As the sun sets over the Dordogne, a lush region in southwestern France known for its walnuts, pate and prehistoric cave paintings, I sit gingerly down at the hotel bar and order a glass of rosé. All week long, I noticed the young bartenders giving me suggestive glances and making suggestions in endearingly broken English about the varieties I should try next. Now, on my last night in France, I feel a sense of relief and anticipation. I accompanied my grandmother on a Vassar alumni trip. I was 19 years old and the youngest in our group, at least 40 years younger than me. The older girls had noted the chemistry at the bar days before and had been urging me to flirt back. But I'm very shy.
As night fell, my grandmother went to bed, leaving me with the mustachioed Frenchman and a freshly refilled glass. But by the time I finished my drink, his shift wasn't quite over yet, and my early morning wake-up call was imminent. We exchanged Facebook contact information and I said goodnight, my rosé sloshing in my stomach while regretting not taking action. Around 11:30, my phone lit up. He wanted to know if I was asleep. "Are there any rules about going upstairs to kiss me goodbye?" I asked.
"It's not illegal. Let's meet in the elevator. There are no cameras there," he replied.
Ten minutes later we met in the stairwell. He took off his striped uniform and put on a black leather jacket and a motorcycle helmet in his hand. He smelled like cigarettes, and his beard stung my upper lip and chin. We broke up shortly after and returned to our lives, which continued to branch out endlessly in different directions.
In theory, a vacation orgy is a carefree, no-strings-attached tryst. But in practice, it can be a delicate matter — especially on family trips. It's both a science and an art, requiring a thoughtful balance of priorities combined with a healthy supply of YOLO (mine is from 2015, after all). Of course, the main reason for a family vacation is time with the family. But if you're in the mood, why not be a coquette and flirt with some strangers?
Spicy one-night stands on family trips can be salutary or X-rated, secret or public, planned or organic. The only requirement is that it's a little fun, a little silly, and well outside of your comfort zone. Whether you're looking for a hotel romance like Albie and Portia in "The White Lotus" or want to enjoy the excitement of "Girls Gone Wild ," there are plenty of ways to live up to your indulgent dreams on your next family vacation.
Your family vacation bash might just happen spontaneously
One of New York's Sarah Riccio's most memorable family vacation experiences happened on the spur of the moment. When the 33-year-old founder of sex toy store and education platform Delicto.com was 21, he and his family traveled to Alabama for a wedding. During a three-hour layover in Baltimore, she wandered around the airport and found herself in line behind "a very tall, very handsome man" from the Hudson News.
She quickly paid for the gum and magazine and followed him out of the store, patting him on the shoulder. "Before he had a chance to tell me his name, I said, 'Sorry if this is a retweet, but you are the sexiest man I've ever met. Any chance you go to Alabama?'"
What's his answer? Yes ma'am. The two were "making out in the middle of the airport," and after boarding a Southwest Airlines flight, they found seats together and he fingered her under the cover of an in-flight magazine — and no one else noticed.
"I would never do something like that now, especially in public. But do I regret it?" Riccio asked. "No."
Just like my little French cutie, 23-year-old Erin Wilson kissed her bartender at a hotel in Tunisia while on vacation with her mom last April. Wilson, a student from Lancaster, England, finally decided to let his guard down after a week of enjoying fancy drinks with hearts and flowers sprayed with aftershave. The two met in the courtyard after he got off work and made out with a week of pent-up sexual tension.
"I never thought I'd be the one doing this on vacation," she said. "But I thought, why not? If nothing else, it's a good ego boost."
Dating apps drive some family vacation activity
If privacy is a concern, dating app connections may be easier to keep on DL. When 21-year-old Alex Hall of Chicago, now 30 and the founder of sex education platform Bottoms Digest, secretly took part in a sex act while vacationing with his godmother and cousins in Austin, Texas Grindr game. His opponent lives off campus in college housing, complete with a recreation room — pool table, bean bag chairs, the entire nine yards — open to the entire building but rarely used. perfect.
Being a butt, or someone who likes to be penetrated during sex, Hall spent 20 minutes carefully getting ready with his travel-size enema ball in the family's shared bathroom. He told everyone he was going for a late-night run (which wasn't unreasonable, since that's what he would actually do). When he gets to the guy's place, the two have "awesome" sex on the common room couch - if not a little paranoid ( what if someone walks in?! Are those security cameras in the corner? ! ).
Hall didn't reveal much about his adventures in Austin. "I thought if my family found out I went to a stranger's house while I was with them, they would kill me," he said.
Luke Metzler, a 29-year-old Los Angeles musician, also hosted a secret app party in 2015 during a trip to Lake Michigan with his parents and extended family. After everyone else went to bed, he invited a Tinder match. The two walked to the beach and in between rounds of sex, they went skinny-dipping in the lake, which he remembered as a truly "movie-like" night that didn't take away from the precious time he had with his family. time.
Want to have your own indulgence?
One-night stands allow you to try things you wouldn't otherwise do, and the risks are especially low during a family vacation. If things go bad, you still have your family with you. Unless you go to the same place every year, chances are no one will know who you are, and you won't expect your romantic partners to keep in touch when you get home.
"We didn't keep in touch," Wilson said of her bartender in Tunisia. "He asked for my email, but I thought that would ruin the magic. I was hoping it was just a vacation."
As for my Frenchie, when I returned to my room with my sleeping grandmother, I immediately sent him a message with a 2015 cringe in my voice: “That was the highlight of my trip. *sunglasses emoji *” Yes, I just spent a great week in the South of France with my grandmother and a bunch of the best people in Vaasa. But the memory of secretly kissing a handsome stranger in the stairwell is as engraved in my mind as the Paleolithic bison in the Lascaux caves.
“Je suis la cerise sur la gäteau,” he replied. I was the cherry on the cake. He is right.
