Are you planning a road trip? It can be a very daunting task. You often need answers to certain questions like: where do you start? What is the first step? What is the second and third? One usually get overwhelming from the start, most especially when you haven’t done such before.
We have put together a step by step instruction on how to successfully plan your first trip with ease.
1- Set your start point, route and destination: It usually takes a few miles for a road trip to lose it romance, and become stressful often when the goals are not clear. Don’t discount valuables and always set your intentions. Just like a return flight home or an attraction filled route one way and economical route the other.
Your route can be modified by using other guidelines, but you should bear in mind that you are establishing thirst for a type of experience. This is normally defined by route you lay out.
2- Define your resource bank clearly: How much money do you have to budget for the trip? And how much time do you plan to spend? These questions usually frame out other details which usually go hand in hand. There must be a resolution for both. Decide if you are travelling with a partner or two, this decision will break or make the elements to enjoy your trip.
You should always remember to plan for the period you return home if you are ending a lease or leaving a job, otherwise, the end of the trip won’t be as sweet as you would like it to be.
3- Fill in the details: the concept of driving through the country side is very easily romanticized. When planning the attractions and you really think it is not important to have some stops along the way, this would not really make your trip that much fun as it should.
Being aware that you have 2-mile loop to hike in about 60 miles, help with the numb butt. Gather all your ideas somewhere accessible, and look up their possibility as you progress on the road. You might want to have a bag of mixed nuts if the nearest sweet looking café you found is an extra 30 miles off your track.
4- Always take 2 preventative measures: it usually sucks to either return home in debt and broke without any specific plan whatsoever or have car problems while you are in the middle of nowhere. It is always advisable to do a bit of work from the beginning of your trip to plan ahead of both. Try changing the oil and filter and you are going to want to have some money in the savings account at least. So as to be on a very safe side during and after you trip.
5- Pack smart: unlike air travel, packing for your road trip doesn’t have to be some sort of hard and stressful thing to achieve. It is advisable to have one rolling suitcase for every single person going for the trip, regardless of whether we are driving or flying. But for shorter road trips, it is advisable to have a pajamas in your overnight bag pack, change of clothes and toiletries so that we don’t have to carry your entire luggage to the hotel or guest house each and every night. F or longer road trips, you should strategically pack the trunk such that is will be very easy to pull out whatever you need for every single overnight stops without going through the stress of unloading your things every time.
You should as well try to have one separate bag for your electronics so that the items can easily be brought into the hotel for the night. This also allows you to charge everything that needs to be charged before getting on the road the very next day.
6- Play outside: After a long time of being cooped up in the car, and sitting on a spot for a long period of time, you should always get out into fresh air and move around. This will help keep the pace among everyone. Try look around on the way for stops where you can go for a short hike, pop in at a nature center, visit a local farm of farm stand or just have some fun around. Koa campgrounds are usually great spots for an overnight stop and the often have small cabins that you a good camping experience without having to schlep all the gear.
7- Snack healthy: road food usually leaves a lot to be desired in terms of its healthfulness. That being said, packing a big bag of snacks will ensures that there is limit to the amount of crap yourself and kids will consume during the trip and this will decide the number of stops you have to make during the day. Normally, anything portable and small is just perfect but you should always take along some reusable containers into the bag. This enables easy portion sharing of bulk snacks. You might also consider a small cooler bag with some small cooler packs which will be useful for refrigerated snacks. Many hotels usually have mini fridge so you can easily refreeze the cooler pack overnight. Here is a good list for road trip snacks.
• Squeezy applesauce
• Granola and cereal bars
• Veggie sticks, pretzels, pita chips, veggie booty
• Almonds, raw cashews, other nuts and dried fruits
• Tube yogurts
• Stick cheese
• A crate of clementines
• Refillable water bottles for everyone