How many posts about road trips am I going to do on this blog? Apparently a lot. Because we’re doing it– we’re finally becoming a family of road-trippers. My dreams are coming true and it’s magic. I don’t need much for road tripping. For me, road tripping requires a bottle of water and a sense of adventure. Oh and maybe a full tank of gas too. But you guys know… or maybe know if you’ve read my other posts that I was really the only one keen on road tripping in this family. Marlowe — well, she’s the best– at a lot of things– but road-tripping? Yeah, she needed work in that category. Until recently really. Before it would be about 20 minutes in the car and she’d be complaining. But now? Well, you guys know we drove across Florida (east to west and back) to test it out– and she did great. Then we drove Asheville and back and she did amazingggg. And most recently? We drove Massachusetts to Canada and across and all the places.

Now that it’s not just me and my little two door car traveling all the places– and I have a family to worry about, my road trip requirements are a bit more, well, requiring? There’s just more to think about. The biggest thing for sure, if making sure we all carry a sense of adventure. I think I have it most, then Marlowe, and Alex, well, he’s warming up to it. The other things are as follows: safety, snacks, timing, and maybe (if you feel like it) a little bit of planning.

The biggest thing that has helped for Marlowe (besides her getting older) has been for her to pack her own travel bags. It is her responsibility and no one else’s. I’ll remind her 2-3 times before we hit the road that she better be prepared, but thats it. She knows to pack any coloring supplies she wants, work books, toys, stuffed animals, etc. Thanks goodness she does not get car sick man. I don’t know how she does it– pure magic.


We also make up games along the way. Mostly we just look for certain brands of cars. Like, when we hit Vermont our favorite game to play is “count the suburus” haha. Every 3rd car is guaranteed to be a suburu.

The first leg of our ride was easy. It actually rained a lot. But thankful I’ve done the drive from MA to VT a million times. (Or it feels that way anyway). We stopped at a rest stop– not just any rest stop– one that I was especially excited about and looking forward to show Marlowe haha. There is one rest stop right past the white river junction that grows tropical plants from the toilet water. Last time we visited it was amazing. This time I was underwhelmed. I talked it up so much that poor Marlowe probably thought it would be a magical dream land. It wasn’t. Either way, if you can, plan fun rest stops! Stretch your legs, buy some maple syrup (things you’ll buy will vary by location of course), and take a car break. Also: clean out all the fruit peels from your car (not pictured). We always pack tons of fun travel snacks. This trip my mom packd us so much fruit and rice crackers. Pro tip: rice crackers may not be the best road trip food– as they will spill EVERYWHERE.

Omg friends.

Take the scenic route. Seriously. If at any point I can jump off the highway to take amore scenic route, I do it. We made alpaca friends. Unless these are llamas… then we made llama friends.
Naps are cool. For as long as I can remember I’ve told Marlowe, “if you sleep the car ride goes faster.” Sort of, right?
Plan stops by food choices. The first time Alex and I road tripped to VT we stopped at the Brattleboro farmers market. It was AMAZINGGGG. This time we traveled on a Friday so we just snacked until we got there (you know, that terrible long, 3.5 hour drive haha). And then loaded up on smoothie and acai bowls for a quick snack, walked around, and got dinner at a Tibetan restaurant with my friend Lisa.


And more friends. We parked our car and saw this adorable dog in the window and had to go in the shop. Having a dog in your store front window is either the best or the worst sales idea. Depending on how much people love dogs haha. We loved this one.

 

We had originally planned to head into Montreal much earlier this day. But at the same time– we didn’t plan too much. Just how I like it 🙂 Make a general outline of stuff— and then sort of stick to it 😉 We left a little later than planned (thanks to me– I refused to wake up early) then we decided to spend a bit more time in Burlington than originally planned. Lisa asked us if we were worried about traffic (still not sure if she was serious or kidding). But we told her we weren’t. We do plan for traffic — and aim to leave at none traffic hours, but this doesn’t really apply when leaving Vermont and heading into Canada haha.

Oh and good tunes. I need to make it a point to download some more music on my phone. I currently have three albums: Poolside, Phantom Planet, and Coldplay– hows that for a selection? haha. We did find some sweet Canadian disco music though.

And safety. Always safety. I know I mentioned it before, but I totally had one of my old cars catch on fire when driving from Massachusetts to Arizona (it happened in Colorado). You just never know what will happen right? So we make sure safety is first– before you hit the road! And especially when traveling internationally 🙂 We plan a little, snack a lot, and as long as the car is SAFE and ready to go, we’re ready to go too.  Happy to partner with Firestone to make sure our road trip is super safe and happy— we don’t need any more fires on the road– especially not with the whole family in the car, you know? 🙂

So grateful to  finally be driving everywhere with this family. And grateful they’re starting to love road trips as much as me.

Firestone Complete Auto Care, is there to make sure your road trip is a family success 🙂  Top-notch services (tires, oil, brakes, battery alignments). Check out a bunch of Firestone Auto Care coupons and deals HERE! Hooray 🙂

Find the closest Firestone Auto Care to you HERE. 

 

*this post is sponsored by Firestone Auto Care— grateful to do these trips and have wonderful companies behind us 🙂 

10 Comments

  1. Laurali Star

    I love hearing some of your thoughts on travel, but I personally don’t enjoy these posts as much. Seems like there has been a lot of them lately. I really enjoy when you post about health and diet or personal thoughts. Still love you, but just sayin!

    • Andrea

      Yeah travel posts vary— during summer theres a lot of them for sure– because we travel a lot– but even then it’s only about 1 in 4 post being a travel post– and most of them really just included travel pictures but lots of rambles about other life stuff. Like this week it was more of a mix of: emotional post, travel post, recipe, craft DIY, and tomorrow it’ll be a totally random local/food post. just depends! The only time you will be seeing A LOT of non stop travel will be in a few months………. but I think and hope you’ll like it– def. something like we haven’t done before!

  2. This is what I piped into say. We just got back from a vacation that included significant car travel and we rented a car with a booster for my son (6 years old, 66 #, 50 inches tall) and a traditional car seat for my daughter (3 years old, 33#, 38 inches tall). There was no extra charge for the seats and they were super accommodating when I got kinda picky about the seats (they tried to initially give us 2 boosters)! I think it’s way inconvenient to travel with seats, but since you can easily get them from car rental places this is a no brainer for me!

    • Andrea

      We did have a car seat on this trip– but honestly, didn’t use it all the time. Only part of the time. But as I commented above (not sure if you get messages for all comments or not!) we don’t use it 100% of the time– probably more like 80-95%

  3. Hi! I love reading about your trips. I would love to be a road trip family too! I would strongly consider researching car seat safety. Don’t do the minimum by law of your state. Marlowe’s belt is not positioned correctly. The lap belt needs to lie across her legs, not belly and the shoulder belt needs to lay across her chest not neck. Picture what happens if you get in an accident and that shoulder belt snaps tight, across her neck. She will be injured by the belt. Boosters will correct the belt position and they should be in them until 58″. My daughter is turning 9 in august and is 53.5″ and still in the booster. Also states have different laws you drive in, like in Ohio she needs to be in booster until minimum 8. Sorry these things scare me when you know people who have had children hurt do to this lack of info.

    • Andrea

      I’m not going to lie– we are not super strict about it over here. I kept her rear facing a lot longer than she needed to be– and then kept her in a car seat longer than she needed to be, but for the booster, we have been more lax. I’d say we use a booster 80-95% of the time, but we’re not strict on the full 100%. Especially on longer car trips where we anticipate her falling asleep (rare, but sometimes!)

      Also, I will say– which is a total mistake on my end– but we are normally strict about seat belt placement. I wish you could ask her so she could tell you first hand how often we tell her she needs to sit up and have the seat belt in the right position. I tell her all the time that she doesn’t want the seat belt to cut off her head… heh. But yeah, we’re def. not perfect about it. Thank you though! I do appreciate your input!

  4. Sounds like a fun road trip! Has Marlowe already outgrown booster seats?

    • Andrea

      No, we use them most of the time– but I’d be lying if I said we use it all the time– we def. don’t. But often, yes!