big games come around and you have to go somewhere else to watch them, it’s because you didn’t go to DirecTV for your families TV programming. For five years in a row now, J.D. Power and associates has recognized DirecTV for their accomplishments in the area of customer service.
The reason for this is, is that the folks at DirecTV make customer service a top priority of theirs, when dealing with their customers. They even have a toll free, twenty-four hour a day; seven day a week, customer service number that you can call any time you have any questions about the programming, or service that you are getting from them.
So you will never be left scratching your head, when you have questions with DirecTV, just pick up the phone and give them a call and it’s as simple as that. DirecTV has great programming packages to choose from and their entry level package is both heavy with programming and economical. After you join the DirecTV families of viewers, you will most likely, at some point, want to make some adjustment to your programming, or want to upgrade your receiver to another model of Hughes receiver, that gives your family more functions to work with while watching TV in your home.
DirecTV makes this so easy to do because you simply give them one receiver and they give you an upgraded model at no extra cost to you when you adjust up your programming package. The time your family spends together at home should be some of the best time to bond and build memories and having great programming to choose from in your home can make this all possible.
Making sure that everyone is happy with what is on the TV can be a problem sometimes and DirecTV has one good solution to this age old quandary and again, it costs you nothing. The folks at DirecTV will give you and install at no cost, enough receivers for up to four separate TVs in your home when you join their family of TV viewers. So everyone in your home can watch what they want to when they want to and there will be no arguments. So look to DirecTV for your families TV programming needs.
