By Mary Flynn
Our Florida-based family has been on four RV trips extending as far north as Upstate New York and as far west as Arizona. After traveling thousands of miles piled in an RV, I finally feel as if I have a better handle on traveling with the kids on these trips.
When I first planned our two-week RV family vacation, I was a bit nervous about how to keep the kids entertained during the long drive. My kids get bored fast, so I wanted to be sure they had plenty of activities to occupy their time. When asked what items they wanted to bring on the trip, their first answer was friends. After explaining that this was a family vacation, we decided to go to the store and shop around.
When we arrived at the store, I was amazed to find road trip activity kits for kids of all ages. I bought several kits for ages 4-6 which were filled with fun items such as “Old Maid,” crayons, activity books, small toys and more. After choosing games, I took the kids to with me to pick out snacks and food. T create excitement and ownership, we also asked the kids to each choose two places they wanted to visit on our selected route.
And dog makes 5
On our first family vacation we traveled from Orlando, FL to Lakewood, NY. We rented an RV that slept 6, had a bathroom, kitchen table, a DVD player (just in case), a bed and 2 pull outs that turned into room for 4. There were five of us in the RV — me, my husband, our two 5-year-old children and the family dog. We left at 4 a.m. and after one round of “are we there yet?” the kids were fast asleep. By the time they woke up we had already been on the road for 5 hours and were already out of the state.
After the kids awoke, we stopped and ate breakfast in the RV to see how they were going to adapt. Turns out they loved it. During the trip we stopped every couple of hours so that the kids could run around a bit. We sang songs, played games, and talked about things that my husband and I did when we were kids on our family vacations. (They were actually very interested in our experiences.) During the two weeks, we spent only three nights in hotels and the rest at camping grounds. As it turns out, campgrounds are great places to meet and play with children of other travelers.
My kids still talk about that first family vacation, although we have taken three more since then. As the years go by, the trips are still as much fun, but the activities change. Hand-held game systems have replaced coloring books, but we never drifted away from singing songs, playing games and talking about our childhood travel memories. The kids are now nine, and the RV trips have become an essential part of family bonding. It amazes me how much you can learn about your kids and yourself when you spend quality time together. I truly can’t wait 'til we can RV again.
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Mary Flynn is an Orlando native with 4 children, ages 21, 19 and 8-year-old twins. She also has two grandsons who are 19- and 6-months old. She travels all the time with some — if not all — the kids.
By Kathy Karlesses
