We Had to Ask . . .

· Basic food. As for road food, cheese rules. Erin Landry, 9, Adam's sister, still remembered a grilled cheese sandwich she once had on vacation. Sullivan Sweet highly recommended the macaroni and cheese at Noodles & Company, a chain his family has stopped at on car trips. "It doesn't make you feel sick," he said.

Vacation Dislikes

· Museums. Nearly everyone agreed that, although parents talk them up, museums are a vacation land mine. Adam Landry summed up the general feeling: "People try to make you look at art. I'm not an art person. I hate it."

Will Clansky said he's sick of "paintings hung on walls. Sometimes they can be totally random pictures. A bed of flowers that's supposed to mean something. Instead I'd pick paintings of either sports or army. Of people who really knew what it was like having bombs dropped on you."

Nick Giuricich, 14, Jack's brother, offered some thoughts on improving museum selection and display. "If museums put more space between pictures," he said, "it would be better. Some have a million in one place. And sometimes they paint the same portrait or the same scene over and over. When you get older, people seem to like old stuff. I like modern things."

· Cathedrals. Visiting cathedrals didn't electrify the panel, though certain trimmings seemed to make looking at architecture more fun. Jack Giuricich said he likes "onion-shaped domes on top of churches," something he and his family saw in St. Petersburg. Nate O'Donnell remembered a "big, boring cathedral" he saw in San Jose, Calif., but said "it got better when I noticed there was some art way up on the ceiling instead of just on the walls. Also, when I saw all the stained glass. Stained glass is cool."

· Outdoorsy stuff. Kids like nothing more than camping, right? I figured you couldn't go far wrong if you arranged a trip to the mountains or out on a lake. Um, guess not. Outdoorsy trips were a frost for my group. "No, I really don't like fishing," Erin Landry said. "I like fish. We used to have a fish named Rocket, but he died."

Isabel Deixel and her sister, Sophie, 10, complained that when they went out West three summers ago, their parents "always wanted to go to these deserted places." Isabel said: "When we were driving through Yellowstone, they kept stopping at every single hot spring they saw. The same if they saw even one animal. It could be just an elk or something under a tree."

"When you're going somewhere outside," Emily Barkan said, "it always seems like it's about to rain. Then you have to leave. When it comes to camping or fishing, there's too much sitting around. You have to sit there and wait. I can't sit in one place for a long time."

Also, tents are bad ("they drip on you").