• For the past four summers, my family and friends have taken a summer vacation to Colorado.
• But the kids go to summer camp during the day, so we parents get to have fun.
• I think it's important our kids see us be adults outside being parents.

For the past three summers, my friends and I have driven our families to Colorado to work remotely, be playful adults, and, in some ways, mildly neglect our children.

My friends and I work hard to nurture our relationships. Whether it's a constantly changing technological landscape or a precarious job market, the world around us continues to evolve quickly.

Maintaining a sense of interconnectedness in our friend group helps us to feel more stable, but it also allows us to find communal joy, for ourselves, explicitly outside our kids.

To further connect on trips, we take it a step further and send our kids to day camp so we can get some respite from our typical demands.

Sending our kids to camp gives us parents a break

Parental expectations seem endless these days. Under the umbrella of intensive parenting, there seems to be an implicit message: we need to be constantly available to our kids.

There's a steady stream of emails coming from schools, applications to download for every sport, and a birthday party scene that is, at times, unbearable. To avoid burnout, we need to strike a balance; to thrive, we need enjoyment.

To do so, our children attend a very reasonably priced day camp in Colorado while my friends and I take our own vacation.

It is a much-needed escape from commuting to an office, rushing to the school pick-up line, and making it to another early-morning sports game. A lingering benefit of the pandemic is that we are all able to slip into remote work for a short time; we take full advantage of the setup. Consolidating our work so we can enjoy our downtime is the goal for the two weeks in Colorado.

We commit ourselves to having fun and strengthening our bonds, hoping that our kids pick up on the importance of connectedness, friendship, and enjoying life in the face of unpredictability.

It's important our kids see us as real people — not just their parents

It's a nice byproduct that our children see their parents as their own people — adults who pursue fun and find ways to play.

We certainly field many comments about how "it is not fair" that we do fun stuff without them. But this does not deter us.

In fact, last year, during a hike through the scenic Rocky Mountain National Park, we ran into our children while they were on their own camp-sponsored hike.

That evening was full of more demanding questions about how we spend our time.

The fun doesn't end when we pick the kids up from camp

We have been intentional about picking an area where we can also let the kids roam a bit.

After-camp hours are filled with self-guided play and time spent outside. So, our evenings feel like a nice balance between connecting with our kids and giving them time to play with one another.

Through these trips, we also hope to instill a sense of independence and love of nature. The whole experience ends up allowing our kids to learn from each other in ways they won't when we are around, and the grownups get space for uncensored adult time, leaving us with more gas in the tank.

We are all set for our fourth annual trip. While the kids are excited to escape the Texas heat and get to the mountains, we adults have been planning for our own adventures. There has been talk of our favorite pastries for breakfast, tennis, hiking, and white-water rafting…none of which our kids are invited to.

• I travel a lot but typically stay in luxury hotels.
• My sister recently asked me to go to an adult summer camp with her, and I was hesitant.
• However, I'm so glad I went, and it changed the way I think about "comfort."

I'm a luxury travel reviewer, so I've spent years refining my standards for comfort. I've stayed at extraordinary hotels and resorts around the world — properties with the plushest bedding and robes, private infinity pools, dedicated butlers, and absolutely no need to take care of myself while on property. Once you get used to that level of comfort, it's hard to un-know it.

So when my sister started trying to convince me to attend a women's retreat at an adult summer camp in Northern California, I was skeptical.

I grew up camping, but stopped doing it over the years

To be fair, I'm not anti-camp. I grew up going to summer camp and even did a fair amount of recreational camping with friends into adulthood. But then I had kids, a life stage that necessitated so much gear schlepping and cleanup that doing so for recreation ceased to appeal. Camping lost its novelty.

Meanwhile, my work as a lifestyle writer moved increasingly toward luxury travel coverage. Over time, I became accustomed to certain elite-level comforts — and, if I'm being honest, attached to them.

My sister asked me to go to an adult summer camp

My sister, whose tastes differ from mine in plenty of ways, recruited two of our closest friends from high school and college to attend, too. It felt like a strategic FOMO operation — and it worked. About a week before the retreat, I finally caved and booked my flight.

I expected rustic accommodations, communal bathrooms, and the general feeling of roughing it.

Instead, I walked into all sorts of surprises.

For one thing, the camp itself had been rebuilt in recent years and felt far more polished than I anticipated — and certainly much more elevated than the Southern California camp of my youth. Our cabin for the four of us had heating and air conditioning, an en-suite bathroom, ample charging ports, and was spotless. The food in the dining hall was genuinely great, including lots of vegetarian options for me.

It felt less like roughing it and more like a conference center situated among trees.

But the accommodations weren't the only type of comforts that surprised me.

The bigger surprise was realizing how many forms comfort can take that have nothing to do with luxury amenities.

I found comfort in community and rest

There were 175 women at the retreat, and many of them were older than we were. My group ranged from age 48 (me) to 51 (my sister), but many attendees were in their 60s, 70s, and even their upper 80s. There was something unexpectedly grounding about being surrounded by women carrying decades of perspective and experience. The atmosphere felt notably free of performance or pressure.

Then there was another luxury I'd almost forgotten: being an off-duty mom in an adults-only environment. My sister has three kids; my two friends and I each have two. For a few days, nobody needed snacks. Nobody needed a ride somewhere. Nobody was making an impassioned case for me to extend their screen time.

Instead, I had time for things I almost never make space for anymore. I tried to learn Mahjong. I made beaded bracelets and dipped my own candles. I dozed through a sound bath and tried forest bathing.

The activities themselves almost felt beside the point.

Luxury hotels are designed to create comfort. That's literally their purpose.

But somewhere along the way, I think I'd unconsciously narrowed my own definition of comfort into something highly curated and highly physical — softer sheets, nicer rooms, better amenities.

I left adult summer camp with the reminder that some of the greatest comforts have nothing to do with thread count at all.