[quote author="new_to_irvine" date=1249020910][quote author="IrvineRenter" date=1249018462][quote author="new_to_irvine" date=1249005833]Hello all,
We are planning our family vacation for the last week of August and got sold on the idea of "farm vacation".
Have any of you vacationed like that before and if you have what was your experience like?
we have 3 and 6 years old who love animals and nature and we thought "farm vacation" might be a perfect choice for us.
Any input is very welcome!!!</blockquote>
I grew up in farm country. I never thought I would see the day people started vacationing to see them.
As a rule, farms smell bad, and if you have allergies, there is enough stuff in the air to wipe you out. There are also some things you would see on the farm about our food production that you might find unsettling (do you know how veal is created?)
That being said, it can be very interesting to tour a farm and learn about how they operate. I took this for granted growing up, but my son has never seen a farm. The closest he gets to farm animals is at the County Fair, so he is missing something entirely that I take for granted.
If you want a great vacation in farm country, go to <a href="http://wisdells.com/">Wisconsin Dells</a>. You can take side trips to see working farms, and you can have much more fun on the other days.</blockquote>
I'm an urban child who saw live chicken in my twenties for the first time. With the urban life and 24 horus a day conviniences our kids do not know how and from where our food is coming from.
I wish I had experiences like that in my childhood. First, we thought of camping out somewhere in Sequoia or Yosemite. But then I came across this site
http://www.granitecreekranch.com/and got very excited about it
Would you take your kids on the farm for vacation? I might romanticize it too much, right?</blockquote>
In the end, it will depend on your kids. Mine would wonder where the water park is and be bored inside of 30 minutes....
That ranch looks like a great place to vacation if you want something more active and immersive. I imagine taking a canoe out on the lake would be very peaceful and relaxing. To me, this looks like the kind of place you take your teenagers when their sense of Southern California entitlement needs to be knocked down a bit. At the 12-15 age, they would be able to do all the horseback riding and roping and such. At 3 and 6, they may be too young to really "get" the experience, but I have never done it, so I don't know for sure.
