13 Favorite Places To Visit from a Traveling Teen

My firstborn became a teenager today. My anxiety is a bit on overdrive at the thought of raising a teenager in today’s world. For now, we’re marking this momentous occasion on the blog with her writing debut.

Our family travels started with a 5-hour road trip to Las Vegas when she was eight weeks old. 30+ countries, 27 states (+3 US territories) and 11 cruises later, she still has many items to complete on her travel wish list and knows she’s been blessed and quite lucky.

In honor of her 13th birthday, she has chosen her 13 favorite travel destinations. These include attractions, experiences and food. She’s hoping to inspire other teens out there to visit these places too or to put them on their travel bucket list.

Places to Visit with Teenagers

1. Bora Bora. Everyone dreams of traveling to Bora Bora someday. When we arrived in Bora Bora, I was speechless because it was so beautiful. The water was so clear, turquoise and blue. There was even a beach outside of the airport.

My favorite part about staying in the over the water bungalows was that I could go snorkeling or swimming whenever I wanted. I also liked that we could feed the fish from our bungalow. Swimming with sharks and stingrays was my favorite part about going to Bora Bora. It was exciting and fun. Bora Bora is the best place I have travelled to so far, and I hope that I will be returning soon.

2. Venice, Italy. I’ve always wanted to go to Venice, Italy. When I travelled there, I loved it right away. I loved how they didn’t have roads for cars and instead they had bridges, canals and the lagoon as the road.

They also had the best food in Venice. I ate gelato everyday I was there, even if it was cold. The pizza and pasta were also very delicious. My favorite part about traveling to Venice was riding the gondola even though it rained on us. However, we got to tour some beautiful areas of the city.

3. Salzburg, Austria. Anybody who loves the Sound of Music should travel to Salzburg, Austria. Salzburg was an amazing experience especially seeing where they filmed the Sound of Music (one of my favorite movies ever). My family and I did a self-guided tour of the Sound of Music landmarks.

We toured the Mirabell Gardens, where the do-re-mi scene was filmed. It was very fun to redo the do-re-mi scene ourselves. We also saw the gazebo where the 16 going on 17 scene was filmed.

We also went to Mozart’s house and learned some things about him. I love playing the piano and I enjoy playing some of Mozart’s music. He was everywhere in Salzburg!

4. Brisbane and Cairns, Australia. Australia was also another place I have always wanted to go. My favorite part about Australia was going to the Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary in Brisbane.

My family and I got to hold a koala and feed kangaroos and wallabies. We loved the koalas! In Cairns, we got to snorkel in the Great Barrier Reef. The water was really cold, but there were many different types of coral and colorful fish.

Another part I enjoyed about traveling to Australia was visiting Fitzroy Island. I enjoyed seeing the turtles and going to the white sand beaches.

5. Oahu, Hawaii. We love Hawaii and have visited most of the islands but I like Oahu a lot.  Hanauma Bay was one of my favorite parts about traveling to Oahu. The water was really warm, and we saw many types of colorful fish when we snorkeled.

In Oahu, we also went to Dole Plantation. My favorite part about Dole Plantation was drinking Dole Whips. My family and I also went to a luau at Paradise Cove. This was my favorite luau I have been to because there was really delicious food and fun activities for kids, like canoeing and getting Hawaiian tattoos. It was also right by a beautiful beach. Seeing turtles on the beach was my favorite experience about traveling to Oahu.

6. Tokyo, Japan. My family and I watched a bunch of anime movies to prepare ourselves before we went to Tokyo, Japan. We went to Studio Ghibli, which is like a museum for some Japanese anime movies by Hayao Miyazaki. My favorite part about Studio Ghibli was the life size cat bus from My Neighbor Totoro movie. Tokyo DisneySea was my favorite part about Japan.

Tokyo DisneySea is kind of like Disneyland, except everything is water based. My favorite part about Tokyo DisneySea was the two-story carousel. Tokyo Banana was one of my favorite foods that I found in Tokyo. It is kind of like a banana Twinkie. I also enjoyed the many different flavors of Kit Kats that you can’t find anywhere else.

7. Copenhagen, Denmark. Tivoli Gardens was my favorite part about traveling to Copenhagen, Denmark. Tivoli is a theme park based on the stories written by Hans Christian Andersen. Walt Disney got the idea for Disneyland when he traveled to Tivoli.

My favorite part about Tivoli was a ride called The Flying Trunk. This ride included all the characters from the Hans Christian Andersen stories.

We also saw The Little Mermaid. The Little Mermaid is a statue of a mermaid from one of Hans Christian Andersen’s stories, which we love reading. Danish cookies were my favorite food from Copenhagen.

8. Iceland. One of my favorite experiences from visiting Iceland was swimming in the Blue Lagoon. The Blue Lagoon is a natural hot spring, and it felt like a big hot tub. I liked how there was an indoor and outdoor area and waterfalls.

Seeing the puffins was another part I enjoyed about traveling to Iceland. My family and I had to take a boat to get to a separate island where the puffins were. We couldn’t go on the island because we would scare the puffins away, but they were so fun to watch. My favorite food from Iceland was the chocolate filled licorice.

9. Orlando, Florida. I recently visited Orlando, Florida to go to the Disney World and Universal Studios parks. I went to Animal Kingdom, Epcot, Universal Studios, and Islands of Adventure.

My favorite park at Disney World was Epcot because it felt like you were traveling the world, and they had really good food. My favorite park at Universal Studios was Islands of Adventure especially the Wizarding World of Harry Potter land because of all the rides and the butter beer. We drank a lot of butter beer.

10. Paris, France. Paris is one of my all-time favorite places. My favorite part about Paris was the food. Some of my favorite foods from Paris are crepes, macarons, and baguette. The Eiffel Tower was beautiful especially seeing it lit up at night.

I saw the Mona Lisa at the Louvre. It was smaller than most people would expect it to be, but it was really pretty and amazing to see such a famous piece of artwork. I also visited the Notre Dame Cathedral. My favorite part about the Notre Dame was the gargoyles and the stain glass windows inside the cathedral.

11. London, England was another place on my travel wish list. My favorite part about London was the Warner Bros. Studio London – The Making of Harry Potter tour. I enjoyed getting to see how they made all the Harry Potter movies.

My favorite part about the tour was the seeing the Hogwarts castle because it was really beautiful and amazing how they built it. Another part I liked about London was riding the London Eye. The London Eye is a Ferris wheel, and you can see all of London when you ride it.

Stonehenge was very fascinating because nobody knows what Stonehenge really symbolizes. We also loved seeing Big Ben and visiting the Hamleys Toy Shop which is the oldest toy store in the world.

12. Fiji. We traveled to Fiji last summer and loved it. My family and I took a speedboat along the Sigatoka River. This was my favorite part about visiting Fiji because we got to meet and visit the Fijian kids, helped them and we saw how they lived.

Riding the speedboat was exciting because we got to see Fiji’s beauty. We also go to do these spins at the end which was so much fun. I also enjoyed going to South Seas Island.

My favorite part about visiting South Sea Island was snorkeling and getting to relax on the hammocks all day. It was like having our own private island.

13. Bavaria, Germany. Germany is a place that I really hope to travel back to one day. It was really beautiful with so many things to do. Seeing the castles was my favorite part about visiting Germany.

The castles I visited were Schloss Herrenchiemsee, Schloss Nymphenburg, and Neuschwanstein Castle. Neuschwanstein was my favorite castle because it was the prettiest one. Some of my favorite foods in Germany were Haribo gummies, Ritter and Kinder chocolates, and the giant pretzels.

*Have you visited any of these places? Are these on your travel wish list?

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