This summer, we’re going on a long car journey. We’re travelling from London to Italy. In the car. With 2 small (ish) kids.

I’m of the opinion that if you survive something the first time and repeat it, you’re an expert. I have 2 kids. I have not done them any major harm. So I’m an expert on kids. And we’ve done this long car journey with kids twice and nobody died. So I’ve given myself expert status here too.

First a bit about our long car journey with kids

Each summer, we head from London to our holiday house in a little-known part of Northern Tuscany called Lunigiana. It’s 916 miles. I guess you could do it in one day of driving, but that seems like the very definition of madness to me.

Instead we do it over two days and have around 7 or 8 hours of driving each day.

A few months before The Long Car Journey

Pre kids, I guess we might have winged it all a bit more. But, mindful of the need for snacks and not letting the kids get hangry, we get our shit together a bit earlier these days.

1. Euro tunnel

Obviously, you can just turn up on the day of travel and buy a ticket, but we always book them in advance. The very thought of turning up with no ticket and having to wait for hours with 2 restless, desperate-to-get-to-the-holiday-house, kids is just too much to bear!

As we’re only a couple of hours drive from the UK side of the Eurotunnel, we normally get the cheapest fixed-time fare for our journey out. However, as we have lots of driving to do through France on the way back, we splash out and book a flexible fare for the return journey.

To check out fares and times, pop over to the very helpful Eurotunnel website. They also have lot of really useful information on driving in France.

2. Motorways

If you want to have a lovely meander through the French countryside, stopping at every hole in the hedge, you can do. But with two small (ish) kids and a long car journey ahead of us, we stick to the motorways. Yes, they are more expensive but also much, much quicker.

And, so far, and I’m aware I might be jinxing it here, the traffic on the French motorways has been quite light. Perhaps everyone else is having a lovely meander through the French countryside.

3. Toll Tags

A toll tag is a little box that means you don’t have to stop at the barrier on the motorway. It allows you to drive up to a designated motorway toll barrier and drive through.

No stopping, no fumbling around for coins. No hassle. Just raise your hand to the less prepared travellers in the other queues and give them a little wave as you sail on by.

Any time and hassle saved on a long car journey with kids need to be explored, right?

(To order a Telepass box for Italian motorways, you can head to this website which explains it quite clearly)

(You can order a Sanef tag for France, Spain or Portugal via the Eurotunnel website. Click here for more information)

4. Overnight stop

As half the world and his wife will be travelling through France, we make sure we book our overnight stay in advance. I don’t fancy schlepping from one place to another with 2 small kids on a long car journey being told there is no room at the inn.

We have broken our long car journey each time in Dijon as it’s around half way.

At first, we had grand aspirations of a handsome French chateau with a pool and sweeping gardens. But this hasn’t quite panned out for us yet.

We’re not sure exactly what time we’ll rock up, the kids need to be fed quickly if it’s getting late and we’re only there for one night. Not enough time to appreciate a French chateau.

So we’ve stayed at the Novotel in Dijon a few times and it ticks a lot of boxes. They have a big family room. They serve dinner and breakfast. They have lots of parking on site. And they give the kids a toy each time they stay.

And actually they do have a pool.

Admittedly it is like swimming in Fly Soup, but it is a pool. Just grit your teeth when you get in. That way you’ll avoid filling up on French minibeasts.

5. Car Snacks

There’s no more crucial thing to plan than car snacks. If you’re going to take a long car journey with kids, you’d better keep them snacked up to the max.

Generally, we don’t do much in the way of snacks as I prefer them to arrive to the dinner table hungry. Hungry and willing to eat. It’s one of my ways of dealing with fussy eaters.

But, when you have a lot of time to kill, you need snacks. Nice, not too messy ones, like bananas and easy-peelers and breadsticks.

I guess the crucial things are to take more than you need and to ration them wisely.

I like to eke the snacks out to last the journey. And I don’t let the kids see what I’ve got in my little bag of delights. Keep an element of surprise.

Last year they didn’t know that I had a bag of chocolate buttons until Day 2. And they became spot prizes for I-spy and all sorts of guessing games.

6. Pack a Picnic ….. or two

In addition to general snacks to be dished out when I feel the mood going sour, we take picnics. (And a big picnic blanket)

I’ll have 2 picnic cool-bags packed up. One for Day 1 and one for Day 2. Each one will have….

• A selection of bread rolls
• A packet of pre-sliced cheese
• A packet of sliced ham
• Cherry tomatoes
• Carrot batons
• Cucumber batons
• A packet of croissants for emergencies

And, of course, water.

It’s going to sound bleeding obvious, but do make sure you have enough water in the car. And then add some more.

We got stuck on the motorway in Italy a couple of summers ago. There was a fire in a tunnel just ahead of us. And the tunnel was closed. Thankfully not with us in it.

We were parked up on the motorway, in the baking sun, waiting for the emergency services to sort it all out. And we had about half a cup of water left.

…To share between four.

I am now paranoid about running out of water.

Don’t forget to pop the contents of the Day 2 picnic in the hotel room fridge. And ask the hotel to put your ice-packs into their freezer overnight. You can pick them up when you’re getting breakfast in the morning.

7. Where to Stop for Picnics

The French motorway has lots of service areas calles ‘Aires’. They are marked, as below, in a distinctive blue signage, with symbols to tell you what’s at that one. They normally have a sign also telling you how far the next one is too.

Some are pretty basic places to stop, others have restaurants, showers and a petrol station.

Now, if you don’t go down the picnic route, you could just make sure you stop at an ‘aire’ with a restaurant. But be aware that you might have to queue up behind a whole load of other people while your bored and starving kids are losing the will to live.

…perhaps not the most relaxing of lunches half way through your long car journey with kids!

Which is why we take a picnic and let the kids run about to stretch their cooped-up little legs.

… and then get scoop back into the car, fed, watered and ready to sleep or play some Car Games.

Keeping it Fun in the Car

When you’re embarking on a car journey with kids, you’ll need to be on your game activities-wise. We haven’t yet caved into the iPad pressure, so our journey is a low-tech, singing and dancing jamboree.

We play i-Spy until our eyes can take no more.

We play Hangman until we are almost ready to hang ourselves.

We list things. Almost without end. Top 5 footballers. Top 5 midfielders. Top 5 international football teams. Top 5 goals. Guess what Big Boy is obsessed with?

Hell, I even slip in a bit of educational play. Who knows the word for ‘belltower’ in Italian? etc

Probably one of the highlights for me is Family Sing-Song Time. We can while away quite a few hours blasting out Katy Perry hits or songs from Sing. This year, I’m looking forward to increasing my repertoire with a few numbers from The Greatest Showman. And Moana, which reception-aged Littlest Angel has learned from her new schoolfriends.

We’ll also download a few kids’ stories on audible. Last year, we enjoyed The Fox & The Snow King by Michael Morpurgo so much that we listened to it twice in one day.

Click on this link and take a browse through the kids’ collection of audio books. I’ll be having a little virtual rummage later on!

(Have you done a long journey in the car with kids? Got any top tips of games, activities and snacks to make the journey fly by? Please share with us in the ‘Leave a Reply’ box at the end of the page)