Dad, Tell Me About the Time (53)

Thursday, June 12, 2025

Where did you go for family vacations?

I don’t know if this is asking about when I was growing up, or about Lisa and I and our children. I guess I will talk about both.

We went on very few vacations when I was a kid, and when we did, it was always to go visit family. Our most common vacation was to go see Uncle Merlin and Aunt Nola in Salt Lake City. I remember a few trips through northern Idaho to see Grandpa and Grandma Lybbert and I think Uncle Ray and Aunt Birdie. I loved driving through the mountains, but the roads were so windy that I would get car sick and barf every time. I remember many times standing on the side of the road puking.

A couple of times we would go see Aunt Zona in Calgary. I did have some relatives somewhere in central Montana that we would go and see as well. Other than that, I don’t remember going anywhere.

As for me and my kids, our typical vacation was a road trip and cheap motels or camping. When we lived in Alberta we made many trips, usually with Lisa’s mother. Those were usually to Utah. We went to conference a few times and Lisa’s mom would do a lot of shopping. On one of these trips, we went on to California where I saw Los Angeles and San Diego for the first time.

After we moved to California the trips reversed, and we made lots of trips to Utah and back to Canada. On those earlier trips, we almost always visited Rosemary when we went to Canada.

There were a few bigger trips. Perhaps my favorite was a big loop up to Utah, Jackson hole, Yellowstone, Alberta, Vancouver and then down the coast, stopping in Oregon on a beautiful river for lunch and then camped in the Red Woods and back to San Diego. I will never forget the giant banana slugs on the tent in the morning.

Working at Kyocera I accumulated many air miles, so we made a trip to Hawaii and later a trip to Nauvoo. Many fond memories from those.