Happy New Year, Vietnam!

Sometimes you just need to get away to the beach. A nice beach. Lots of them, in fact. Given the Dominican Republic's relative proximity to the US, combined with affordable accommodations and a wealth of the aforementioned beaches, our travel group chose the Samana' Peninsula as a base of operations for a relaxing beach vacation.

Our motives in traveling to Rio and the Costa Verde were to enjoy some beach vibes and colonial charm. Plus, the opportunity to see famous harbor of Rio de Janeiro and its world-famous beaches was a strong incentive as well.

Since we always head east to see family for Christmas, Thanksgiving became our time to travel wherever we want (just the five of us). Initially we took beach vacations to islands, but then we decided it was time to start exploring the different areas within the United States, more specifically the National Parks.

For this trip, we didn’t have a full week, so we decided to start with three parks that were relatively close to each other.

Also, since my youngest was in fourth grade, we wanted to take advantage of the US Government’s Every Kid Outdoors (everykidoutdoors.gov) program, which provides all fourth graders and their families free access to national parks, lands, and waters for a full year! This is an amazing program—increasing access to outdoor recreation for everyone!