Setting Sail with Kids "The sailing itch returned, and my wife and I decided it was time to raise sail again and introduce our brood to the dream." By Josh Holloway There are many romantic visions of family sailing life: sunsets, dolphins, children laughing in the rigging. There are fewer brochures featuring a toddler urinating on a carefully assembled brunch buffet. This is an oversight. Cove and Kai enjoy a swing in the rigging of Tiny Bubbles II in the waters off Maine. The Brunch Incident “Josh, shut off the water!” my wife, Heidi, yelled up to me from the galley. Huh? What water? I thought, as I turned just in time to witness our 1-year-old standing proudly in the cockpit, having repurposed himself into a fully operational fountain. The stream arced gracefully across the entire brunch buffet and, for good measure, continued through the companionway onto my wife. I reacted quickly, which is to say, not quickly enough. I scooped him ...

Disclosure: As an Amazon Associate, Nomadventure earns from qualifying purchases. This post contains affiliate links (#ad), meaning we may receive a small commission at no extra cost to you if you make a purchase through a link. We only recommend gear we actually use. Costa Rica Surf Guide: Best Waves for Every Skill Level (Family Tested, Parent Humbled) 14 breaks from mellow beginner beaches to the wave that locals call "the cheese grater" — plus eight years of honest, hard-won knowledge from a family that moved here in 2016 and never quite left Costa Rica. Where the waves are warm, the children are prodigies, and the parents are excellent documentarians of their own failures. 📋 What's in This Guide 1. Why Costa Rica Ruined Us for Other Surf Destinations 2. Beginner Surf Spots (Sandy Bottoms, Patient Instructors) 3. Intermediate Spots (Where Confidence Meets Humility) 4. Advanced Breaks (Approach With Respect and Insurance) 5. When to Go: Seasons ...

Traveling to Costa Rica With Kids (2026): Caribbean Coast Reality Check for Families Traveling to Costa Rica With Kids (2026): Caribbean Coast Reality Check for Families We moved our family of five to Costa Rica's Caribbean coast when our kids were still in preschool and early elementary school. Here's what we learned — the stuff the polished travel blogs leave out: the good, the complicated, and the parts that will unexpectedly change how your family sees the world. Costa Rica is genuinely one of the best countries in the world for families. That's not marketing copy — it's something we discovered slowly, through hundreds of ordinary days: mornings watching howler monkeys shake the mango tree outside the window while you're trying to make breakfast, afternoons when our kids came home from school muddy, exhausted, and completely alive in a way that was hard to explain to people back home. But here's the thing nobody talks about: your experience de...

Planning a two-week Costa Rica trip with kids sounds overwhelming. We know — we've done it with our family of five, year after year. So we've distilled everything into this day-by-day itinerary that balances adventure, wildlife, surf, and downtime. Whether your kids are toddlers or teenagers, this route delivers. Affiliate Disclosure: Some links in this post are affiliate links. If you purchase through them, I may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. We only recommend gear and services we personally use and love — thanks for supporting Nomadventure! Why 2 Weeks Is the Sweet Spot for Costa Rica Families One week in Costa Rica is too rushed. Three weeks requires serious budgeting. Two weeks gives you time to cover the Pacific Coast, the cloud forest, and a volcano region without spending half your trip in a rental car. It's the itinerary we keep coming back to, before settling into our Caribbean digs. What to Pack Before You Go Before we dive in, here'...

The mullet bus. Business in the front. Pure chaos in the back. No regrets.   We had just sold our sailboat. Maine winter was circling like a creditor. Our family of five — two adults clinging to the dream of being "adventurous people," and three children who had opinions about everything — needed a new plan. We needed warmth. We needed wheels. We needed, apparently, a school bus. There is a moment in every questionable life decision when you think: this is either genius or a cry for help . Buying a school bus and driving it across two countries with children inside it sits somewhere in that grey zone, possibly closer to the cry-for-help end. But here we are, on the other side of it, sun-tanned and slightly smug. We drove our converted school bus — a skoolie , for those not yet initiated — across the United States and deep into Mexico, and we are here to tell you it was one of the best decisions we ever made. Also one of the loudest. ...