Welcome to the third edition of SINGLE PARENT TRAVEL e-zines - a continuing series of monthly newsletters created for the community of single parents who like to travel with their kids. These newsletters are designed to make your trips more fun, expand your horizons, and add more value to your Single Parent vacation dollar.

In the first two newsletters I addressed the fact that the needs of single parents traveling with their kids are quite different from those of double parent families. Single Parents need to be twice as organized, twice as patient, and twice as creative. In this newsletter we will discuss the third item - CREATIVITY. Even if you do not consider yourself a creative person, with a little thought, you can come up with some great ideas that will make your trip more fun and educational for everyone. Just let your hair down and try to think out of the box.

I have often heard people say that very young children should not be taken to Europe. "They will not get enough out of it." How do you define enough? And who is defining it? If you define Europe as a series of art museums, yes, that is true, young children would be bored with a steady diet of only that, but then so would adults. And museums are not the only things to see and do in Europe. With a little creativity and a small child you can enjoy much of the culture, history, and local life of Europe.

When my son had just turned five, I took him, and his twelve-year-old sister, on their first trip to Europe. In preparation for that event:

• * We read a number of children's books about Europe, one of the best being a Richard Scarry book that featured stories and illustrations about many countries around the world including some that we planned to visit.
• * I drew pictures of all the types of transportation vehicles we would use and next to each drawing was a series of small boxes so my son could check off a box each time we used that vehicle. Besides trains, planes and double decker buses, I had pictures of cog railways, cable cars, ferry boats, lake cruisers, even a picture of hiking feet!
• * The three of us planned an itinerary together that would include something for everyone. Often we would do a museum visit in the morning, followed by a swim in a local mountain lake. I didn't see as many cultural attractions as I would have liked, but we certainly made new European friends as my children frolicked in the lake or rode paddle boats with the local children, picking up a little French or German along the way.

Certain that my advance preparation had covered everything of interest to my son, I packed up our itinerary and drawings in my fanny pack. On the second day of our trip, while in England, I noticed my son Greg had become fascinated with European toilets. Back in the 70's most European rest rooms and hotel bathrooms still used the old pull cord or some other European system of flush. Once we reached France, Greg was in his glory. Every place we stopped had a different flush system. He insisted I make a new page of drawings so he could check off every kind of flush toilet that we found. Inevitably we encountered the "footprints" style of French toilet, prompting Greg to fire away with all types of scatological questions. By the time we left France, Greg had discovered over 21 different ways to flush a toilet and we had recorded them all. I received a valuable lesson in thinking out of the box and my son easily remembered all the places we visited by the type of toilet flush we found there.

Another way to get creative with your kids is to turn the tables and let them play tour guide. I first tried that when my daughter was twelve years old and we were visiting the Chateau de Chillon, a beautifully preserved castle perched at the edge of a Swiss lake. On a whim I handed her the map of the castle and said "Here, you studied castles in school and you are the Dungeons and Dragons player. You can read a map. You guide us." My daughter rose to the occasion. With the aid of the map, she found and identified each room and explained its purpose. She made a couple of mistakes, but corrected herself later. I was surprised to learn how much she knew about medieval weapons, much more than I. At the end of her "guided tour" her face was all aglow as she said "I really enjoyed that." So did I. Her little brother, on the other hand, had spent much of his time - you guessed it! - looking for remnants of the medieval sanitation system.

Encouraged by our success with the castle tour, I planned our first trip to Arizona so that my son could play tour guide as well. We found some great children's books about Arizona cacti. The Sonoran Desert of Arizona is like a vast botanical garden, so I prepared some simple drawings of a dozen or more prominent Sonoran cacti and labeled each drawing with the name of the cactus. With my drawings stashed in my backpack we set off for our first desert hike with my seven year old son leading and spotting all the cacti he could identify. About twenty minutes into our hike, as I was rubbernecking around to enjoy the view, my son came running back toward me screaming as if I was about to step on a poisonous snake. Just in front of my foot was a four inch high "jumping cholla" plant. Jumping chollas (pronounced choy yah) get their nickname from the fact that the spines of the plant are heat-sensitive and will cling to any warm-blooded animal that approaches the plant. Some people say the spines or needles "jump out" at you. Getting stung is a painful experience, we had read. My son had spotted the baby plant, which I had not. For years after, he reminded me how he was my hero and had "saved" me from a jumping cholla.

A few other creative suggestions are:

• * Bring along a disposable camera or two for the kids to use.
• * Take a diary or a tablet and have each child record their daily impressions over dinner, while waiting for your meal to be served. Better yet, if your child is too young or doesn't want to do it each night, do a two-way or three-way diary in which each of your writes a paragraph or two of his or her daily impressions. The little ones can dictate to you. Trust me, no two people will have the same impressions.
• * Prepare quizzes before you leave - about the culture, the history, the geography - and quiz them before and after the trip.
• * Assign each member of the family a task. Young ones can be baggage counters. It will be his or her responsibility to count suitcases, backpacks, each time you prepare to move on.
• * Research assignments are great. Have a child learn about something they like that you will visit on your trip.
• * If you are traveling overseas, prepare cue cards for foreign languages.

Another creative way to make the trip more fun for your children is to "borrow" a kid. One summer we planned a three week extensive driving trip throughout the American West. My daughter was then a young woman, having finished her first year of college. My son was twelve and still a boy so we "borrowed" an eleven year old neighborhood friend to keep my son company. His friend's parents were thrilled with the idea, and agreed to pay their son's financial share of the trip. Just as importantly, we knew his friend was a good travel companion, an excellent swimmer, (we did some white water rafting on that trip) and was not a whiner. It worked out very well and everyone was still friends when the trip concluded.

The first day of that big American West trip we arrived in Denver Airport late morning and drove our rental car straight to the Denver Museum of Natural History, which I had read was an awesome museum. As we approached the exhibit on Mineralogy, my daughter Monique, fresh from her college course on geology, stepped forward to expound on her research assignment and explain the Doppler Effect to her captive audience - her little brother, his friend, and me. A few minutes later, out of the corner of my eye, I saw a tall distinguished gentleman lurking in the corner with a smile on his face. When my daughter finished her explanation, he approached her, introduced himself as the Curator of the Denver Museum of Natural History and asked my daughter if she was planning to major in one of the science fields. When she replied she was majoring in International Business, he told her it was a great loss to the field of science. He then asked the two boys if they would like to be on TV. Eagerly they agreed and the curator signaled a cameraman to approach and he immediately filmed a segment on Mineralogy for the local Denver TV stations, with the boys acting as the curator's audience. Unfortunately, when the segment aired, we were somewhere in the wilds of Wyoming. Nevertheless the kids all had an ego boost that day and my son's friend had plenty to write in his first day's travel journal.

Next month, before I focus on itineraries and activities, I will talk a bit more about trip preparation and how you can help your children develop some important travel skills, such as map reading, so that you, the parent, do not have to carry the entire load of responsibilities on your single parent vacation.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -- - - - - - - - -- - - - - - -- - - - - - - - -- - On another note, I was contacted by Bev Holmes, who is writing a book about "Runaway Moms," those brave women who have "chucked the workaday, schooladay world, pulled up stakes and taken off to show their children the world. She wants to interview seven or eight inspirational women who are either on the road long-term, or who have settled somewhere unusual and are spending their lives in unusual, but successful (according the them) ways". If you know of any of these women please contact Bev Homes directly via email at: bevkev@telus.net
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POSTING MESSAGES
Feel free to send me your comments, queries or feedback to me directly at: globalbrenda@yahoo.com or to the list directly at: SingleParentTravel@yahoogroups.com. Please note that comments sent to the list must pertain to single parent travel.