I despise road trips! The idea of being in the car for 12 hours is a mean to end, I do it if I have to. It is not something I do for “fun”. If you get my drift you can tell I do not like road trips at all.
At least that was the case until last summer. I took a 9-hour road trip with my girlfriend and it was the most fun I had in forever. I had so much fun, I decide to do it again, this time with my kids!
It was a blast! We had such a great time, I’m going to tell you what made all the difference.
First of all, take a road trip to a destination you actually want to go. I realise one of the reasons why my road trip were such dread, is because I was always going to place I didn’t really want to go.
I used to get on board trying to be a *cough* pushover *cough* good sport, a team player but quite frankly these trips use to sucked my soul.
So make sure you want to be in the car first place LOL don’t be me.
1. Pack up the snacks
When you’re in the car for a very long time, your mind is going to deflect your boredom to hunger. You going to need the right tools to fight back.
Healthy low-calorie snack makes for enjoyable road trips.
2. Make scheduled stopped
Scheduled stops are a great way to break up the trip into smaller chunks of time. I’m not talking about bathroom breaks, I’m talking about real stop and do something fun.
On my trip with my girlfriend, we made a stop to visit a mall on the way, take pictures on local landmarks and even did a food tasting at a local event.
On my second trip with the kids, we bought maps. We picked placed on the map we’d like to stop to take a picture there and pin in on our map.
The girls had a little state book, they a whole game out it. It was so much fun!
3. Plan games and activities
Nobody wants to sing “row row your boat” for 4 straight hours. While tablets and phone are great time killers, you would want to think outside the box.
My girls had this great idea to play a geography game, our trip involved crossing the Canadian border. It was a thrill to them to cross over all those different states to another country. They love maps, so that was a great game for us.
Brainstorm with your family to come up with the perfect game that will engage everybody.
4. Music
You can’t have a successful road trip without some good tunes. Compile a playlist that include everyone preference. It sucks when one person just hogged the sound system and blast only their musical preferences while the rest of us just roll our eyes.
Be considerate!
Sing along and have fun.
5. Chit chat -Tell stories - good company
On my last trip, I couldn’t believe how much I enjoyed being on the road. We talked, we laughed, tell stories old and new.
We traded so many stories, from serious real life issues to what if aliens were real, type of stories.
It was the best part of the trip and I will always remember it.
Are you a fan of road trips?
What was your most memorable one?