Most families consider a vacation to be a rejuventing and much-needed break. However, this is not the case for big families. For families with six or more people, going on vacations can seem more stressful and chaotic than being at home.

One of the most common struggles for big families going on vacation is finding enough available rooms. According to Keiran Simunovic ’16, his family of eight usually needs to “resort” (so to speak)  to renting houses or villas rather than hotels. “One time when we went on vacation, no hotels had big enough rooms, so we had to pick a completely different place to vacation,” Simunovic said.

Eliza Donovan ’16 added, “There are eight people in my family total, so it can be hard to go on vacation because not many places have rooms for eight.”

Aside from the living situation, going on vacation with big families can really hurt the budget. It’s no surprise that the more people you have, the more money you have to spend. From meals to transportation, there are always going to be greater  costs for big families.

“It’s financially hard because the more people you have, the more money you’re forced to spend, especially on meals and flight tickets,” Logan Murphy ’15 said.  “It limits the amount of activities our family can do in order to save as much money as possible.”

Besides the difficult financial situation vacationing puts on big families, Murphy also believes that one of the hardest things to do is to get the whole family together.

“All my siblings are completely different ages. Some are in college, and some are in elementary school, so it’s hard to get a time where everyone’s available,” Murphy said.

Obviously no one’s going to be left out, but this can make it extremely difficult for the family to be able to actually go on vacation. “If not everyone in our family is able to come, we have to move our vacation to a different date and re-plan our entire trip,” Donovan said.

No matter where they go or what they do, vacationing with big families always seems to cause many struggles. “It’s always hard for us, and we may have to be flexible, but, if it means we can all vacation together as a family, it’s worth it,” Donovan said.