cottages4you blog: inspiration for your cottage or villa holiday in UK, Ireland and Europe

The journey is part of the holiday - how do you keep the kids entertained?

Bags packed, got the road map (and passports if you’re heading overseas), checked the car, everything’s good to go. The family is ready for its next cottage holiday. Load up the kids, and 45 minutes from home…”Are we there yet?…I’m bored”, yes, the little ones start piping up from the back. Without the proper ‘management’ it could well begin to feel like the longest journey ever.

So, to help out all those parents wishing to keep their sanity, we thought we try and gather some great, easy to play games to keep everyone amused.

Our ideas so far:

I SPY – the old classic, but can quite easily pass the time. The only question is, do you restrict it to items in the car, or venture outside…?

The Collection Game - set the topic, e.g “Cars with stickers on the back” or “Red lorries”, and see how many everyone can spot in the next 5 minutes.

In Car Karaoke – nothing more technical than picking a song and all having a really good sing-a-long.

I went to market and I bought… - Simple game, but tricky to play. Moving through the alphabet, each player adds an item to an imaginary shopping list. Start with player 1 who might say “I went to market and I bought an apple”. Player two then follows with “I went to market and I bought an apple and a bicycle” and so on. Each player has to recall (in order) the previous items in the list. Sometimes tougher for the adults than for the kids!

What other games should be on this list? What do you regularly play on long journies? Let us know by leaving a comment…