10 hour road trip with 4 year old

[Scout]

I'm taking my daughter to Florida in 2 weeks and it's a long drive, about 10 hours. It'll just be me and her, and I'm a bit concerned. I wouldn't worry if someone else were going and could sit in back and entertain her.
Has anyone taken a trip like this, alone with their kiddo? I'm thinking of leaving the day before and going about half way before stopping for the night. Or I thought about leaving around 4am and hoping dd sleeps the first few hours. Any tips? I plan to load her ipad with cartoons and get her some sticker books and such, but i don't know how that will be if there isn't anyone else in the car to give her things or pick up things that fall or whatever else that causes instant meltdowns in the car.

 

[cutestuff]

Scout I'm looking at a 12 hour one way trip with my 18 month old dd...I've read it can help to go to restaurants with lots of grass and outside seating so they can play and since yours is older you might be able to distract him with eye spy or give him big boy jobs if he can read like looking for street signs and stuff. Let me know what works please so I can prepare myself....

 

[Berri]

I would leave a day earlier and stop overnight. Ten hours is a lot of driving for you too and if you split it up you can make it more of an adventure than torture! Good luck

 

[SarahBear]

I'm guessing that if you leave in the early morning, you're going to end up with an over-tired kid who DOESN'T sleep the first few hours... but hey, you know your kid better than I do. I'd actually opt for traveling late and hoping she falls asleep for the last few hours. As for the entertainment aspect, have a bag of toys and try to encourage her to put things back when she's done. You'll need to stop for potty breaks or snack breaks, et cetera. You can use those stops as opportunities to pick up what's been dropped. As for meltdowns, she'll just have to learn that once it's dropped, it's dropped. If she has a big bag of toys, she'll find something else to play with and learn to be more careful next time. If she likes stories, you could also have audio books of kids stories. Violet really enjoys that. You could also try playing car games, word games, telling stories together, et cetera.

Edit: also, have her pack the bag of toys. Give her a bag such as a paper shopping bag and ask her to fill it with the toys she wants for the trip and let her know it will be a long one, so she'll want to bring lots of stuff. It's more likely to keep her busy and happy if it's filled with things she has chosen. I ALWAYS have Violet pick her own car toys.

 

[petite ping]

We've already done 12 hour road trips with our two. I would suggest splitting the trip in two and staying overnight somewhere (ideally with space for the kids to stretch their legs). It really does make a difference to everyone.

We only have minimum toys (only the teddies and blankies) as sometimes toys can induce carsickness. But we do have a lot of nursery rhyme CDs (which we know by heart). Some of my friends use DVD players.

We always pack water and snacks in case it's difficult to stop for lunch or if you're stuck in a traffic jam.

My experience is that the girls start going nuts around the 4.5-5 hour mark. We stop every 2 hours for at least 15 minutes not least because the DD2 is just out of nappies.

We generally leave as early as possible (around 5-6 am), but some of my friends leave straight after dinner so there is a chance the kids will fall asleep but that only really works if there's two drivers as there is also a chance you'll feel tired too.

 

[petite ping]

I forgot to say eye spy only works for a moment.

What works for us is getting the girls to look for wind generators or a particular type of animal or object and when they see it everyone shouts at the top of the voices. So every time we see a windmill we shout out windmill. In France there's enough of them to entertain the kids but not so many that we are shouting all the time. I find the noisier the game the longer it lasts and it's better if the adult joins in the shouting.

Singalongs work well too but can do your head in after a while.

 

[Scout]

Thanks. I have decided to leave the day before and stop for the night. I'll find a hotel with a pool and make it a fun stop. I'm going to head out right after lunch becuase if we are out in the car early afternoon, dd usually falls asleep. (Plus I'll get through Atlanta, which has horrendous traffic, before the Friday afternoon rush)
Thanks for the game ideas. I had forgot about eye spy. And I'll let dd pack her own toys; good idea. I'm still dreading it, but feel better now that I have some sort of plan and some ideas.

 

[.Mrs.B.]

I done a 6 hour trip when mine were 4 and 2.5. Just me and them. I was worried and packed a few bits in case they got bored but they were amazing. We managed to do it without even a toilet stop, they both slept about 2 hours of it. (We left late morning.) I had a Disney CD playing and that was enough to entertain them for the whole trip. I still cant believe it to this day, lol.
Anyway my point being she might just surprise you, I think because I was driving by myself they were a lot less demanding than usual.

 

[MindUtopia]

Yes, I would say definitely plan to do it in two days and also I would assume it will take about a third to twice as long. We've done several 6 hour trips and with stopping every two hours, eating, carsickness, etc. it took much longer than we expected door to door, about 9-10 hours for what would have otherwise taken only 6. So I would personally leave in the morning and plan to stop mid to late afternoon, then do the same again the next day, assuming that realistically you might be on the road 8 hours each of those days. If you can plan in stops in advance, like stop at a nice picnic place or a favourite restaurant you know is along the way so you have something for her to look forward to, and then pack some favourite snacks for the car too. We just did two 12 hour flights with our 4 year old, and though it's different, it's similar too. I packed special snacks and then special things for her to do along the way. We also brought a tablet with us (which she doesn't normally get to use at home) with tv shows and games, though be careful at it might lead to carsickness in a car. Extra clothes, wipes, etc. easily accessible is good too just in case you need them.

 

[staralfur]

We just got back from a really long road trip, about 18 hours each way plus another little excursion in the middle of the trip which was another 7 hours or so, and we went on lots of 9-10 hour drives when she was younger as her grandparents used to live far away. An iPad with her favourite movies and tv shows downloaded on it is always helpful, she also has lots of games on there that she likes to play that don't require wifi (a princess game with colouring and activities, Fruit Ninja, some sports games). She also has those Look-and-Find books which kill some time, and a mess-free colouring book that she probably spent hours on overall. Whenever she got bored of doing stuff on her own, or dropped something I couldn't reach, I played I-Spy with her which actually entertained her for quite a while (though I got tired of it pretty quickly). You could print off some travel bingo sheets and give one to her and have one by you so you can check it occasionally and remind her of what to look for, and give her stickers to put on the ones she finds. As for dropping things, if she has other stuff to do that she's not bored of then redirect to that, otherwise plan to make time to pull over when it's an option to pick up stuff/let her out for a minute to move around. We were doing mostly 6-7 hour stretches on our trip and stopped probably 3 times per stretch to let her out, get gas, grab snacks, whatever.

I think if you're stopping to split up the trip you'll be just fine. My LO hit a few rough spots where she was whining or constantly asking if we were close but we kept reminding her of the fun stuff we were going to do once we got there (pool at the hotel was a big one so if you can swing that it might help a lot).

Good luck!

 

[.Mrs.B.]

Love the travel bingo idea.

 

[cutestuff]

Wanted to follow up on this post. I found a website called measuredmom.com. If you look up road trip 2-8 it will have a few ideas including free print outs. I checked out a few of their ideas for my 18 month old but I think the majority of them would be perfect for your dd. Wanted to pass it along

 

[Gym knickers]

Would you move her seat into the front with you so you can pass her drinks/ talk to her properly etc?

 

[Scout]

Would you move her seat into the front with you so you can pass her drinks/ talk to her properly etc?

I'm a bit of a car seat safety nut, so no, I would never move her to the front seat no matter the situation, especially not for convenience. We'll do okay. I think she's getting more used to me not handing her stuff while driving or being able to pick up something she's dropped. (happened twice today!)

 

[Wobbles]

I did an 8 hour drive with my hen 7 & 8 year old ... it should have been 5. I bought a duel DVD player for the back, both with earphones and I was totally shocked how well it kept them from nagging the hell out of me - wish I'd bought one before. They had other bits in the car ... ipod for music, books, note pads. Healthy snacks too.

 

[Scout]

I did an 8 hour drive with my hen 7 & 8 year old ... it should have been 5. I bought a duel DVD player for the back, both with earphones and I was totally shocked how well it kept them from nagging the hell out of me - wish I'd bought one before. They had other bits in the car ... ipod for music, books, note pads. Healthy snacks too.

I just bought a portable DVD player yesterday! I also have 2 books that she can push the buttons and the characters read the book to her (Paw Patrol) I have another book that I can play a CD that reads the book to her. She's already listened to that one and loves it. I bought a paw patrol dry erase board she can doodle on and have a sticker book and coloring book. I think we'll be good. Oh, and she has an ipad loaded with games if I get desperate. We're leaving tomorrow after lunch!!

 

[Midnight_Fairy]

We used to do a 6hr trip once a week. I don't have did players and don't let them have pads in car. Honestly? They just got used to it. Played ispy for a while or just music/sleep/look out window.

We just done a 16hr trip and only stopped every 3/4hrs to get baby out car seat. My daughter age 4 only slept 2hrs of it but was fine. We did eye spy and mainly she looked out the window x

 

[RaspberryK]

For trips under 4 hours I do them at nap time, anything over that we do a few hours in the morning stop for lunch and play and walk and carry on at nap time. Obviously at 4 they don't nap so instead of splitting it in two days or trying to do it on a day I'd drive overnight and they'll be asleep. X