Traveling with young kids is never easy, but it’s always an adventure and worth the memories made! My kids are 1 and 6 and I try to pick destinations that are easy to get to, lots of activities for kids and good weather is always a bonus, which is why we recently went to Long Beach, CA for our winter vacation. They are so many fun things to do with kids in Long Beach, CA and wanted to share what we did while we were there.
From Seattle, a flight to Long Beach is only 2 and a half hours and when you are traveling with a baby or toddler, the short flight is a definite win! We flew directly into Long Beach airport which is a beautiful, open air airport. Layla was so excited to get off the airplane and directly be outside! It’s the little things like this that make me love traveling with my kids as it’s so fun to see what they get excited about.
This post is in partnership with Visit Long Beach. All opinions are my own.
From the moment we got in the car and started driving, I knew we were going to love our vacation there! We left a gray, rainy Seattle to a perfectly warm (to us) no jacket needed climate, which we all were so happy about. The warm weather allowed us to plan full days of activities outdoors.
Where to stay in Long Beach with kids
We stayed at Hotel Maya which is a gorgeous hotel overseeing the water. We rented a car and I loved how close everything was. We could get to everything, from the water to downtown, to all the restaurants and activities within a 15 minute drive. The hotel room was very spacious for the 4 of us and the food was amazing! They have a restaurant inside the hotel that looked great, but when traveling with kids, eating out at restaurants for every meal can be a bit tough. We ended up ordering room service and having a cozy little meal in our room but my husband and I agreed that it was the best room service meal we had ever gotten!
The hotel has a private beach right on their property! I can’t wait to come back and enjoy the beach when it’s warmer.
Fun things to do with kids in Long Beach, CA
Pow Wow Murals
Downtown Long Beach has a lot of fun things to do, but one of our favorites was to spot all the beautiful murals! These murals are part of Pow Wow Long Beach and you can go on their website to see all the murals and locations. All the murals are so unique and beautiful and of course, a great photo opp!
Aquarium of the Pacific
My oldest, just loves animals so I knew a trip to the aquarium was required. I had heard a lot of great things about the Aquarium of the Pacific, and I completely agree, it was one of the best aquariums we have ever been to! Not only did we get to see all sorts of beautiful fish, we also saw penguins, sea otters and even got to interact with these beautiful birds!
You can buy a little cup of nectar to feed them and it was the funniest thing to walk in and immediately get swarmed by birds. When I first walked in I had at least 10 on me! This little one stuck by and got to eat up until another one landed on my husband’s arm while he was taking my photo and then they both had to share! It was hilarious and so fun!
Lion Lighthouse
The Lion Lighthouse is a short walk from the aquarium and so worth it! The walk there is beautiful and spacious. And once you get to the lighthouse you have the most beautiful view of Long Beach! Layla loved running up and down the hills and along the boardwalk.
Christmas in Long Beach
I loved that we got to visit during the holidays as we got to do so many fun Christmas activities. Our favorite had to be the Queen Mary Christmas. The Queen Mary is worth a trip itself and I wish I had gotten a photo of the boat but trust me when I tell you that it’s something that can’t be captured on camera, you just have to see it for yourself! For Christmas they had a ton of fun activities including ice skating, a merry go round, making your own stockings and so many other activities that the kids loved. We did all of that and then even got to visit and take photos with Santa! We spent so much time there doing everything and really enjoyed it. This wrapping paper room was so fun to take photos in!
Shopping at Shoreline Village
You can’t do Christmas without some shopping right? We headed to Shoreline Village to pick up some presents for family and friends and we weren’t disappointed! All the shops there are so unique and fun to browse. We picked up some great souvenirs for ourselves too! There’s even a great arcade with lots of games and a merry go round to entertain the kids. It’s right by the water so it’s just fun to walk around and I love how brightly colored all the buildings are. We had lunch at Tequila Jack’s and I highly recommend it! The salad I got was fresh and so full of flavor and they had a great kid’s menu which I always appreciate for my picky little eater.
Pike Outlets – don’t miss Snowopolis!
We also took the kids to Pike Outlets one afternoon as it ended up raining for a little bit. It’s kind of funny as it rarely rains in Long Beach, but apparently we brought the Seattle rain with us! We never mind a little rain and it was the perfect spot to hang out for an hour.
We stumbled upon the most amazing milk shake and shave ice shop! Snowopolis did not disappoint with their unicorn milkshake. We don’t let Layla indulge in treats like this at home so having something like this on vacation, made her day! I loved just seeing her face when it came out!
One of my favorite things was seeing all the Christmas decorations but also palm trees everywhere! It’s just not something you see in Seattle, so I loved the change of scenery for us.
Family friendly restaurants in Long Beach
I have no photos of restaurants or food because if you are a parent of a toddler, you will know that meal times are impossible enough to just get them to sit down and eat much less take photos of food! LOL! But I did have to mention that we enjoyed all of our meals in Long Beach. I loved the diversity of cuisine we got to try, from Thai to Mexican to Greek. Every place we went to was very family friendly. Our very favorite of the trip was Michael’s Downtown Italian Kitchen. First of all, I loved the area, it was full of great looking restaurants and shops, this was the street right by the restaurant. Look how cute it is!
The food we had at Michael’s was so so good! From the charcuterie plate to the wood fired pizza, the food was high quality and the staff was so good to our girls. They had games for them to play and our waiter even treated Layla to ice cream! It was such a great dinner and something we still talk about!
I’ll be honest, I wasn’t sure what to expect of Long Beach being that I wasn’t very familiar with it. But it’s such a great spot to take your family, even the littlest ones will love it! One thing that I noticed was that even though we went to a lot of touristy areas, it never felt overcrowded. There was definitely a lot of people around but it was still spacious enough that my girls could run around and enjoy the area without having to worry about them getting in people’s way. If you are not a fan of long lines and crowds, especially during the holiday season, I highly recommend a trip here.
Long Beach is only a 3o minute drive to Disneyland which is where we headed to after and I was so glad that we started our trip in Long Beach as it was so much more relaxing then the craziness of Disneyland. If you are headed that way, make a stop at Long Beach for a few days as there’s so much to do but at the same time, it’s still relaxing and you can really enjoy your vacation! I can’t wait to head back during the summer and hit up some of the beaches my girls!
