1. Plan your route in advance, but also be flexible. If it’s a long road trip, it can help to have daily distance goals to make sure you stay on track. However, if the situation is extenuating, don’t hesitate to deviate from the plan to make sure you’re safe!
  2. Bring chewing gum. It’s easy to feel a bit sleepy or inattentive if you’ve been driving for awhile, and ideally when you feel this way, you can trade off. However, it’s not always possible. Chewing gum or having some food can help keep you awake! (There are studies on how chewing can help you think more clearly and feel more awake…)
  3. Stock up your car with snacks and drinks. You never know when you might end up in bad traffic or stuck in a remote area while you’re very hungry. Also, being hangry makes it likelier for you to quarrel with your trip mates. Also, don’t forget to bring a spare plastic bag for garbage (wrappers, fruit peels, gum, etc.).
    1. Once, while stuck in Sunday traffic in Tahoe, E was exasperated by the stop-and-go traffic. In order to make time pass by faster, I offered him one cheddar bunny (Annie’s!) every eight minutes. Suddenly, when measured in units of cheddar bunnies, time passed by relatively quickly.
    2. Another time, we were caught behind bison in Yellowstone and didn’t reach our accommodations until 10pm, when even the general store had closed. Good thing we had food on the car otherwise we may have gone hungry that night…
  4. Have lots of music to play! I love singing along while I drive and I also think that creating a road trip playlist that you add to during a particular trip can help solidify some memories. This way, when you listen to that playlist in the future, you’ll always remember that road trip. Don’t forget an auxiliary or USB cable! Bluetooth also works although your phone will probably run out of battery fairly quickly this way.
  5. Listen to an audiobook. Before E and my first road trip, some kind friends lent us the audiobook for the sixth Harry Potter book. What a lifesaver! If your trip is a long one, you will probably find yourself tired of music, talking, and roads. The audiobook was a great source of entertainment that didn’t detract our attention from the road. Audible is probably the easiest way to get audiobooks on your phone nowadays, and sometimes they have offers for Amazon Prime subscribers.
  6. Cook for yourself once in awhile. It’s not as hard as it sounds because by “cook,” I mean “make instant noodles.” If you get cup noodles in bulk, they’re really inexpensive. You can pick up some pre-washed baby kale at a grocery store and then toss that into the noodles. (Sometimes, for the kale to cook more thoroughly, you have to throw it into boiling water separately before adding it to the noodles.) I’ve also heard of people who bring rice cookers and Spam and vegetables for meals on the go. Sometimes it’s not just about saving money – it’s also about saving energy. At the end of a long day on the road, you may not always want to sit through a sit-down dinner and fast food may have lost its appeal by then…
  7. Learn to feed your driver/be fed by your passenger. Sometimes you’re just trying to cover some ground in a short time and a meal has to be eaten on the go. It’s not fair to the driver if only the passengers get to eat!
    1. Start with simple foods that can be fed in small, discrete chunks (and preferably without crumbs). Once you’re good at it, you can advance to things like Filet-o-Fish sandwiches or even burrito bowls. Always remember to use both hands – one to feed and one to catch any crumbs that may fall – otherwise you’ll have an angry driver with a dirty lap.
    2. Once we were driving from Montreal to Boston and the weather forecast was rain along our entire route – but it was slated to begin an hour after our projected time of passing through each place. We drove like mad to beat the rain – and it worked!
  8. Get a water bottle that does not have a screw-on lid! The best are the ones where you press a button that is connected to the cap/lid/insulating plastic. I always drive with my Contigo because then I don’t need E to open a bottle for me when I want to hydrate.
  9. Use the Google Maps detour function. Set your route, start navigation, and then use the magnifying glass button to search for gas, food, tourist attractions, etc. Google Maps will tell you how long the detour will take and it’s much more efficient than searching separately and trying to overlay two maps in your head.
  10. Pack your trunk smartly. If you have a lot of luggage, make sure the items you need are near the outside. This is especially important if you have a hatchback or plan to pack the backseat of the car as well.
    1. Once, we had to wade through a bag of clothes hangers and an over-the-door rack in order to get to our kettle to boil some water… Not the most fun.
  11. Don’t forget to gas up. Better to gas up more often than not – sometimes gas stations are really spaced apart. A general rule of thumb is a full tank of gas per 4 hours of driving. On a Prius, the gas tank is smaller but you have better mileage; on a Murano, the gas tank is larger and you have worse mileage. It all works out to about the same… You just pay different amounts for a full tank of gas!
    1. If you’re on a budget, use Gas Buddy to check for gas prices and always opt for the cash option – it usually gets you a few cents off per dollar. However…if you have a nice credit card, you may want to weigh the opportunity cost of the lost credit card points.
  12. Always check speed limits when you cross state borders. Some states will sneak up on you with a speed limit lower by 10-15 mph and then you can get into some expensive trouble if you’re caught driving at the last state’s legal limit. Downloading Waze and navigating through it can sometimes help by informing you of upcoming police officers/state troopers/etc. The information on Waze is all crowd-sourced though, so it’s not always foolproof. It’s also nice to give back and submit updates on what you see while on the road if you can – this is a great job for your passenger/co-pilot (who isn’t driving!).
  13. Track your trip using TrackMyTour or Google’s My Maps online if you have a particularly long trip. We used the former app to keep track of distance driven, fun things we saw, as well as time on the road. It was also very cool to look at how much we’d driven after the trip. (It is also a great way for curious friends/family to keep up with what you’re doing. You save yourself time by not needing to send/post updates to everyone. And you also avoid upsetting the people who are not interested in your trip.)
  14. If you’re going to lots of national parks, consider getting a National Parks annual pass. We didn’t think about this one until it was too late, but the breakeven is probably around five parks. It’s pretty easy to hit that many in certain parts of the country.