In my experience, things were very limited 4/c year, but got less limited as you advanced each year.
4/c year, I think we could go on libery sometime around noon Saturday, but had to be back by, maybe 6 p.m. or 10 p.m. (or somewhere in the middle). Of course, you were so scared of being late, you didn't want to cut it close, so I was probably back an hour or two before I needed to be. Essentially, I had enough time to go to get a bite to eat, catch a movie, and maybe walk around the mall a bit. You could also leave Sunday, maybe just after church (unless you wanted to attend a church in the area), and you had to be back and ready by, I think 6 p.m. We were in uniform whenever we went out.
When I had liberty 4/c year, I often went to my sponsor family's house.... where I could relax a bit.
3/c year we had more time off. I feel like we could spend time overnight between Saturday and Sunday, but that may have been 2/c year. I think we had Friday night liberty too. We could wear uniforms or our "3/c libo uniform" which was essentially a blazer.
2/c year we had more time off. Maybe that's when we had overnights between Saturday and Sunday. We also had "civies" so we could wear whatever clothing we wanted. But remember your 2/c year you're training 4/c, so you generally need to be back, at least part of the time, when it's time to train them.
I think 1/c year we had overnights too, but I can't remember if that was also overnight Friday. We also had cars, which really freed you up on where you could go. No more relying on the liberty vans, you could drive to Mass. or New York or Rhode Island.
Each year you got a little more freedom but also more responsibility.
As far as vacation was concerned, Christmas break was maybe a couple of weeks. You had about a week for Spring break and three weeks for Summer. Some people had a little more time to "recruit" but you had to be doing well in school.
In most, if not all, things at CGA, there was an approval process and a reward system.
"Longs" and "Shorts" were weekend liberty that could be earned. It's like vacation time, but was essentially permission to be away overnight. A "short" was overnight between Saturday and Sunday. A "long" was overnight between Friday and Sunday.
