Seeing the sights in San Francisco is an family adventure waiting to happen. Cable cars climb steep hills so you don’t have to. Segways glide through Golden Gate Park, bikes roll along the waterfront, and now classic VW Beetle convertibles will have you turning heads during a family visit to San Francisco with kids.

It’s relatively easy to fill your days on a family trip to San Francisco. Most don’t even need a guide book to put together the basic must see, must do list. But after you’ve walked on the Golden Gate Bridge, escaped from Alcatraz and jumped on a Cable Car, take the kids to Golden Gate Park.

I’m like most parents in the sense that it’s rare I get good stretches of quality one-on-one time with my girls. Could I do a better job of making it happen? Absolutely, but it seems as though something always gets in the way.

When I was invited to take my teen on the Chevrolet Volt Sunshine Road Trip, I cleared the calendar, no excuses.

Last winter my 7th grade daughter brought home information about the school trip to Washington, DC. She wanted to go, but said she’d rather do DC with the family instead of her friends. Once the shock wore off, I started planning almost instantly. Being organized is the key to exploring DC with the kids.

Plan Ahead & Reserve, Reserve, Reserve

Unless your kids are fans of waiting in long lines, do your homework. Have a family discussion, decide what you’d like to do and get busy …

Exploring places off the beaten path is one of my favorite things about traveling. But planning a family vacation with a tour operator makes that a little difficult. It’s hard for a destination to have that undiscovered, almost exotic allure when you’re walking in a group of 30 or more. Hard, but not impossible.

When we went on our family trip to China, Guilin amazed us all. It was the part of the tour that lead us to the Li River, in other words, tourist central …

I read an article recently about the rapidly dwindling number of California sea otters (they don’t know why this is the case yet) that left me sad. As a native Northern Californian, I grew up appreciating our spectacular coastline from Monterey to Big Sur. This is home to the much-adored sea otter.

The Northern California Wine Country has a reputation for many fabulous things, but being family-friendly isn’t one of them. Wine tasting with kids is do-able, but different. And though wine is obviously the toast of the town, kids have a new, fast-flying reason to celebrate when they visit.

Move over grapevines, some towering Redwoods have a new view of wine country to share. Ziplining is a favorite activity in family vacation spots like Cabo San Lucas and Costa Rica. Now, the California wine country …

The countdown is on and there’s shopping to be done. The good news is many companies have finally figured out traveling families can mean big business, so more and more products that make parents (and kids) lives a little easier on the road are showing up every day.

We’ve broken down the gift list by age group. Nancy Solomon covers gifts for babies, toddlers, and school age kids and Dana …

Make sure you let your teens bring along their electronics so they can keep in touch with their friends and amuse themselves with the apps when driving or waiting around.

Tell them to make sure they leave lots of time and set aside plenty of money for shopping! Clothes make the best souvenirs. Let your teens buy clothes they can wear to school or out with friends, not just tacky tee shirts.

Does this sound like a dream not reality?

Kids’ clubs can be an essential amenity for parents seeking downtime on vacation, particularly at resort properties where families spend the bulk of their time onsite. Many parents hesitate to use kids’ programs because they don’t want to feel guilty that they are “dumping” their kids into glorified daycare or they feel uncomfortable leaving their kids in an unknown environment.

Good news: It is possible to have …