Color me Griswold

October 4, 2007 5:27 PM

Heading to the Big Easy for a couple of weeks around X-mas. Driving ~1,800 miles from PA with a 2 and 3 year old. Suggestions on making it bearable for them, and us?

I fly a bit and can't imagine exposing my little monkeys to modern air travel. Especially around the holidays. I've decided to do it over three days and two nights. Three six hour legs. Borrowing a friend's minivan rather than trying to do it in our Ford wagon. Borrowing the in-laws portable DVD player to keep them distracted. Wondering about driving at night. Though if they sleep while we drive, when do we sleep? Anyone else tried something this sketchy? Advice, anecdotes, warnings?

posted by Toekneesan to travel & transportation (8 comments total)

We have taken our 2 1/2 year old from GA to Maine and Chicago via car with minimal hassles. The back-set DVD is great as are CDs of kids music (we tried to get some They Might Be Giants and such to avoid going totally insane). We drove during the day an usually stopped early enough to eat dinner and then let her run around before bed; we also tried to let her run around as much as possible whenever we stopped for gas, and had a number of toys and books in the car. In other words, avoid boredom. On the ME trip we took a lot of side trips so it took several days to get there, but we made it to Chicago in 3 days/2 nights without any problems, so that is not an unreasonable schedule.
posted by TedW at 5:56 PM on October 4, 2007

I have 2 siblings, and we were all born within 4 years of each other. When we were young and my parents had a long car trip planned, my mom would buy small toys, snacks, etc. ahead of time and not let us know what they were until the trip started. I think she used to make up a little bag for each of us, and once we were on our way she gave them to us - not a minute before. It made us actually look forward to all those hours in the car...

Something like this might be a good idea in addition to the toys and books you're already planning on bringing. I'm not sure though if your kids are too young for this...?
posted by splendid animal at 6:35 PM on October 4, 2007

The good thing about traveling in the south is that smaller towns still have the courthouse in the square. It's a good starting point to let your kids blow off some steam (there are usually small lawns surrounding the courthouse), and if it's the town center or county seat you'll also find lunch places within a block or two.

Our backseat DVD player made our daughter carsick. Very carsick. Just a thought.
posted by mdiskin at 7:01 PM on October 4, 2007

drive over night
posted by i_am_a_Jedi at 7:15 PM on October 4, 2007

Regular stops with foot races and rambunctious play. It the weather is bad places with play areas like McDonalds are golden. Kids CDs of music and stores are good, check your public library.
posted by LambChop at 8:14 PM on October 4, 2007

I used to drive long distances with small children regularly, back in the day before the in car DVD player. Here's what I did:
1. Go to the Goodwill and buy a bunch of cheap junk toys. Wrap them. Have a big brown paper grocery sack full of wrapped toys up front. When the kids start to lose it, hand them each a Present. Or when they do something really great, hand them a Present. It works for hours.
2. Car games. Travel Bingo, the alphabet game, etc. We kept a roadkill tally and a travel journal and we had a polaroid camera to take pictures of weird stuff along the way, which we glued into the travel journals.
3. Books on CD are great for you and for them and you're all sharing in the experience. We did Treasure Island and Harry Potter and, when they were a little older, HP Lovecraft stories. And then when we stopped for lunch, we talked about the books.
4. Leave right after dinner, drive until midnight, check into a motel, let them jump on the beds for an hour, sleep until 7ish, drive until 1 (they'll be tired from the midnight jumping and sleep until 10 or so,) stop for a few hours, etc. The more they sleep in the car, the farther you'll drive. The more they sleep after dark, the less their sleep pattern will be disturbed when you get there, which can make all the difference between miserable time and happy time.
posted by mygothlaundry at 8:23 PM on October 4, 2007

I took a few ill-advised long trips with my family as a child and Mad Libs did more to entertain my sister and I than anything else, by a stretch.

Books on tape.

2nd everything mygothlaundry wrote.
posted by Pecinpah at 4:35 AM on October 5, 2007

Your trip sounds more like 3 twelve-hour legs than 3 six-hour legs. When my kids were young we did sort of what mygothlaundry is suggesting, but in the mornings instead. By getting up at around 4:30am, we could get about 4-5 hours of driving in while they were asleep. Then we'd check in to a motel in the early afternoon, making sure that the motel had a pool. Lots of splashing around, and everybody goes to bed early.
posted by Killick at 6:53 AM on October 5, 2007