Rob Taylor and his husband Chris have been taking their kids on road trips for 13 years. Together, they’ve traveled over 30,000 miles in the US, Canada, and Mexico.
“Our first trip was when our oldest was just a month old, so we’re going on 13 years,” Taylor told Business Insider, adding that they’ve spent an average of two weeks on the road monthly in 2024.
Over the years, Taylor’s family has picked up some tips for long car rides with kids — primarily through learning from their mistakes.
Taylor shares family road trip advice on his blog, 2 Travel Dads, and in his book, “The Road Trip Survival Guide.”
When the kids were little, Taylor said they overpacked for road trips.
When packing for a road trip with kids, Taylor said not to overdo it.
“A lot of people love to have that viewpoint of you can’t be too prepared, but you can be too prepared,” Taylor told Business Insider. “When we first started traveling with two kids, we made sure to bring the entire house.”
Taylor said the family used to load the car with various toys and stuffed animals, which made their car more cluttered and trips more stressful.
“When you have so much stuff in your vehicle on a road trip that you can’t be comfortable, it’s just not worth it,” he said. “For me, keeping things clean is how I manage my stress level.”
After all, when road-tripping with babies and toddlers, Taylor said there’s already more to pack.
“You already have equipment you have to travel with — car seats, booster seats, a diaper bag, and a pack-and-play popup,” he said. “Bringing so many toys just doesn’t help anybody.”
He added that leaving toys at home has made Taylor’s kids more content with simply looking out the window on long car rides.
“We’ve definitely learned over the years how much less stress it is when you’re not worried about either forgetting something at home or having a filthy vehicle,” he said.
But not bringing a pillow for each passenger was a mistake …
“It’s absolutely worthwhile to sacrifice space to ensure that people are not tired and miserable,” Taylor told BI.
He learned this early in his family travels, when they would leave their pillows at home to save space in the car.
Still, if people aren’t sleeping well on a road trip, everybody’s cranky,” including the adults, he said.
Nowadays, Taylor’s family always packs one pillow for each person so everyone is well rested.
“For a lot of families doing a summer road trip, this is the vacation that they get,” he said. “So making sure that people are not unpleasant is totally worth it.”
… and so was only packing a few snacks.
“Kind of like how when you don’t sleep because you don’t have your own pillow, we all get hangry and it can really have a huge impact,” Taylor told BI. “As much as adults like to pretend like they’re in full control of their emotions, hungry adults are absolutely miserable.”
Taylor learned this tip when his family would hit the road without enough snacks in the car.
“You can’t have too many snacks,” he said. “It seems really obvious, but one of the things that we have seen both with airplane travel and with road trip travel is that we all get hungry at different times.”
To keep your car clean, Taylor recommends bringing jerky, grapes, and string cheese.
“I know a lot of families take the chip route,” he said. “We avoid crumbly things when we’re doing road trips because we know how that contributes to the grossness of a car.”
In Taylor’s experience, spending too many hours in the car without stopping can spoil a road trip.
When traveling with children, don’t forget to stop frequently.
“Kids are influenced by one another in tight spaces like a car,” Taylor said. “Plan your travel in a way that allows [you] to have as little time in a car as possible so you can have as much time expelling energy that the kids need to get rid of.”
He figured this out in 2016 when his family drove through the Redwoods up the California coast.
“Both kids had escalating breakdowns in unison after about an hour and a half without any break,” he said. “From that point out, all of our travel included intentional stops, no matter how much it added to our total travel time.”
Taylor said his family typically spends less than two hours in the car at a time.
“Now that the kids are older, we can make it longer, but stopping to stretch our legs is a welcome habit nowadays,” he added.
Forgetting to make an alternate travel plan has made chaotic situations more stressful.
“Approaching a road trip with either an alternate route or a backup plan is something we’ve had to get good at,” Taylor told BI.
For example, on a recent road trip to Alaska’s Denali National Park, Taylor said the family planned hikes and booked tours, but a wildfire made the area inaccessible.
“There were thousands of tourists scrambling at the same time,” he said. “We hadn’t done any research about what to do if our plans had to shift.”
Taylor said the family thankfully extended their trip but had to opt for a smaller accommodation where the kids had to sleep on the floor.
Luckily, Taylor used to live in Alaska, and he knows locations that had fewer tourists
“There’s the whole scenic side of the state that people pass over because everybody drives on the Parks Highway that goes from Anchorage up to Fairbanks,” he explained. “On the other side, you can drive through the wilderness and experience the tundra. It’s not a mainstream destination.”
Taylor said it’s always good to do more research on destinations to have a more flexible itinerary in case of cancellations.
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