I Want Your Best Road and Camping Trip Advice!

I’m planning on taking my kids on a road trip/camping trip later this summer.

I’m not calling it a vacation, because in my opinion it’s not a vacation if I’m going to be working as hard or even harder than I would be if we were just staying at home.

The trick is that I’m going to have to go it alone, as my husband won’t have any PTO available.  Yes, I know I’m insane. But as my husband said once as we were brainstorming for a family motto, “Sanity is overrated.”

However, this is the first summer of my adult life where I haven’t had to worry about having enough or accruing enough PTO for a trip, so I’ve decided that I need to take advantage of the situation while it lasts — even if that means taking the kids somewhere by myself. It’ll also be nice to get out of the southern Arizona heat for a while.

I have locations in mind, but I’m going to be intentionally vague on that for a while. Maybe Utah, as pictured in the above image — I do think Zion National Park is one of the most beautiful places on Earth. Also, thanks to my now-former fourth-grader and the “Every Kid in a Park” program, we get into all national parks free of charge until September 1. But I haven’t made any decisions yet.

For now, I’m interested in the following:

What’s your best advice when taking kids (toddlers to teenagers) on a long road trip (other than, of course, “Don’t do it!”)?

What’s your best advice when taking kids (toddlers to teenagers) on a camping trip?

What has worked best to keep your kids entertained during long car trips?

What has worked best to keep your kids entertained on camping trips?

What did you regret doing on a long car trip with your kids?

What did you fail to bring that you wish you would have on a camping trip with your kids?

Do you have any favorite recipes for snacks in the car?

What are your favorite camping recipes? (I have a camp stove and a cast-iron dutch oven — I found the latter, brand-new, at Goodwill for forty dollars. It remains one of my finest thrift store scores ever.)

Any other general advice? Please share!