About Detour Kids

Family travel guides crafted by parents, for parents · Last updated: May 2026

Our Mission

Detour Kids exists because we believe every family deserves access to trustworthy, detailed travel information that is written specifically for parents traveling with young children. Most travel guides on the internet are created for adult travelers, couples, or solo backpackers. Even guides that claim to be "family-friendly" tend to offer generic suggestions without addressing the real questions parents have: Is there a changing table in the restroom? Will my three-year-old actually enjoy this attraction, or will we spend sixty dollars only to leave after twenty minutes? Is the hotel truly equipped for families, or does "family-friendly" just mean they tolerate children? We started Detour Kids to answer those questions honestly, based on firsthand experience rather than secondhand research. Our founder, Sarah Chen, launched this site after years of frustration with travel resources that ignored the realities of traveling with toddlers and young kids. What began as a personal collection of notes and recommendations has grown into a comprehensive resource covering more than thirty-two cities across the United States, relied upon by thousands of families every month.

What makes Detour Kids different from generic travel sites is our unwavering commitment to the parent-tested, real-experience approach. Every single recommendation on this site has been verified by a parent who visited the destination with their own children. We do not scrape reviews from other platforms, we do not rewrite press releases from tourism boards, and we do not accept paid placements that influence our editorial content. Our guides cover the full spectrum of family budgets, from completely free activities like public parks and museum free-admission days to premium experiences that are genuinely worth the splurge. We include the practical details that other guides skip entirely: stroller accessibility, proximity to clean restrooms, noise levels, wait times during different seasons, and whether a restaurant will actually welcome your toddler or just tolerate them with a forced smile. We believe that when parents have access to accurate, detailed information, family travel becomes joyful instead of stressful, and that belief drives everything we publish.

How We Create Our Guides

Our editorial process is rigorous and multi-layered, designed to ensure that every piece of content on Detour Kids meets the highest standards of accuracy and usefulness for families. The process begins with destination research. Before we ever visit a city, our editorial team spends weeks gathering preliminary information from local tourism boards, parent forums, community groups, and established travel publications. We compile a list of potential attractions, restaurants, hotels, and neighborhoods to evaluate, prioritizing those that are most likely to be genuinely enjoyable and practical for families with children ages two through ten. This preliminary research phase helps us create a structured evaluation framework for each destination, so that when we arrive, we know exactly what to look for and how to assess each recommendation against consistent criteria.

The next phase is the on-the-ground visit. Our editors and contributing writers travel to each destination with their own families, spending a minimum of three to five days experiencing the city as a typical visiting family would. During these visits, we evaluate attractions based on a standardized checklist that includes factors such as age-appropriateness, accessibility for strollers and young walkers, availability of restrooms and changing facilities, wait times, noise levels, shade and shelter availability, food options, cost, and overall enjoyment for both children and parents. Hotels are assessed on family-specific criteria including crib and rollaway bed availability, suite layouts, pool safety, breakfast quality, proximity to attractions, and soundproofing between rooms. Restaurants are evaluated on kids' menu quality, high chair availability, service speed, allergen accommodation, outdoor seating options, and the overall atmosphere for families. We take detailed notes and photographs throughout every visit, and we document both the highlights and the disappointments with equal thoroughness.

After the visit, our editorial process includes a comprehensive fact-checking and verification stage. Every recommendation is cross-referenced against current online reviews, official venue websites, and community feedback to ensure accuracy. We verify operating hours, pricing, seasonal availability, and any recent changes that might affect the family experience. Our guides are then reviewed by at least one additional editor before publication. Crucially, our commitment to accuracy does not end at publication. We update every city guide on a quarterly review cycle, incorporating new information from our community of readers, revisiting destinations when significant changes occur, and clearly displaying the last-updated date on every guide so that readers always know how current the information is. When we receive tips or corrections from readers, we verify the information independently before incorporating it into our guides. This continuous update process is what separates Detour Kids from travel sites that publish once and never look back.

Meet the Team

Sarah Chen, Founder and Editor-in-Chief. Sarah is the creator and driving force behind Detour Kids. A former magazine travel writer who spent eight years covering destinations for regional and national publications, Sarah pivoted to family travel content after the birth of her first child in 2019. She quickly discovered that the travel industry had a massive blind spot when it came to genuinely useful information for parents of young children, and she set out to fill that gap. As a mother of two — her daughter Lily, age seven, and her son James, age four — Sarah has personally visited all thirty-two cities currently covered on Detour Kids, many of them multiple times as her children have grown. Her background in professional travel journalism informs the site's commitment to thorough research, honest assessments, and practical detail. Sarah oversees all editorial content, manages the site's quarterly update schedule, and personally writes or reviews every city guide before publication. She holds a degree in journalism from Northwestern University and has been a member of the Society of American Travel Writers since 2016. When she is not researching the next family adventure, she can usually be found testing out a new playground with her kids or organizing her famously detailed packing spreadsheets.

Marcus Rodriguez, Contributing Editor. Marcus brings a unique perspective to Detour Kids as a former elementary school teacher who spent twelve years working with children ages five through ten before transitioning to travel writing. His deep understanding of child development, attention spans, and age-appropriate activities makes him an invaluable contributor to the editorial team. As a father of three — twin daughters Sofia and Isabella, age eight, and son Diego, age five — Marcus specializes in evaluating attractions and activities through the lens of what genuinely engages children versus what merely markets itself as kid-friendly. He has a particular talent for discovering hidden-gem activities that do not appear in mainstream travel guides, from neighborhood parks with exceptional play structures to local eateries where kids are treated like welcome guests rather than inconveniences. Marcus contributes to city guide research, writes detailed activity and restaurant reviews, and manages the site's community feedback program, where reader tips are verified and incorporated into existing guides. He holds a master's degree in elementary education from the University of Texas at Austin and has contributed travel writing to several family-focused publications. His teaching background gives him an intuitive sense for which experiences will truly delight children at different developmental stages, and that instinct shows in every review he writes.

Our Editorial Standards

Integrity is the foundation of everything we publish at Detour Kids. We maintain a strict no-pay-for-play policy, which means we never accept payment from hotels, restaurants, attractions, or tourism boards in exchange for positive coverage or inclusion in our guides. Every recommendation on this site is based solely on the quality of the experience for families with young children. When we do participate in affiliate programs — such as the Amazon Associates Program — we disclose these relationships clearly and prominently on every page where affiliate links appear. Affiliate partnerships never influence which products, hotels, or experiences we recommend. Our editorial decisions are made independently, and our readers can trust that when we say something is worth their time and money, it is because we genuinely believe it based on firsthand experience, not because we received compensation for saying so. For complete details about our affiliate relationships and how we maintain editorial independence, please visit our Affiliate Disclosure page.

We are also committed to keeping our content current and accurate. Travel information goes stale quickly — restaurants close, attractions change their pricing, hotels undergo renovations that dramatically alter the guest experience. That is why every city guide on Detour Kids follows a quarterly review cycle. Our editors systematically verify key details such as operating hours, pricing, seasonal availability, and contact information at least four times per year. When significant changes occur between scheduled reviews — such as a recommended restaurant closing or an attraction adding new features — we update the relevant guide as soon as we can verify the information. Every guide on the site displays a clearly visible last-updated date so that readers always know how fresh the content is. We encourage our community of readers to share tips, corrections, and updates with us, and we independently verify all reader-submitted information before incorporating it into our guides. This combination of scheduled reviews and community-driven updates ensures that Detour Kids remains one of the most reliable and current family travel resources available online.

Contact Us

We love hearing from the families who use Detour Kids. Whether you have a question about a specific destination, a tip you would like to share, a correction to report, or a city you would like us to cover next, we welcome your message. You can reach our editorial team through our contact page, or email us directly at hello@detourkids.com. We read every message personally and do our best to respond within forty-eight hours. Your feedback is what makes this site better, and we are grateful to the thousands of families in our community who help us keep our guides accurate, comprehensive, and genuinely useful.