Travel Fun & Game for Children

For many families moving day means a long car trip or a cross-country flight. Prevent backseat blues and airline angst by adding travel fun and games to your plans. The following suggestions will help make your trip more fun for your kids and more enjoyable for your entire family.

The following are suggestions for anywhere fun and games for kids:

Little Surprises

Purchase several inexpensive toys before your trip. Give them to your children as surprises periodically throughout the journey. A new toy can add fun and excitement to a particularly dull portion of the journey.

Document the Trip

Give your child a disposable camera and the assignment of recording the trip. Keep a travel journal or diary recording interesting places and adventures. Save ticket stubs and other mementos in a scrapbook.

Tried & true Travel take-a-longs

Road-tested by pint-sized travel buffs across the country, the following travel games are sure to provide relief for sufferers of acute travel boredom:

• Travel versions of popular board games such as Connect Four, Battleship, or Checkers. Travel Magnadoodle and Travel Etch-a-Sketch have received top marks from little road warriors around the country.
• Hand-held video games or even a lap-top computer can provide hours of zap-it-up fun. Save your sanity and turn off the sound.
• Exercise the mind with activity books filled with mazes, crosswords, and other puzzles. Quiz each other with trivia cards or giggle as you work your way through a book of Mad Libs.

Rest Stop Races

Turn rest stops into fun stops! Bring a soccer ball or football for rest stop fun. Running games like tag or foot races are a great way to spend some of that saved up energy. Schools, city parks, recreation areas, and fast-food restaurants with playgrounds are great places for kids to do a little more than stretch their legs.

Read aloud & sing along

Bring several books and take turns reading aloud in the car. Be expressive and entertaining. Sing-along cassette tapes can be fun for the whole family. Cast recordings of popular musicals as well as movie soundtracks are a great way to sing away the miles.

Map Your Journey

Take time to learn about your destination and all of the exciting places along the way. Plan your rest stops at museums, historical sites, and other interesting places. Trace your route on the map and look up interesting facts about each place in a guidebook.

Scavenger Hunts

Search roadside billboards and signs for the letters of the alphabet, in order. Make your own list of things to find: gas station, school, church, horses, cows, river, and anything else that you may find between your starting point and your destination.

Fun & Games

Deal Me a Hand Tray tables were made for card games. Bring your own cards in case the flight attendant can't provide you with a complimentary deck. Popular children's card games include War, Rummy, and Go Fish.

Get Plugged in

Even very young children enjoy being read to, so bring a portable cassette player with headphones and some books on tape. Set the volume at a safe level and don't be surprised if they want to hear the same story over and over again.

Courtesy of United States Postal Service