budgeting

4 Vacation Activities That Won’t Break The Budget

My son was given the option to have a friend accompany us on our vacation to Florida.   He’s seventeen, and getting him to do anything as a family activity is difficult.  We thought by having a friend with, we could spend some time with him, and he’d have a friend along to do teenage things.  Unfortunately, right before the trip my son’s friend cancelled. I viewed this as an opportunity to spend some quality time with my son during the trip, whether he liked it or not. He’s high school Junior and will soon be heading off to college and starting his own life. There won’t be many more of these opportunities. Of course, the activities we do need to fit within our budget.

Hit The Gym

During the summertime, my son and I went to the gym together several times a week. Once the school year started, our schedules just never seemed to mesh. The place we’re staying has great fitness facilities and will serve as a nice way to spend time together, and hopefully get us back in the habit of working out that we can continue once we get back home.

Go-Karts

As long as I can remember, my son has loved driving cars. He once had a pedal bike that he would drive around the neighborhood. He graduated to mini-bumper cars, and then to go-karts. There’s a great go-kart track nearby where we can race as much as we’d like.

Golf

Being in an area heavily visited by tourists, everything from t-shirts to hamburgers cost more. A round of eighteen holes at a golf course is ridiculously expensive, but for a much smaller fee we could hit the driving range and hit a bucket of balls together.

Jet-ski Rental

This one may not be very frugal. In fact, this one will likely land in the “spurge” category. Since the other father-son activities we have planned are relatively inexpensive, this is the one activity that we’ll spend a little extra on. However, it’s something we’ve both wanted to do for a long time, and will easily be worth the value. It’s important to realize that while many fun activities can be inexpensive, one in awhile it’s OK to shell out a little cash on something special.

I want my son to remember this vacation. Not only do I want to spend time with him, but I want to give him a great example of how special and important vacations can be to help bring families closer together, and that it can be done while still paying attention to value,and a budget. Hopefully, this can be an example he can take and apply to his own family some day.

Brought to you courtesy of Brock

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Brock Kernin

Brock is a software engineer by day and personal finance blogger at night. He is a fitness junkie and enjoys grilling and smoking meat. Married with two children,  Brock strives to improve his skills as a husband and father, and is always on the lookout to stretch his family’s budget as far as he can.