Sometimes, half the fun is getting there. Even when you have kids in the car.
A couple of times a year, my husband and I drive our two young kids from Sydney to Adelaide to visit family (and then drive them back, obviously).
Our friends think we’re crazy.
Airfares are so cheap.
They can’t understand why we would choose to spend so much time on the road. Well, it’s partly because we have family members and friends scattered in different country towns, but also partly because we like the trip.
Yes. In the car. With kids.
I have to admit, these road trips haven’t always been fun. When my daughter was tiny and still in a baby capsule, I had to read to her the whole way over or she would cry. By the time I got to the end of the trip, I wanted to tear Postcards From Kitty into tiny pieces.
There was also the time, when my son was a few weeks old, we ended up in a freezing motel in Wagga Wagga in the middle of winter and I thought we’d never make it through the night. Oh, and then there were the bushfires, dust storms, floods, plagues of locusts, etc, etc.
But, on the positive side, my kids have seen a lot of country Australia. They’ve watched, fascinated, as herds of cattle and flocks of sheep have crossed the road in front of our car. They’ve seen emus running alongside us, and kangaroos hopping by. They’ve been transfixed when we’ve stopped the car at night, in the middle of nowhere, and stared up at millions of stars, looking like a tub of glitter that’s been spilled (a sight I’m very familiar with).
I do have a few bits of advice, though, for any parents about to set out on a major road trip for the first time.
Don't be too ambitious. We don't usually plan to drive for more than five hours a day, although the kids have coped with more than that. Within that five hours or so, we'll schedule two stops. If the kids run around enough at the stops, they'll spend a big chunk of the drive sleeping.
