Are you thinking of traveling with us on an active vacation this year or next? Many people ask us: How far in advance should I reserve my trip with Backroads? That’s a great question and one for which you want to be sure you have the right information, as it would be disappointing to call to reserve your trip only to learn that it’s full.

Our best recommendation is to book as far an advance as your timing allows. The further ahead you reserve your spot, the more availability you’ll find. When you’re planning a major getaway like a European bike tour or hiking tour through the US National Parks, you’ll want to be sure the dates work best for your family’s schedule.

Many families travel with us during the summer months, for example, so those dates fill quickly, along with holidays. To make sure you can choose your top destination and date, try to contact us at least four to six months ahead of time.

There are also several tours that are very popular and tend to book quickly. They include Yellowstone & Tetons Walking Tour, San Juan Islands Biking, all of our Italy hiking tours and Italy biking tours as well as our France hiking tours and France biking tours. If any of those locales are on your list, call us early.

To reserve your active trip, please call us at 800-462-2848 7 a.m.- 5 p.m. Pacific daily or use our secure online reservation form by clicking Reserve This Trip! on any trip page on our website. We request a $600 deposit per person made by check or major credit card. The balance of your trip cost is due 95 days prior to departure in most instances. In a few Special Departure           cases we request the balance due 125 days prior to departure.

So pick your destination, choose your dates and give us a ring! Before you know it, you’ll be on your way to an active vacation of a lifetime…

We take thousands of families on active trips around the globe every year; in fact, it’s one of our most popular programs! Many of our families have a lot of questions, because they want to ensure their multisport trip or biking trip will be fun for both kids and adults and will hold their children’s attention.

A common question families ask is: Is childcare available during the trip and will there be other children my kids’ ages?

Childcare is not included as part of Backroads’ family adventures; however, that doesn’t mean that we can’t help you find childcare if that’s a need for your family. Many of our hotels on family trips do offer childcare services or we can explore other English-speaking options in the area. We do not book the care for you but can direct you to the appropriate contacts.

Remember, our Trip Leaders are not charged with childcare, but on active family trips there is a Trip Leader dedicated just to the children to create age-appropriate opportunities wherever we’re traveling.

Second, you’re certainly welcome to ask your Trip Consultant about other children’s ages who have booked the trip. Just keep in mind it could change prior to departure. One of the best parts of a Backroads active family vacation is the friendships that kids develop with each other. You may find a new “pen pal” that your child can stay in touch with for years to come.

We have lots of fun family trips available this summer from bike tours and hiking tours of the US National Parks to multisport adventures in Hawaii, Costa Rica, Panama and more. Take a look at our Family Trip Advisor to get customized trip recommendation for your family.

For more information about our family adventures, please visit www.backroads.com/family-trips or call us at 800-462-2848 daily from 7 a.m.- 5 p.m. Pacific time.

Traveling with a family can be a bonding experience that your children will remember for the rest of their lives, but choosing the right trip for your family is key to making those happy memories. Backroads, which offers nearly 40 different active family trips around the world, knows how to create the best travel experience for families and we want to share our knowledge with you.

That’s why we created our new Family Trip Advisor, an online tool to help you discover which family vacation is right for your crew.

To use the tool, simply visit our Family Trips page at www.backroads.com/family-trips and select Family Trip Advisor. A box will pop up and begin to ask you a series of question. The process only takes a few minutes, which we know is important for busy families juggling work, sports, school and other activities.

We start by asking the age of your kids. Are they teens, pre-teens, young kids (at least 6) or mixed ages? Once you’ve made your selection, we want to know what time of year you’re planning to travel. Are you looking for an active family summer vacation or perhaps a winter break getaway for families?

Next we’d like to know just how active you’d like your trip to be and then if you’re more interested in exploring nature or culture on your active family vacation.

Once we know all this information, you’ll receive a customized 2-3 minute video with recommendations for destinations that may appeal to your family. You’ll get three specific family trip suggestions with a description of each trip and photos of the sites you’ll see. Once you’ve watched the video, you can even choose to email it to a friend or yourself so you can watch it again!

Try our Family Trip Advisor and let us know what trips we recommended for your family. Do they sound like a good fit?

Please read our blog on 5 Tips for Active Travel With Kids and give us a call 7 a.m.-5 p.m. daily at 800-462-2848 to book your active family trip!

We love kids here at Backroads! It’s a joy to see them biking through the rolling hills of Tuscany with their parents, hiking around a volcano in Hawaii and ziplining through the jungles of Costa Rica. Since we see so many families on our active family vacations each year, it’s only natural that we have a few tips for active travel with kids. We want you and your family to have the best vacation possible and a little preparation can make sure it’s a trip your children will remember for the rest of their lives.

Here are our top 5 tips for the best active travel experience with kids:

1)      Getting home and back can be the least fun parts of your family biking tour or family hiking tour. Make flying fun by bringing games, books, favorite snacks and a surprise for after the flight. Be sure to ask the flight attendant if they have any special packets for kids. Select pre and post hotels that cater to families and offer kid activities and amenities—our Travel Planners can help you with that. Research activities in your gateway city that the whole family can enjoy: aquariums, zoos, parks, children’s museums and theatres.

2)      When packing for kids on an active family trip, be sure to include plastic bags for sticky and dirty clothes, a nightlight to brighten unfamiliar rooms, pediatrician contact information, medications, a comforting toy and addresses of their friends so they can send postcards.

3)      Staying at a hotel can be an exciting experience for children. To make your family’s stay more enjoyable, give kids a tour of the property when you arrive and explain the rules regarding the minibar, in-room movies and telephone.

4)      Practice hiking and biking with your kids before you arrive on your family bike tour or family walking tour. The additional time together on training rides and hikes can make great family bonding days.  And not only that, the kids became familiar with what gear they need, how to layer clothing properly, and what snacks and food they like most on the trail and on the bike.

5)      Have a meeting before your family adventure and agree to rules regarding the use of electronics during your trip. Consider allowing electronics during travel to and from only; a camera as the only electronic item for kids during the tour; or simply leaving phones and Gameboys at home.  If parents also agree to unplug, they’ll likely get more buy-in from the kids. The rewards of real family bonding, full immersion into the culture or nature of a place, disconnecting from the distractions of daily life and home, and creating more opportunity for incredible memories far outweighs the hardship of giving up the electronics.

Come explore the world with your family on a Backroads family adventure vacation. We’re pretty sure the kids will forget about the PlayStation quickly and be ready to send off postcard after postcard to their buddies as they enjoy all our trips have to offer.

For more information about Backroads Family Trips, please visit www.Backroads.com or call us 7 a.m.-5 p.m. daily at 800-462-2848. You can also check out our online Family Trip Advisor to get help finding the perfect adventure for your family.

Sometime in your life, you’ve got to see the American West whether it’s the canyons of Utah or the mountains and hot springs in Wyoming. We happen to think the best way to see this region is on a bike tour or hiking tour of the American West.

Backroads offers active tours to Montana, New Mexico, Utah, Wyoming and more, giving you the opportunity to see these glorious vistas in the open air as you pedal through each state or hike on your own two feet. Smell the wildflowers, see the mountains unobstructed and drink in the fresh alpine air.

Here are a few of our top Western vacations that we think you should consider this year:

New Mexico Biking: Santa Fe & Taos – This 6-day, 5-night New Mexico bike tour takes you through the land that inspired artist Georgia O’Keefe, across the fifth highest bridge in the US, a chance to bike the Enchanted Circle around Wheeler Peak and through Spanish and Indian ruins. Runs May, June, September & October.

Wyoming: Yellowstone and Tetons Multisport – This is your chance to see mud pots, spouting geysers and steaming vents, along with the beautiful peaks of the Tetons and the Snake River as you white-water raft  down it. This 6-day 5-night tour screams adventure! Get ready to bike Wyoming, hike Grand Teton National Park and kayak Yellowstone Lake. This Wyoming adventure is offered as a Classic Tour June-September, for Singles-Solos  in July, for families June-August and as a deluxe camping experience June-August.

Montana Biking – Right next door to Wyoming is beautiful Montana where you’ll get to bike the Going-to-the-Sun Road and take in the true alpine beauty of the American West. As you bike Montana, pedal past Lake McDonald, sparkling waterfalls, through glacier-carved valleys and even take a trek into Canada and visit a National Park. As the finale, raft down the Flathead River. This is a 6-day, 5-night trip that runs July-August as a classic tour and June and August for Singles-Solos.

Utah: Bryce & Zion Biking – Red rocks galore are what you’ll find on this bike trip through Utah. You’ll see rocks of all shapes and sizes from whimsically-shaped formations to towers and arches. Get ready to be amazed at what Mother Nature creates! On this Utah bike tour, you’ll also work your way through many canyons, bike through Zion National Park with its colored pinnacles, spires and hoodoos, as well as marvel at Mount Carmel’s white sandstone Elkhard Cliffs. This bike tour of Utah runs 6 days and 5 nights June-September and is also available for Singles and Solos in July.

Where have you always dreamed of heading out West? Don’t forget to bring your cowboy boots and cowboy hat – oh yeah, and your sense of adventure!

To book any of our active trips to the American West, please call us daily 7 a.m.-5 p.m. Pacific time at 800-462-2848.

Backroads offers active travel experiences for single travelers and solo travelers and this is a question we hear quite a lot: Are singles trips and solos trips just for unmarried travelers?

Let us just say we are not the Match.com of travel; however, if you happen to find a love interest on one of our trips, all the better!

The answer to the question is no, our active trips are not just for unmarried travelers. However, many of our singles-solos travelers are unmarried. Those who travel with us who are married sometimes are simply traveling alone without their spouse or with a friend or sibling.

We strive on our active singles trips to put together an engaging group of individuals – married or not – who will make for an interesting active travel experience.  We often hear from our solo travelers that we know how to ignite an amazing chemistry in a comfortable, easygoing atmosphere. Our Trip Leaders are skilled not only in knowledge of their country but in how to encourage a camaraderie and interactive group dynamic.

Wine tastings, meals and other social opportunities we create help everyone to get to know one another, making your bike trip or walking trip about more than just the destination. The people you travel with can be just as wonderful!

You’ll often find that those who choose our bike tours and walking tours are individuals who share a sense of fun and passion for exploring the world and drinking in as many experiences as they can.  That instantly gives you something in common.

Bottom line: We welcome all!

We had such an awesome time at the 2012 Bikefest, a fall singles tour to Wine Country with 60 other single travelers, that we decided to offer TWO dates in 2013. This year, the Bikefest California Wine Country bike tour will be offered July 21-26 and September 29-October 4. But no matter whether you choose to bike with us in summer or fall, there’s no question it will be a blast!

On our Singles-Solos Wine Country Bikefest, we let you enjoy the best of the single life in the great outdoors while traveling through the beautiful California wine country. We’ll start our singles adventure in Napa Valley, pedaling past famed vineyards and stopping at a host of wineries for a sample, swirl and sip.

Bikefest is a Backroads deluxe camping adventure, which means we sleep in tents under the stars, enjoy gathering with friends around the campfire and dine on delicious gourmet camping meals. Our amazing Trip Leaders get the camp site all ready for you, so all you have to do is arrive, socialize and fall asleep in your comfy sleeping bag on an extra thick pad while breathing in the fresh air. Ahh…

Next head to the Russian River Valley for more wineries and enjoy a group picnic under the giant redwood trees of California. A party awaits back at camp with drinks, food, live music and plenty of fun!

During the next two days, we bike down the California coast, exploring seaside hamlets, visiting the country’s oldest cheese manufacturer (what goes better with wine after all?!), exploring Pointe Reyes National Seashore and enjoying a farm-to-table dinner. Again, a live band with an opportunity for dancing crowns the day.

On our final day of our California Wine Country biking tour, we head to the hilly city of San Francisco, stop in the town of Sausalito and pedal across the Golden Gate Bridge for the finale!

If you choose to go on Bikefest in September, we recommend extending your visit in San Francisco to enjoy a host of local events that take place like Fleet Week.

Hurry and book Bikefest before we fill up. There are only two opportunities for this fantastic singles travel adventure! Call us at 800-462-2848 daily from 7 a.m.-5 p.m. Pacific to get started.

Backroads offers a range of deluxe camping vacations to destinations in North America where travelers sleep in roomy domed tents in plush sleeping bags and enjoy gourmet meals around crackling campfires.  If you’re an outdoorsy person who loves to travel, our adventure camping trips are perfect for you. We handle all the work of set-up and tear down; you just have to show up and enjoy it!

If you’re planning a camping vacation soon, here are 8 tips that we recommend for all our adventure campers:

• Consider taking a guide to the constellations. In many of the settings Backroads’ visits, you’ll have access to stars from a different side of the world in a dark environment with fewer city lights that lends itself to seeing lots of astronomical bodies.
• Bring out the Scout in you and learn a few good knots. A bowline, for example, will never work itself loose; a figure eight will not slip but is easy to untie. These come in handy during camping trips.
• Unpack only the items you need to use. Keep items you may need in the middle of the night within arm reach.
• Beam me up Scottie! Enjoying a campground by moonlight is a special treat. However, on evenings when the moon is less than full, it’s helpful to have on hand a small flashlight with a strong beam. If you prefer to keep your hands free, head lamps make a great alternative option.
• Meet new people. Part of the fun of a Backroads’ adventure vacation is meeting people from all walks of life, especially your fellow travelers at the campsite. You never know what fun might happen around the campfire!
• Bring a spirit of adventure! Think of all the people before you who’ve lived and camped in the great outdoors. There’s nothing quite like sleeping under the stars in the fresh air. Dare to take a jump in the lake or hike that intriguing trail around the bend.
• Keep a journal. There’s nothing like documenting your outdoor adventure for the future by journaling about your experience daily. Curl up in your tent and write away! You’ll cherish it for years to come.
• Get up early. Enjoy the sun rising each morning at our gorgeous destinations. It’s a wonderful way to start your day and the beauty of the sunset just might unexpectedly take your breath away.

Backroads offers camping trips for families, camping trips for singles and solos and traditional camping adventures. Pick from destinations like Montana, Alaska, Wine Country and the Canadian Rockies. For more information about Backroads’ camping vacations, please call us 7 a.m.-5 p.m. Pacific daily at 800-462-2848.

2013 has arrived and we know you like to travel as much as we do. So we’ve listed out some of our top 10 New Year’s resolutions specifically dedicated to travel. Lots of people make “travel” itself a New Year’s resolution, but we wanted to go deeper and make some suggestions of how to improve your travel experience in 2013.

Here are Backroads’ top 10 New Year’s travel resolutions:

1)      Travel somewhere you’ve never been – At Backroads we travel to hundreds of destinations around the globe, and we can help you find a bike tour or hiking tour to a place you’ve yet to discover. Instead of taking the same trip you do every year, be bold and try something new!

2)      Travel somewhere unexpected – Sure, everyone wants to take a Tuscany bike tour or a Provence walking tour, but consider traveling to a location more off the beaten path. For 2013, Backroads has introduced bike trips to Myanmar, for example, a country that has largely been closed to the modern world for many years. By biking through Myanmar, you will truly discover an “undiscovered” world untouched by tourism.

3)      Add activity to your trip – At Backroads, we believe half the fun of travel is the way you travel. Step out of the car or tour bus and hop on a bike, walk or even kayak down the river. Your travel experience will be so much richer out in the open air with some activity mixed in. You’ll even be able to enjoy all the gourmet dinners we provide without the guilt!

4)      Bring your kids along – Afraid to travel with your kids? Don’t be! We offer wonderful family adventures that will make a trip with the kids a great experience. Our family bike tours and family walking tours are designed with lots of kid-friendly activities, whether it’s a scavenger hunt, eating gelato in Sicily or fencing in the Loire Valley, that will entertain and educate not just them, but you, as well. Browse our family adventures.

5)      Try a solo trip – Traveling alone can be a life-changing experience and you can do it without worry with Backroads’ Singles + Solos travel program. We offer trips around the world designed for traveling solo. You’ll enjoy meeting other solo travelers on the trip and get plenty of time to explore the world on your own with the unparalleled service, support and guidance of the Backroads team. Browse our singles trips.

6)      Travel at a different time of year – Always take a summer vacation? Try traveling at the holidays to create once-in-a-lifetime memories. Paris in the spring? Yes, it’s lovely, but Europe in the fall can also be a wonderful time to travel. Mix it up this year!

7)      Try a new food – Backroads offers gourmet meals at many Michelin-starred restaurants and plenty of opportunities to try food local to your destination. It might be a little out of your comfort zone, but be brave and try a new food or dish. You just might be surprised at how good it tastes!

8)      Try something adventurous – Add some adventure to your travel! With Backroads, you can fence in Loire Valley, zip line in Costa Rica, hike a volcano in Hawaii and Sicily, visit ancient temples and the list goes on. No ho hum vacations for us! Make your travel exciting in 2013!

9)      Engage the locals – To really get the most out of travel, try to immerse yourself in the local culture. When you bike or hike a destination, you’re more likely to stop and have a conversation with the farmer selling produce by the road or chat with the couple next to you at the café. Make an effort to talk to the locals, ask them about the area and their favorite things to do. You’ll likely come away with a new world view.

10)   Learn a new language – It’s easier to engage the locals if you know a little bit of their language. Challenge yourself a few months before your trip to learn some key phrases in the language of the region you’ll be visiting. Not only will you feel more confident and comfortable, you may just be inspired to learn the language fluently.

Have you set any resolutions related to travel? Let us know what they are and if we can help you meet them! Give us a call 7 a.m.-5 p.m. Pacific any day of the week if we can help you stick to those travel resolutions with a Backroads bike tour or Backroads hiking tour. Happy New Year!

Forget packed beaches in Florida, long drives across the country or crazy kids out of control. Let us give you a truly memorable, relaxing and enjoyable adventure of a lifetime for your family spring break instead. Imagine a vacation where you’re active, where it’s warm and where everyone learns a thing or two – all while having fun!

Our family adventure tours are packed with kid-approved fun, all designed with a pint-size traveler in mind. Plus, they offer plenty of opportunities for separate children’s and adult activities.

Although we’re just headed into the holidays, now’s the time to secure your spring break adventure vacation before we’re all booked. Let us make a couple family spring break suggestions for some of our bike tours and multisport tours around the world:

• Multisport Costa Rica Biking Tour – This is a popular trip for families who enjoy traveling with Backroads. Here are just a few of the amazing activities you’ll enjoy: jungle treks, white-water rafting and horseback riding.
• Sicily Bike Tour – New in 2013 is our Sicily Bike Tour that takes you past volcanoes, lets you eat pizza with French fries on top (no, we’re not joking!), tour the rugged countryside in Jeeps, bake biscotti and enjoy a scavenger hunt.
• Death Valley Biking – If you want to stay a little closer to home, try our Death Valley bike tour. You’ll get to see a castle with an indoor waterfall, gaze on a mirage, look for ancient lava flows, and view rock formations that look like Neapolitan ice cream.

We offer dates in February, March and April to fit your unique spring break needs. Come “join the party” with us on spring break this year – you’ll never go to a crowded beach again!

Call us at 800-462-2848 7 a.m.- 5 p.m. Pacific time to book your spring break now.