Matt Frei, 44, is the BBC’s Washington correspondent and presenter of BBC World News America. He lives in Washington with his wife, Penny, and their 10-year-old son and daughters aged 8, 6 and 4

In France, the entire nation goes on holiday for the whole of August, but for Americans that idea would be anathema.

In the USA, you get lots of little holidays – long weekends based around Labor Day, Memorial Day and so on. You pack a lot of stuff in your car, drive an enormous distance, stop somewhere for 12 hours, then drive back. And, quite frankly, that’s hell with four kids.

Our family does holidays differently. Every Easter we explore somewhere new in America. First we toured the gorgeous beaches of the Carolinas, and then Virginia, which is like a cross between Tuscany and Dorset: very beautiful, cold in the winter and incredibly hot in the summer.

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BACKGROUND

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BACKGROUND

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But we realised that we’d only scratched a tiny corner of the map. So we took our road trips west, starting with Las Vegas.

Vegas itself is ghastly. We stayed at the Bellagio hotel, the famous one from Ocean’s Eleven, and like every hotel there, it’s both smart and grim, because it has slot machines and roulette tables in the lobby. Our kids didn’t know whether they’d gone to heaven or hell.

Really, we were there for the scenery, which is jaw-dropping. It looks like Mars. Then there’s Phoenix, which feels like driving into a John Wayne western. Because there are six of us, we have to hire a people carrier with a DVD player. My kids must be the only children to have watched Harry Potter while driving through the Grand Canyon – but then we had been driving through it all day.

My childhood holidays were less glamorous, mostly spent in Cornwall, staying in grey hotels and eating dry pork chops with pineapple chunks, or some sort of awful fish. My parents would chuck us in the back of a Peugeot, with pillows, duvets, books and toys.

We didn’t even have a tape player in the car, so my brother and I would fight all the way to Cornwall: sometimes Dad would stop and tip us out into a field for 10 minutes, until we’d calmed down. To us this was great fun, but then our expectations were more limited than today. With my kids, it’s often: “Oh God, not Bali again!”

Even so, I think it’s important to give them an awareness of the wider world. As a BBC correspondent, you often go where terrible things are happening – not the kind of places you’d dream of taking your family on holiday. But sometimes I do return as a tourist. You have a wonderful time, and you’re giving a vote of confidence to the local tourism, which is really important.

Cambodia is a good example. I went there loads of times for work; then after Pol Pot died and the Khmer Rouge was disbanded, Penny and I toured Phnom Penh and Angkor Wat. It’s a thrilling place to visit, and we could feel the whole country breathing a sigh of relief, which was fascinating.

My children were born in Asia, so we’ve always yanked them on planes. They still like nothing more than raiding the hotel minibar. We had an especially great family holiday near Solo, a city in the middle of Java. Our hotel was built straight into the hills and surrounded by four erupting volcanoes - just enough lava to create fireworks, but not enough to make you run for the hills. Indonesia is so exotic, and it’s one of those countries where they really know how to pamper you.

We also like Mexico. I think it’s good for the children to witness the poverty there, which they don’t see much of in the USA. It helps that they love Mexican food: all that cheese and guacamole - it’s like the whole cuisine has been invented for kids. We stay in lovely, cheap places right on the beach. The kids play in the sand and we drink margaritas. It’s very laid-back.

But there is still plenty of America to conquer. Last year, we headed off through Utah to Zion National Park, which was extraordinary. It’s got the most gorgeous bucolic rivers, green terraces with wonderful trees, and amazing red rocks towering above. A lot of the geology out west takes you by surprise. That’s what I love about America - the sense that you can still be an explorer.

Matt Frei talked to Ann McFerran. His latest book, Only in America, is published by HarperCollins

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