We’ve got four destinations planned in our California “road trip”. We’ve been to all of them before with the exception of Palm Springs so we have some idea of things we want to do, but there was still a lot of research to do.

San Francisco

This was by far the easiest to plan for. I’ve been there dozens of time for work and it’s one of my favorite cities to visit. I’m comfortable getting around it and it’s easy to find things to do.

I know I wanted to take the kids to Alcatraz and to ride the cable cars. Those are no-brainers as I remember those from my first trip when I was their age. I also want to rent bikes and ride over the Golden Gate Bridge with them as well. It’s something I’ve done a few times and the views are amazing.

I also work with many people in San Francisco and they all had their own recommendations including Sausalito, the Exploratorium, Angel Island, an old US Missile site which is now a museum and countless other things.

I also planned ahead to see if we could catch a basketball game while we were there. We’re diehard Celtics fans from Boston (there’s no other kind), but we were interested to check out a Golden State Warriors game if I could get reasonably priced tickets. Plus the team just opened a brand new stadium in San Francisco so we were interested to see how it compares with Boston. While the game was sold out, I found lots of seat options on Ticketmaster for resale seats. I used Rakuten to get an additional 5% cashback on the tickets and the prices weren’t all that bad.  The team wasn’t having a great year which helps push the prices down, I guess. While we were up in the nosebleeds, we were at least close to mid-court so hopefully the tickets would be good.

Other than that, we were interested in combining a day trip to Sausalito with a quick side trip to Muir Woods. Some friends of ours had gone last summer and recommended a shuttle you could catch from Sausalito. You can’t really use a Lyft/Uber/Taxi to get there because there isn’t any cell phone coverage at the destination according to the website. I found the official site to book those reservations, but didn’t make any because we didn’t know what the weather would be like. We’d have to play that by ear.

San Diego

We had been to San Diego a few years ago on a real road trip where we did a big circle from LA to Las Vegas to San Diego and back to LA, all in a car. We really enjoyed our time in San Diego as it has such a different vibe than LA. There are lots of things to do including the Zoo, Legoland and Sea World, though we’ll probably skip all those and go for more low key destinations. My wife’s brother will be meeting us there and we’ll probably play things by ear and focus on enjoying the time together.

The hotel is located downtown near the water and within sight of a maritime museum we had been to on our first trip. We’ll likely go back to that again as we all really liked it. It’s next to a big open park as well and I’m sure we will be playing multiple sports there for hours on end. The hotel has a gym and pool which will help the boys get their energy out with their uncle around.

Since we will be there over Christmas we decided to make reservations for a nice dinner at our favorite steak house which is within walking distance of the hotel. We’ll surprise the kids with that.

Palm Springs

This was a “last-minute” addition to the trip and we’re only there for two nights. We’ve read and heard there are tons of interesting things to do. In addition, our hotel resort seemed to be overflowing with activities that the boys would love.

Outside of the resort, the town appears to have an interesting downtown with shopping and restaurants galore. Nearby we saw there is an aerial tramway/gondola that many people describe as a must-do activity for the views at the summit. The website says it’s busy during the holidays and they don’t take reservations during that time due to how busy things get.  Depending on how things go we may not be able to fit that in.

During my searches, I also found a covered wagon tour. You apparently get to ride out into the desert at sunset in an authentic(ish) covered wagon. It sounded interesting to me so I signed us up for some tickets. There were two options. One that included a BBQ dinner and one without. I chose to get the one without which I hope was the right decision for us. The boys will be surprised by this, for sure!

Long Beach

We have 5 nights in Long Beach to fill, including New Year’s Eve and New Years Day. From what I’ve read the New Years fireworks should be visible from the hotel we’re in, which will vastly simplify things if we decide to stay up for them. The hotel is close to the beach and some shopping/dining area. It also has a pool so hopefully, it’s warm enough for us to use it.

We’ll generally be using this hotel as a home base for exploring some other things in LA. We’ll likely try to visit the Santa Monica Pier among other places. My wife will be working in the days after New Years Day so it may be the boys and me finding things on our own. There are tons of things, though, so I’ll not worried that we’ll feel stuck at the hotel

We’re hoping that over the course of the trip we’ll be able to have a solid mix of activities and relaxation. My wife and I have been looking forward to the break for a long time. Work has been pretty stressful for both of us and having a break is desperately needed. Hopefully we can find the right mix!