Meet Angela Douglas | Travel Family Influencers and Travel Agent

We had the good fortune of connecting with Angela Douglas and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Angela, how did you come up with the idea for your business?
Prior to having kids, we had always been big travelers. Collectively, we had traveled to Europe, Asia, Central America, and the Caribbean. We loved the excitement felt when boarding a plane for a country we had never visited. One of the best feelings ever, is that of hearing the language spoken by the flight attendants on the plane switching from English to something new. We had our first son Nixon, in April of 2012. He was born in Colorado, where we still currently live. Unfortunately, all of our extended family either live in California or Illinois, we were overwhelmed new parents, both working full time jobs, without family support. Despite having our hands full, we still wanted more children. We had our daughter Madden, in January of 2014 and finally our youngest son Nash, in October of 2015.
In order to visit our large families, all of our children traveled as infants. There were flights that we entered the airport with 4 suitcases, a stroller, two car seats, a booster seat, snacks, cold milk, breastmilk and two backpacks. It definitely was not easy, but it was doable and the more we traveled the more we learned. We baggage checked our car seats so that we had less to carry through the airport. We made little treats with notes in them explaining that we had three young kids and we apologized if they were loud or cried. We had bought a stroller than sat two kids and we found that we could sit the third kid on the handlebar if positioned just right. All of the planning and stress that traveling with three little kiddos brought, was outweighed by the experiences they were having when we traveled. Even though our kiddos were still very little they were exploring and learning something new with every adventure. We saw sea life in San Diego, the bean in Chicago, Mickey at Disneyland, and skied in Breckenridge.
In December of 2017, with our youngest just turning 2, we decided to travel internationally with our kids for the first time. We were going to explore The Dominican Republic. We were going to explore La Romana, Punta Cana, and Santo Domingo. We had specific questions regarding international travel with younger children. In researching where we would be going, where we would be staying and what we would be doing, we noticed that there was not the information that we were looking for. We also searched YouTube videos for what we were looking for and were unsuccessful through that route as well. This is when we decided to create Perfect Misadventures. We started with the blog and expanded to the YouTube Channel and Instagram. We wanted to answer travel questions for other families traveling with younger children. We wanted to show families that travel is possible with children of any age. Since we started in 2018, we have had many families message us travel questions and still others thanking us for the information we have provided. We know we have helped many traveling families explore the world, which was always our goal.

Alright, so let’s move onto what keeps you busy professionally?

Breaking out in the family travel YouTube and blogging world was much harder than we initially thought. Many times, we would create an amazing YouTube video and it would not get as many views as we had wanted. Then there were other times that we created a shorter video and it would get many views. We knew we were onto something with the content we were creating, yet our hardest mountain to climb, was to get the right eyes viewing the right videos.
In December of 2019, we visited Hotel Xcaret in Playa del Carmen. After our trip, we created a YouTube video detailing our stay at the resort, which is a massive property. We think of this resort as Disneyland in Mexico. They have 8 parks that guests can visit and the price of these parks is included in the resort cost. When we posted this video, it instantly took off. We were receiving so many views and comments and were very excited. This was our first video that was seen by many.
Following that video, we were contacted by a large travel company and asked to visit one of their resorts in Mexico. They wanted us to create a YouTube video and Instagram content. This was several months after the pandemic had started and we had not yet started to travel. We were nervous, but decided to take a chance and signed the contract. Two weeks later, we found ourselves at an all-expense paid resort in Cancun for a week. It was our first paid assignment and we poured our heart and soul into that video.
We have had several travel assignments since that initial trip and want to continue the forward momentum. Our current challenges are COVID and finding time to travel between our children’s school schedule and our dad’s work schedule. We will continue to create content for our followers, especially in this time of uncertain travel. It is more important know than ever, that we help travel families with young children navigate COVID testing, masking protocols and the opening and closing of borders. We know we started something great in 2018 and we cannot wait to see what 2022 brings.

Let’s say your best friend was visiting the area and you wanted to show them the best time ever. Where would you take them? Give us a little itinerary – say it was a week long trip, where would you eat, drink, visit, hang out, etc.
We absolutely love Colorado! Our favorite time of the year is definitely fall, as the leaves changing colors are absolutely beautiful. We love to have family and friends visit us in September and October, as the weather is just starting to cool off. This is the perfect time for a Rockies game at Coors Field. This Field has the absolute best views of the Colorado Sunset and The Rockies always put on a great game. Prior to the game we would recommend grabbing a bite to eat at Union Station, which has been recently restored. It is full or shops and small restaurants and holds much of Downtown Denver’s history. Denver also has plenty of hop on and hop off electric scooters around the town available for rent. We would definitely love to have our guests rent these with us as we fly back to Coors Field. Another fun place we love to spend the day is Golden. It is the perfect college town with Coors Brewery sitting right in the middle. If the weather is warm enough, we will bring tubes to the river and take a ride down. This can be a bit dangerous at times, with a strong current, so we definitely recommend this for adults and older children. After the river, we would take a short tour of Coors Brewery, as this is always a highlight for out-of-town guests. Post tour, they give out three of the freshest beers to guests in their tasting room. Those activities generally make us fairly hungry, so a stop at the all you can eat pizza buffet is always on our to do list. Woody’s Wood Fired Pizza, has been tied (with Beau Joe’s Pizza) as our favorite pizza in Colorado. The all you can eat pizza, definitely makes our children happy.
As a family of skiers, we love to take visitors to the mountains. We are roughly 2-3 hours from the slopes and our favorite ski towns. We love to spend the weekend in Breckenridge, Keystone, or Crested Butte. We stay on the mountain and walk to the lifts. We generally park our car and don’t have to move it the entire weekend as we walk to the delicious mom and pop restaurants, the little shops, and the slopes.
There are so many other places we love and love to take visitors to in Colorado. For example, there is an entire week of activities in Colorado Springs that we could enjoy. Great Wolf Lodge, Garden of the Gods, Manitou Springs, the Cheyenne Zoo, the Broadmoor, are some of our favorites. Our little town of Castle Rock, has also impressed many of our friends and family. It has a small-town feel, with local hikes, great restaurants, fun events, and beautiful red and orange sunsets. I hope this gives an idea of how much we love our state and how much there is to do here.

Who else deserves some credit and recognition?
We love to watch other families living their dreams of traveling the world, specifically, the Bucketlist family and their adventures. They were the travel family trailblazers and showed many families, like us, that it was okay to travel with little kids. We have found inspiration in many of their adventures, including the Maldives and their African Safaris.

Website: https://perfectmisadventures.com

Instagram: @perfectmisadventures

Youtube: Perfect Misadventures

Image Credits
The feature family shot was taken by Photographer: Kristin Camfferman All other photos were taken by Angela Douglas