Travelling with children? Keep calm and carry on

While a break can be blissful, getting there can be anything but if you are travelling with children. Never fear though there are ways in which you can make journeys with your offspring more bearable.

I consider myself somewhat of an expert in tackling long journeys with children having ferried my four sons everywhere from a two-day drive to go skiing, to a 12-hour flight to America, complete with a stopover to change planes. We have done ferries and trains to Europe and even memorably once attempted to get about by bicycle, so there is not much I don’t know staying sane while transporting children.

Screen time cuts down scream time

The key to it is to keep them entertained, which can be as simple as ensuring they have some kind of screen to be glued to. Our trip the Alps was blissfully quiet as the boys worked their way through the entire works of Harry Potter on their in-car DVD players. A DS or similar apparently works just as well according to friends who have tried this method.

The other key to a peaceful trip is to ensure that your children are well fed and watered. My children have an incredible ability to put away food while travelling and it’s amazing the soporific powers a biscuit can have on them. So pack heavy when it comes to snacks and drinks.

I blush to admit that when travelling all healthy eating goes out of the window and its sweets, crisps and biscuits all the way, but I am assured by more health conscious parents that fruit, plain popcorn and vegetable sticks do work too.

Take time out for toilet breaks

All this talk of eating leads me neatly on to toilet breaks.  When driving these must be frequent and you should never take no for an answer to the question of ‘Do you need the loo?’. If you do you will only end up pulling into the next service station, muttering darkly all the while ‘I knew I should have made you go at the last one’.

Perhaps the biggest challenge to a serene journey is the pent up energy that accumulates. When you are in a car this can be solved by stopping at a service station with a play area and letting them loose for a while. Check out Motorway Services Online to plan you trip around service stations with play areas in the UK.

Tire them out before travel

On a plane or train it is trickier to get active. The solution to this is to pick a travel time when you know the children will be tired. Night flights are great as you can hope that the children will sleep at least for a few hours. If that isn’t possible make sure you really tire them out the day before you travel, and fingers crossed the exhaustion will mean they appreciate being able to sit down during the journey.

Obey these golden rules when travelling with children and you won’t spend your entire holiday dreading the journey back home.

Read more

Help, we're going on a long journey by Rosie Scribble

How to keep the peace on holiday