Planes, Canes, and Automobiles: Connecting with Your Aging Parents through Travel

Valerie Grubb’s father was a pilot, so she was born with travel in her blood. She began traveling solo at the tender age of four (when she wandered out of eyesight of her house one day), and since then she has continued to make exploring the world a priority while pursuing careers in both operations management and executive coaching. Val and her mom, Dorothy, took their first overseas vacation together when Dorothy was sixty-four, and in the more than twenty years since then, they have logged over 300,000 miles (and counting!). In response to the lack of available resources on the subject of seniors traveling with their adult children, Val began publishing Travel with Aging Parents (www.travelwithagingparents.com) in 2013, a blog that chronicles the triumphs (and challenges) of intergenerational travel with Val’s signature “you-can-do-this” flair.