# Trip Complete !! - Long Travel With Kids



## Sayonara (Jul 23, 2007)

We have not made any longer of a trip than about 7 hours and that worked out fine. We will be leaving soon and i was hoping to get in about a 12 hour drive the first day on the way down to FL. many have recommended that we leave in the late evening and travel through the night (yes luckilly i can get a lot of sleep during the day before leaving). i was thinking of leaving early morning (4 am)

what are your thoughts / suggestions??


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## tdvffjohn (Mar 10, 2005)

Been there, done that. The best reason for leaving at 4 am with a 12 hr drive is that you will arrive around 4 pm and have time to relax and set up. It makes the day more relaxing than arriving at 8 or 9 pm, set up in the dark and be more stressed out. When I travelled cross country and drove for a long time, I promised the girls we would stop at a campground that had a pool and they would have an hour or two to enjoy it. It gave them something to look forward to at days end.

John


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## puffer (Aug 28, 2008)

Went to Florida In Jan with 2yr old boy.We left at 8pm and he went to sleep about 10pm and didnt wake until 7 am.We stopped and ate popped spiderman in the dvd player and drove till 3pm and got a room. Slept for a bit and did it all over again. My father in law gave me a set of ear plugs and they did come in handy a couple times.


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## Nathan (Jan 2, 2007)

I'm not a night person, so I won't drive through the night. I also really prefer the visibility afforded by daylight, and my kid's don't sleep well in the car. Add those up and we usually try to leave early morning. Get a couple hours under your belt before breakfast is, in my opinion, the best. Of course that rarely works, but that's life.









I hope you have the DVD player spooled up with backup disks ready. That and some well placed breaks and you should be good! Have a great trip!


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## fourwalls (Sep 21, 2007)

I have to agree with Nathan. We started at 3 or 4 am. Kids slept a couple of hours and then daylight set in. It was a lot easier to see the road hazards and felt better when we got there. We have figured out that pushing 50 is hard work.







Now we can not stay awake past 10 pm so we start mid morning 9ish and go half way find a place with a pool and relax, repeat the next day till arrival. works great with the gs also.


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## Sayonara (Jul 23, 2007)

Good feedback. Thanks!! so far if we left at 4 am, we are looking to stop in Perry, GA for the night then continue on 5 hours to Orlando in the morning. id feel better about traveling through the night if i were not pulling the Outback....but then again, im not completely opposed to it. The DW is worried that getting the kids up at 4 am might mean they wont go back to sleep and this could lead to a long, cranky day.....valid point i imagine...


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## Y-Guy (Jan 30, 2004)

Few years back while living in Missouri we headed to Disney World, left about 8PM Halloween evening and drove all night. Good thing was the kids slept from about 11PM till 3AM, then again from 4AM till 8AM. The rest of the time they were pretty much wide awake, we did get up and run around at 3AM as we fueled up so they wouldn't be stiff or have to go 10 minutes after stopping. I drove the whole way, just sort of got in the groove so it was pretty easy. By the time we reached the GA/FL border though I shut down, ding fries are done, game over, no mas, let me out. I slept solid that night, wife and kids went swimming. Next morning we were a day early for our reservations, but we arrived on property early and refreshed and were able to relax.

The drive at night itself was pretty easy, the roads heading down were marked well and in good shape. The worst part of the whole drive was going through Atlanta in rush hour traffic.

Electronics are good keeping them busy, but if it starts their mind going it may not be so good early in the morning.


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## johnp (Mar 15, 2004)

When we have made the "mouse" run I try to leave around 3am. DW and kids would sleep a couple of hours in the truck. That also put me into NJ and passed the morning NY traffic. The goal was to hit South of the Border's little campground by nightfall. Next day would be SC to Orlando. I would prefer to drive all night but the family doesn't go for that. The limit seems to be 750 miles or RI to Cedar Point anything else they want to stay over somewhere. At least with the motorhome the only real stops are when the driver (me) has to or the beast needs fuel. I really want to pull a prank on DW and set the cruise control get up and say 'take the wheel"







but I know better.

Have a safe trip and keep the kids happy it make for a less stressfull ride.

JOhn


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## Fanatical1 (Jan 9, 2006)

Sayonara said:


> Good feedback. Thanks!! so far if we left at 4 am, we are looking to stop in Perry, GA for the night then continue on 5 hours to Orlando in the morning. id feel better about traveling through the night if i were not pulling the Outback....but then again, im not completely opposed to it. The DW is worried that getting the kids up at 4 am might mean they wont go back to sleep and this could lead to a long, cranky day.....valid point i imagine...


If I remember correctly your kids are pretty young, but you all know your kids sleeping habbits better than us. If you think they may be too excited to go back
to sleep, start at 3:00 or 3:30 instead of 4:00. I suspect at their age they will go back to sleep even at 4:00.

Sounds like a good plan to me..... I would do the same, but you do need to make sure they go back to sleep or it could be "I told you so day" and I would
not wish one of those on anyone.

Mark


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## MJRey (Jan 21, 2005)

When our kids were young, under 5, we would get up really early and get on the road about 4. We could then go til almost 8 am before stopping for breakfast. After that we had to make more frequent stops but those early 3 or 4 hours helped cover some pretty long distances. Now that the kids are older, 8 to 13, we just leave around 7 am and then go a bit later into the evening before stopping.


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## Sayonara (Jul 23, 2007)

Im planning to get up at 3:00am and get on the road by 3:30.


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## Oregon_Camper (Sep 13, 2004)

Sayonara said:


> Im planning to get up at 3:00am and get on the road by 3:30.


I think that is a great idea. I prefer driving at night. I can see people coming up on me and the traffic is a fraction of what it is during the day.


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## clarkely (Sep 15, 2008)

Have a Safe Trip and do what ever you are most comfortable with!

When we went down last December we left at 12:30 am (hardest part was from 6-7:00 waiting for the sun to rise, after that it was easy), we had allowed two days going down .......we tried calling ahead to get into Ft wilderness early....but couldn't so we stopped on the Fla/GA border and had a nice day hanging out........then went on the next day...........on the way home we lft at 4:15am and pulled in our driveway that evening at 10:00 pm.

On the way somewhere i always like to get there and set up in daylight and let the kids enjoy the day a bit.................way home its hammer down all the way till we pull in the driveway









We did a dollar store run for gadgets and toys, puzzles, coloring books,word searches....etc. to fill in time between the movies and video games.as well as state clue /highlight type searches. We did a separate bag for the way home to keep it "fresh"

Kids were better on that knowing it would be an all day affair than they were with a 2 hour trip........go figure!!


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## TurkeyBranch (Mar 12, 2009)

I prefer to drive at night also. My kids are grown and gone now so I can drive whenever.
The thing I always try to do is plan ahead. I used to drive from D.C. to Mobile, AL a lot for family visits. I would plan the trip so I would leave before rush hour in D.C., slide through Richmond mid-day, then through Atlanta before evening rush hour. Of course it worked me around every other major city's rush hour problems too. There was still traffic, but missing all the major stuff was nice.
I was also very lucky that my kids loved to sleep in a moving vehicle.

Anyway, have a great and safe trip.

Ed


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## Oregon_Camper (Sep 13, 2004)

TurkeyBranch said:


> I was also very lucky that my kids loved to sleep in a moving vehicle.


Mine too! Heck....they can fall asleep in the truck just going to Lowes. (10 min drive??)


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## clarkely (Sep 15, 2008)

Oregon_Camper said:


> I was also very lucky that my kids loved to sleep in a moving vehicle.


Mine too! Heck....they can fall asleep in the truck just going to Lowes. (10 min drive??)
[/quote]

Makes it NICE!!! Missing traffic driving through the night Makes it ALL GOOD!!


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## Collinsfam_WY (Nov 9, 2006)

We have always driven with our daughters so the oldest is used to it. Youngest will get there. The oldest will typically ask a couple times how far away a certain place is. When we tell her she will often say "is it far far away?". When we answer "yes, it is far far away", she knows it will be a long ride and she tends to settle down. We always tended to save the DVD player until we felt it was needed (we were about to go nuts). We aren't fans of letting our kids "unplug" from us but we do reach a breaking point. DVD player is busted now so they (and we) don't have much of a choice. We don't think much of driving 7-8 hours with the girls. We start planning parent survival tactics when faced with a trip like the one from our home in Lubbock, TX to visit Dad in Kansas City. A buddy at work has called us "crazy road warriors". We don't really see it that way - it is just what we do. We like to sleep. We "high fived" each other when we got out of our campground at Eden, TX at 9:45am when travelling to the Spring TX Outbacker Rally. If we get an early start, it will be a "rise at 6am, on the road at 7" kinda deal. Honestly, when towing, about 8-9 hours is all we will do before we find an RV park and hang out for the night. Not towing - probably about 14 hours is the max. When we do 12, we are pretty durn glad when we arrive.

-CC


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## Sayonara (Jul 23, 2007)

*WE SURVIVED !! * We had a perfect trip. Left SE MI at 4:00am pulled in to Perry, GA at about 8:00pm. left the next morn at 9:00am and pulled in to Disney Fort Wilderness CG at 1:45pm.

Thanks BigDisneyDaddy for the tips.... this plan worked out great!

The kids were great. slept until about 8:00 am just as if they were at home in bed. we had no issues, they slept, colored, did puzzles, played I-spy, and watched 1 movie each way. We were so surprised and proud of them.

All-in-all it was a great trip and one we might plan to do every 6 months or so.

Trip report (and new hitch report) to follow...


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## rdvholtwood (Sep 18, 2008)

Glad to see you survived!! I know this is a bit late, but, hey maybe for your next trip.....

For years, we went to the Outber banks when the kids where younger and we left early also. However in all the excitement it never failed that they were up for most of the trip. So, DW, one year went to AAA and got each of the kids a map. She told them that their job was to follow along with the map - so they new exactly where we were and didn't keep asking - are we there yet????


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## JerseyGirl86 (Mar 30, 2009)

We went to Disney twice from NJ (18 hours) in a minivan and it was a nightmare!!! We were green by the time we saw Mickey.







We stayed at the Pop Century resort...too small for 5 but right there , brand new, and priced right. Even back then, we were totally jealous of those who stayed in Fort Wilderness. Happy to hear you made it there without...







...yeah, that was me as we were going down 95!







The only one who slept in the car was me!


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## Nathan (Jan 2, 2007)

Glad to hear it all worked out for you. Now you are ready for longer trips!!!


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## clarkely (Sep 15, 2008)

Glad to hear all went well!!! We want to go back as well!!! Such a nice time taking the camper and staying at Ft. Wilderness!!!

Surprising how well the Kids do when they know it will be an all day Drive!!!

Rick mentioned maps..........we did a maps for the older ones and a coloring map for the younger ones.............that way they could color in each state......one more thing for them to do to stay occupied............

Our Drive was more stressful on the wife...................she kept waiting for the kids meltdown.

How did you like the Hitch................I am dying to know as you went from the Equalizer to the ProPride......i am dying to hear your evaluation.

Glad to hear all went well!!

Clarke


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## mike (Dec 17, 2006)

glad to hear u had a great trip. we try to do the early morning thing, i generally get up at about five anyway to go for a run before the day starts so 4 is not too much of a stretch, with a couple of monster energy drinks i am good to go


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## Sayonara (Jul 23, 2007)

clarkely said:


> How did you like the Hitch................I am dying to know as you went from the Equalizer to the ProPride......i am dying to hear your evaluation.
> Clarke


Hitch...what hitch....??







that will be a seperate topic where Ill give my opinions and summary. all-in-all, very happy with it!


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