Last Updated on 20 October 2023 by Colette
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Top tips for making road trips with children as stress free as possible.
Our children are no strangers to long car journeys – our extended families live around an hour from our home in Manchester and I used to commute from Manchester to Leeds on a daily basis when Ben and Chloe were babies. We’ve driven to Wales, Dover and the South of France as well as been stuck on the M62 more times than I care to to remember – a four hour car journey isn’t a big deal to them.
These tips are for younger kids, but if you have teens who are currently learning to drive, I’ll give you one tip – get them behind the wheel! And for Australian families thinking about a more comfortable car for those long stretches – or a first set of wheels for a newly licensed teen – car loan options from a flexible lender like Azora can ease the upfront cost of the upgrade.Â
With this in mind, I wanted to share some of our top tips for road tripping with kids!
How do you survive a road trip with kids?
1. Think about how long is reasonable for each “stint” of your journey
Over the years, we’ve learned how far our children can manage to travel in one go before they (and we) lose patience – and of course as they’ve got older (and have gained more control over their bladders) those times have stretched out. On our last big road trip (when we drove from Manchester to the South of France) we broke the whole trip down into three sections with two overnight stops. We then aimed to do each chunk with one break along the way – this balanced out at 2 / 3 hours at a time in the car. They did so well with this that we think we could have actually skipped the over night stop part way down France and just powered through. Of course this is very personal and will vary from family to family – younger children might struggle with longer stretches in the car, or indeed children with less experience of long car journeys.
2. Think carefully about what time to set off
Some people like to do long journeys at night whilst the kids are sleeping – we’ve tried this and it doesn’t work for us, they don’t sleep and we all just end up really tired. When they were younger we used to try and plan long drives around their daily routines, maybe setting off just after a meal when we knew they might need a sleep. As they are older this doesn’t matter so much and we tend to plan our trips more around the traffic or meal times. When it comes to planning what time of day you want to travel, do think about your child’s sleep patterns and whether you want them to sleep in the car or whether a danger nap might cause you problems later on! (We’ve always been pretty lucky that a “danger nap” in the car hasn’t caused us problems with sleeping later so we do tend to take advantage of this and encourage them to sleep a bit to pass the time!)
3. Plan stops in (we do this around meal times)
It’s important to plan in stops to break up the journey – travelling with kids will always take longer than doing it on your own! We tend to do this around meal times so that we have a real purpose to our stops. (Obviously it’s a bit hard to plan for a wee stop, you just have to take those as they come!) We usually set a time target (say two hours into the journey) or a distance we want to cover (maybe half way or 150 miles) before we stop and then look for services within that area. This has bitten us on the bum before now when we’ve ended up on a road with no services and have had to plough on.
Don’t be afraid to divert for a proper stop – sometimes you need a bit more than just a motorway services and you can really make this part of the adventure – check out The Extra Mile for some great suggestions or take a leaf out of Donna‘s book and plan your journey around a National Trust or English Heritage property.
4. Set Challenges
Something we’ve found that really works for our three is to set them challenges, “Can we go two hours without stopping“, “Let’s see if we can keep going till lunch time“, “I wonder if we can beat yesterday’s drive?” – they love the element of challenge and competition. Amy will proudly tell you she has previously managed 4 hours in the car without stopping – I should say this wasn’t intentional, she fell asleep just as we were about to stop for a break and we didn’t want to wake her so we just ploughed on – luckily the big two were cool with it!
As well as setting challenges around driving time, don’t forget the old classics like, “Who can see the sea first?“, or “How many red cars can you spot?” – my friend Mich likes to do scavenger hunt lists for her kids on a long journey giving them all sorts of random things to find a like a Porsche, a high viz vest, an Eddie Stobart lorry or a yellow car – and of course, you want to be the first one to tick off your list! You’d be amazed how quickly the time passes when they are concentrating on what’s going on outside the car!
5. Pack snacks
Snacks hold all the power! When I’m packing for a long journey I want to make sure I’ve got a good range of snacks – sweet and savoury – healthy things that will tide them over till we stop for a meal, less healthy things for treats to keep us all going. We have a rule that they are not allowed to ask for sweets in the car, whoever isn’t driving is in charge of them but if they ask for them, they have to wait longer – this does a good job of stopping the incessant asking for snacks and sweets!
I tend to pack a cool bag with frozen Capri Sun (top tip for keeping everything cooler for longer), cans of pop (for the grown ups), crisps, biscuits, sweets, fruit etc etc and we can just dip into it as we need it – this also means that when we finally arrive at our destination we’ve usually got some bits to keep us going! I always like to make sure we’ve got more than enough for the journey – mostly to make sure there is plenty of variety but in case things take longer than we expected or we find ourselves stuck without anywhere to stop.
(Obviously it’s important to bear in mind that more drinks = more toilet stops so there’s an important balance to strike between keeping everyone hydrated and adding 3 hours of toilet stops to your journey time!)
6. Dress comfortably
When you’re going to be sat in the car for long periods, it’s important to consider your clothing – you don’t want stiff fabrics or tight waistbands, nor do you want to be worrying about creasing! Just make sure that you are going to be as comfortable as possible – and not too hot as taking layers off in the car can be tricky.
Our three like to take their shoes off in the car for long journeys – this drives Dave mad as it is a faff when we arrive anywhere for them to find their shoes and put them back on again – but I totally get why they want to do it!
Each child has their own special travel blanket – they are only allowed them for flights or really long car journeys. It’s just means they can tuck themselves up for a snooze if they want to!
Oh, and while we are on the subject of comfort:
7. Pack Sunglasses
Make sure everyone in the car has access to sunglasses – even in the winter! I actually think the low winter sun can be as hard on the eyes as the summer sun when it comes to driving. We tend to keep a spare set of sunglasses in the car for everyone as, “Muuum, the sun is in my eyes“, is a complaint that is easily avoided!
8. Don’t forget the headphones!
Tablets can be an absolute life saver when it comes to entertaining kids on a long journey – but don’t forget the headphones! Our children have wireless, rechargeable headphones – the lack of wires make them much easier to use (just don’t forget to pack a charger for them!). Having headphones means all three children can listen to or watch whatever they want without distracting each other and we don’t have to listen to it either!
9. Remember things to do that aren’t just tablets
As I’ve already said, the invention of portable DVD players and of course tablets, has been an absolute game changer when it comes to long car journeys with kids. My Mum and Dad tell tales of a drive to the South of France in the 80s where pretty much the only thing keeping Nic and I entertained was a single Winnie the Pooh cassette on repeat . . . how we didn’t all go stir crazy I will never know!
However, it’s worth making sure you’ve got other things up your sleeve – both in case of battery failure and also just to reduce the screen time just a smidge! I tend to pack each child their own bag with their tablet, headphones, travel blanket, favourite cuddly toy and then some extra bits and pieces like a book of travel games and some colouring things, or a puzzle to fiddle with depending on their current interests.
You can also find a list of family friendly podcasts here, a great list of car games here, some road trip printables here and a list of great toys for road trips here!
10. Have a bin bag ready
I think it’s fairly impossible to travel any sort of distance in the car without creating rubbish: sweet wrappers, discarded drawings, tissues, wet wipes, crisp packets. I keep a handy roll of bin liners in the door of the car (just small ones) so that at the end of the journey, the rubbish is all in one place and can be thrown away.
If you are unlucky enough to need to consider travel sickness then those bin bags will come in extra handy! *Touch wood*, this hasn’t been an issue for us yet – we’ve had a couple of moments where we’ve had to open the window and hope for the best but mostly all three are pretty good in the car!
11. Keep things accessible
Think carefully about what you are going to need on your journey – as I’ve mentioned, I pack a small rucksack for each child filled with the things I think they are going to need and they keep this by their feet (this might even include a change of clothes or their pjs in case of emergency!). If we are planning on an overnight stop to break up the journey then we pack a separate bag for this. This bag is packed last to make sure we can get to it easily without disturbing all the other things we’ve packed wedged carefully into the boot!
12. Be flexible
At the end of the day, you can plan your road trip all you like but the weather, the traffic, how often your child needs the toilet – are all beyond your control. Be flexible, stay calm and remember, you’ll get there when you get there!
I’d love for you to share your road tripping experiences below – any tops tips to share? Where’s the furthest you’ve driven with the kids?
