Not Sleepless in Seattle!

We leave San Francisco laden with college materials--the same way you're loaded with hotel and destination information on fam trips!

And as Virgin America flight begins its descent into Seattle, we get our first of many views of Mt. Ranier as it rises above the clouds. It's positively mythic. We're on Day Five.

Day Four

Yesterday was Day Four of our four-city, five-day, seven-school college fam tour. Virtual tours are starting to look damn good!!

Discipline is starting to slip; we leave for our first information session of the day half an hour later than we meant to, but make it with two minutes to spare. Bay area traffic is more forgiving than LA traffic. Or at least it is today.

It is a refreshingly succinct information session. "We don't look at grades from ninth grade," the admissions officer tells us. (I make a mental note to share this fact with a friend whose son did not have his best year in ninth grade).

Someone asks about interviews. I close my eyes, hoping that none are available. I am pretty sure that I asked about interviews when I reserved this session two months ago when my daughter was on an internship in mountains beyond the reach of cell phone service, but you never know what detail I might have miseed.

"We call you to schedule interviews." the admissions officer says. "Oh thank goodness!" I say to myself.

This is apparently news to other parents as well.

"When do we schedule interviews?" one asks.

The admissions officer explains again.
"We call you to schedule interviews." Apparently, they don't even start the interviews until November.

I LOVE this! They just do the job for you! Other parents more conscientious and detail-oriented than I triple-check this; two more ask when they can call to schedule interviews and the admissions officer politely explains the process.

This is, by the way, school that accepts six percent of its applicants.

I recall the suggestion of another dad a day or two earlier: rank schools by their acceptance rates.

As a matter of fact, it turns out that Google, which happened to be founded in a a dorm room not far from where I was sitting yesterday, conveniently--and automatically--presents three pieces of information about schools when you google them: mascot, location and the percentage of applicants it accepted last year!

Boy,the internet is a wonderful thing!!

Our next stop: a school that, I learn later when I google it, last year accepted 56% of its applicants.

But, with one tour and info session under our belts, before we leave for the next one, we have to find a lunch spot. I head back into the admissions office, where an admissions officer is in an intense conversation with an entire family.

"I would recommend go deep," I hear her say.

I hang back, so as not to intrude,but she notices me.

"Do you have a quick question?" she asks.

"Yes," I say. "Where is the closest In- N-Out Burger, please?"

Following Marilyn Monroe

Two days, four schools. This is day three and it is time to take a break. No college visits today. Instead, we head from the beach to the canyons to indulge at the .... Hotel Bel Air.

Whoa. I know. Not in the same league as the Country Inn. But, when you're in the travel business ... sometimes you land in legendary resorts.

We drive up a narrow, windy, leafy road in the darkness and pull into the entrance, to be met by two gracious, patient staffers. We check in, not in the lobby but in our room! Which is amazing--it has its own yard, a glassed in sunroom (or tonight, a moon room, I can see the moon shining through the leaves).


This wows my daughter, who's been doing hotel tours for her entire life.

"Why didn't we come sooner?" she asks.

Then, we explore the hotel, which is set into the side of the canyon, like an Anasazi ruin. Except it's pink---pink walls, explosions of pink bougainvillea. We climb the stairs from one level to another, getting glimpses of little hidden nooks, flames in a fireplace on some of the balconies and the lights of mansions twinkling on the opposite side of the canyon.

Then, we repair to the bar. I have my first martini--a peach martini. It is great! My daughter has a fizzy berry drink.

Next day: gym workouts.

And then?

My daughter gets locked in the bathroom. I have to crawl in through the window and land in the bathtub to help her with the latch.

We never totally shut the bathroom door again. But who would want to in a bathroom with a TV to watch while you're luxuriating in the bathtub, a rain shower and really amazing toiletries.

Cool as the bathroom might be, we have to see the hotel in daylight. In quintessential southern California style, its layout blurs the lines between indoor and outdoor.

Get this: the dining room floor is heated in the winter; that's how most of theof the dining room can be outdoors. And even though the heat was blasting us in the afternoon, the evening breeze means we put on sweaters.

And in the lobby, I am completely absorbed by an outsized book about Marilyn.

She lived there multiple times and I can see why.

Below: Hercules, one of the three swans in residence at the Bel Air.

Hercules, the resident swan at the Hotel Bel-Air

And, guess what? When the hotel's marketing director finds out we're doing a college tour, she tells us about her alma mater. And we visit it!

L.A. Driving 101

Los Angeles is packed with beautiful, thoughtful small liberal arts colleges that deliver incredible opportunity to students. My problem: driving there. Here’s Driving in L.A. 101.

I am so focused on getting into the correct lane for getting on to the 405 that I head south instead of north! It takes us a while to realize that we’re headed in the wrong direction--but we correct it surprisingly easily.

Then, one motorcycle accident--incredibly, the motorcyclist was clearly fine, but I nearly had a heart attack when another motorcylist squeezed in between me (nearly grazing the sideview mirror) and the emergency vehicle blocking the lane where the wrecked motorcycle lay.

One more accident (three cars) and one car fire later--again, everyone appeared uninjured--and I say to my daughter, “Forget it hon, you’re not going to school in LA.”

We arrive at stop No. 1. 40 minutes late.

“Uh,” I say to the young man at the admissions desk, “we were aiming for the 9 a.m. tour but …”

He smiles and says, “Welcome to southern California traffic!”

“Well,” I confess, “we took some wrong turns, too.

I meet a mother touring with her 17-year-old and towing her 9-year-old. With her long, streaked blond hair, she looks like the quintessential Southern California girl. But she is from Minneapolis and went to St. Olaf’s!! We talk allergies (if you’re of northern European descent and live in the verdant upper Midwest, it’s a fact of life) and In -n-Out Burgers.

As the tour winds up and the ever helpful admissions staff asks if there are any more questions, I ask for the location of the closest In-n-Out Burger.
It has not one but two drive-in windows and a clerk taking orders. It’s very efficient and I marvel at the bright and cheery staff. “Why wouldn’t they be?,” says my daughter, “look at what they’re serving!”

Yes, they are making people happy with those high-fat burgers and fluffy shakes.

But, major mistake in having that before a college tour in 95-degree Southern California heat. The tour guides are always so enthusiastic and their audience so subdued--parents afraid to talk for fear of humiliating their children, kids not talking for whatever reasons. So, I always try to be very smiley and non-verbally responsive. But post one In-n-Out Burger lunch, it is all I can do to to stay upright, much less look attentive. I do, however, have a nice conversation with a mother from Switzerland. Once in the college's air-conditioned library, I get a brief energy surge and do manage to ask the question that is always uppermost in my mind, thanks to my own college career back in the days when you could drink everything at age 18: Where do students drink beer today?

Answer, they manage.

End of the day: we swing over to our L.A. surfer and fitness queen Carrie’s house and head to the beach for a workout and a swim.

In Garrison Keilor's Backyard

Northfield, Minn., is a college town. The desk clerk who checks us in at the Country Inn goes to St. Olaf’s and loves it. And one of the barristas at my new favorite coffee shop, the Goodbye Blue Monday Coffee House, loves Carleton.

And I make new friends on my run--at the morning coffee klatch outside the coffee house, where about eight gentlemen are sitting out on the sidewalk chatting away. They’re so cute, I want to take their photo--and they let me, as long as I pose with them. Sounds fair to me! And the other thing I like about them is that one has a huge handlebar mustache, which make me hope that he is preparing for Northfield’s Defeat Jesse James Day, an annual three-day event commemorating the day the townspeople foiled a robbery attempt by Jesse James and his gang.


Every Labor Day weekend, the town restages the robbery as part of a three-day event that includes tractor pulls, bike races, fun runs, parades, a carnival and an award named after the man who did the most to help foil the robbery--Joseph Lee Heywood, the acting cashier. He paid for his heroism with his life. He left a small daughter who ulimately went to Carleton College. According to one version of the story, both schools had money in the bank and many believe neither would have survived the loss of their funds (this was before the advent of FDIC insurance) had the robbers made off with the money.

In a classic example of Midwestern sensibilities, each year, the town holds a memorial ceremony to hone the two men who died--Heywood and town resident Nicholas Gustavson, whose limited English meant he didn’t understand the shouts to take cover.

Shopping in America

If the Mall of America isn't contributing substantially to the dozen or so schools within an hour's drive of this mega center, the development departments of all Twin Cities schools should be calling them now.

It is not possible to just land in the Twin Cities, pick up your car and drive past the Mall to your hotel.

So, we stop, shop--and buy.

But even if you don't shop, it's still worth a stop, just to see the parachute ride, the roller coaster and all of the other carnival rides! There's even a water ride! Frankly, it's better than Circus Circus in Vegas.

College Fam Trip!

In the travel agent world, which I cover for my day job, there is an institution called "the fam trip." It's short for "familiarization trip."

If you're a travel agent, you go on these trips to learn about hotels, restaurants, day trips and the general ambience of a destination. You troop in and out of hotels, taking notes and photos, so you don't get them mixed up. It's kind of a forced march, but, they can be fun.

And I'm using the skills acquired on fam trips and press trips on a whole series of college fams with my daughter, who soon -- too soon for me but not soon enough for her--will be a high school senior.

You can come along for the ride for our latest:  two states, four cities, seven schools.