Standard or Family trip?

[Alura21]

Hello!

I'm currently in the middle of researching of going on the ABD Egypt trip as a big 35th birthday splurge. While I most likely will be going by myself, I find myself torn between the standard "all ages" ones and the adult-exclusive. My one worry about the adult-exclusive is that the age range of those will be more retirement folks vs maybe family that are a bit closer to my age range. Has anyone done either the standard or the adult exclusive and what did you think about them?

 

[thanxfornoticin]

We've done 2 adult-only ABD trips, both to Asia. On those trips, the age range was probably early 20s to 70s. Overall, the average age was probably 45-50 if I had to guess. We did adult trips for 2 primary reasons. We preferred the time of year they're offered, and we prefer to have a more adult approach than worry about 1/3rd of the group being grade school kids. We have zero against the kids or families - we have traveled for years with our kids! But we're at a point now where we're older and it's our preference. Looking back, I think the younger families on our trips had no issue traveling and dining with any of the older groups - but I cannot actually speak to their view of their experiences.

Hopefully someone will give you their experience on the trips they've done with kids, or with travel groups with kids. But if you're doing Egypt, you might want to take the time of year and potential weather into account just as much as kids or no kids. Gotta say, the Egypt trip is on our list for a future trip! Looks awesome. Good luck with your planning.

 

[sayhello]

I have done both Adults Only trips and Family trips. The times I've done the Family trips were because either someone I was joining on the trip preferred that date or the trip was not available as an Adults Only (like the Med Cruise add-on and the first year of the Danube River Cruise).

While I had a perfectly fabulous time on those Family trips, I still prefer the Adults Only trips, and that's what the majority of trips I've done have been.

I agree with what @thanxfornoticin said about the Adults Only trips.

I tend to prefer shoulder season trips, which mostly end up being Adults Only. For a long time they were also generally much smaller groups in the shoulder season.

I also have *nothing* against children. Luckily, most of the children on the trips I've done have been seasoned travelers. But I just find I like the atmosphere of the Adults Only trips better. I find that people allow themselves to be more "child-like" when they don't have to worry about Adulting for the kids. And the Adventure Guides interact a bit differently when they're herding adults vs having to spread themselves out over taking care of the adults *and* herding the kids. Again, there was nothing wrong with any of the Family trips I've done, I just prefer the Adults Only.

I've found that the age ranges for the Adults Only trips really varies a lot. Some of the trips, it's skewed older (50's to 70's), but some have also had several younger people in their 30's to 40's. Plus there's frequently people traveling with their adult children (usually in their 20's). And really just everything in between. The Adventure Guides are really good at making sure everyone is covered, and that people who are slower for whatever reason don't hold back everyone in the group, and that those who are more athletic don't stress out those who aren't. It's one of the reasons I love ABDs. The range of activities and people is part of what keeps it interesting.

I mean, it's always possible you might end up being the youngest people on the trip (although you didn't indicate how old you are). But I don't know that I would consider that to be a problem. My first "big" trip was an Alaskan cruise many (MANY) years ago, and I was by far one of the youngest adults on the trip, and I still had a great time. But that's just me. YMMV.

Sayhello

 

[DollyM]

I’ve only been on adult exclusive trips. In my experience, the average age on the trips in the US and Europe was noticeably older than the average age on the others (China, South Africa, Egypt).

 

[abdgeek]

I always travel solo and will do my 11th ABD the end of the year. While I’ve looked at the Adult Exclusive ABDs, I’ve never booked one because I can only travel during school breaks.

I have never had an issue with the family trips. Everyone is friendly and you can be as involved with the other families as you want or do your own thing. As has been mentioned, the guides do a great job of matching you up at dinner, group excursions, or other meals with people they feel you will gel with. I typically do pre and post nights on my own to see sites the ABD isn’t visiting. I also normally pre schedule (dinner, museums, etc.) what I want to do if there is free time during the day. My family prefers that I travel with a group when I travel internationally. That way they have piece of mind and I get to travel with a clear conscience. The only thing to keep in mind is that some families treat the trips as their individual vacation and don’t want to mingle with others unless they have to. As long as you’re ok being a solo traveler with all it entails, choose whichever works best for your schedule.

 

[AquaDame]

I’ve only been on adult exclusive trips. In my experience, the average age on the trips in the US and Europe was noticeably older than the average age on the others (China, South Africa, Egypt).

That makes sense.. generally younger folk will be more comfortable OYO with their own culture than internationally (or at least see the bigger benefit of extra hand holding when it's not their own backyard). We've yet to do a tour aside from BSM in the US with any company, but we've done five group tours so far, two more private, and are doing another ABD in January internationally and a tour with Viking next Nov to Egypt and Jordan. We are early 40s now. Once driving around becomes cumbersome, or if one of us were ever solo, we'd maybe do one in the US/Canada.

I cannot deny the adult ABD we were on skewed older, but there were a few groups of college grads there as well as other 30s couples on that one. In all cases the majority of folk have been celebrating big milestone birthdays, anniversaries, or retirements, frankly, but there ARE younger folk on them too. The family one we did to the Arctic was younger but the parents on them were understandably busy so we still ended up interacting mostly with older folk and the other oddball couples that had the vacation time and inclination to take that kind of trip.

 

[JRM815]

With my children now in their early 20's, we have done a couple of adults only with them and several more standard family ABD trips. The biggest difference I have noticed is that the adventure guides have more time discussing with you the place you are visiting versus them having to round up roaming kids. As to the average ages, it seemed to me you have more folks at the two ends of the age spectrum with the standard trips, where you see multi-generational groups (kids, parents, and grandparents) traveling together. The adults only trips had more folks in the 30 to 65 y/o range, but admittedly that could have been a function of the destination and scheduled events on the trip versus a generic adults only/family trip split. There certainly were some trips we have taken that I did not think kids would enjoy as much as the adults would and vice versa, largely because some trips have more of a history/art component versus an outdoors/nature component.