Every once in a while we parents get an opportunity to re-experience a treasured childhood memory with our own kids. If you grew up here in Southern California, odds are that you made it to a grunion run at least once when you were a child. If you're from elsewhere, chances are that you thought this was total urban folklore. Well, it's no myth; there really are SoCal fish that jump out of the ocean at midnight and slither up the beach when the moon is full. The Cabrillo Marine Aquarium in San Pedro has been hosting grunion runs with a front row seat for this peculiar phenomenon since 1964. I remember cooking out on the beach with friends and family, bundled up and waiting for those squirmy silver fish to appear. The hot dogs were usually a bit burnt, and the sand was wet and cold, but it was a night of adventure and marine biology that I never forgot.

My family doesn’t do a lot of camp. I have two children who loath having their time scheduled, and I am mostly home with them, so in the summer I let them loaf. We all enjoy not having a schedule, and, let’s face it, camp can be pricey. We peruse Mommy Poppins’ Event Calendar, where I always find something fun and usually free. Inevitably, though, the point arrives when somebody, maybe even everybody, is a bit bored—or, in the case of the camp director (me), tired. Also, I do work part time, so I can’t always be in charge of the entertainment. This is a recipe for that most dreaded of all childhood diseases: too much screen time. That's when camp starts to seem like a really good idea, and I regret not having signed up. Even the kids sometimes yearn for something scheduled, because most of their friends aren’t around; they're at camp.

So what to do with a couple of bored couch potatoes? It’s summer. Send them to the beach, the beach, the beach! This is a no brainer. People travel from far away to spend their summers by our shores. We are already here. It would be crazy not to take advantage of this most glorious natural resource. Slather on the sunscreen, get some UV sunglasses, maybe even invest in a wet suit, but make sure those kids get some time in the surf and sand! Of course, if the beach is not your cup of tea, we also know a few other places that don’t require advance planning and will welcome your children for the day. As the summer progresses you may even find more, because sometimes a camp that books by the week becomes more flexible if it doesn’t fill all its places.

Here are 10 you can count on:

Nothing says “summer” like barbecue. Many of our local parks are standing by with grills and pits to satisfy that craving for charred food. And the beauty of life in Southern California is that "summer" can be practically any time of year; the 15 parks below have year-round, mostly free barbecue facilities, ready for birthday parties, holiday celebrations, spontaneous picnics, or family dinners al fresco.