Gas Water Heater

In our previous home we had an electric water heater. When going on vacation we would shut the water to the house and turn off the circut breaker to the water heater.
In our new home, we have a gas water heater. If we turn off the water to the house, can we just turn the thermostat to the " vacation " setting or do we have to shut down the gas entirely; pilot light and all ???

If your going on vacation you can turn it to vacation. If you want to save a $ 0r 2 you can turn it off and relight it when you come back.

heater

Turn it to PILOT and you do not have to worry about the gas coming on to heat the water until you come home.

What you don't want to do is turn off the water and leave the WH on. If for some reason it leaked, you'd be trying to heat up the empty heater and ruin it if it wasn't already bad, and waste a lot of gas in the process.