We are planning an epic summer road trip for our family! My daughter will be in 4th grade- so she can get the pass to go to national parks for free! We're overdue to visit my best friend that lives in South Dakota as well! The kids are excited we will drive through 6 states! SO- tell me about Yellowstone, Mt. Rushmore & Badlands. I've been to all- but it's been a long time. We will spend a few days at Yellowstone, then a night with family in WY, then hit the others on the way to my friend's house. It'll probably take us 2 days to drive back home as well. The Kids & Hubby have never seen any of them so that will be fun! We make the 6 hr drive to my mom's house often so the kids are pretty good car travelers. Tips? Tricks? Best places to stay at yellowstone? Ways to not make Mr-car-sick-declan not puke the whole way?
This sounds amazing! We don't travel often, so I don't have any tips . . . just wanted to pop in and say I'm jelly. LOL
We did this exact trip a few years ago! Depending on how you route, you can also include the Grand Tetons. It's such a FUN vacation. The best thing we did in Yellowstone was to hire a private guide. We had him for 3 days and were able to see some pretty amazing wildlife, including the elusive wolves. It was phenomenal! We also did a river float - a more sedate one because our youngest was little at the time, but I think that's another great add-on that allows you to see different parts of the park. I also highly suggest staying on property if you can swing it. It really does cut down on travel time. As far as Mount Rushmore, make sure you do more than just the viewing area, which is very touristy. You can actually hike around to the sculptures for a close up view. My youngest really struggles with motion sickness in the car. We use a combination of Relief Bands, which are basically acupressure bracelets for the wrists and Kids Dramamine. I don't love medicating her but it's better than her being sick or vomiting for 2 days in the car!
Another jealous one, although not the whole long trip. But it sounds so fun. I've been thinking there are too many National Parks around here for me not to start planning some trips. Yellowstone is one of them.
My DD used to get terribly car sick, even with Dramamine. The only thing that worked for her was watching movies on a dvd player. If not, well, it wasn't a pretty sight. I'm not sure where you're driving from, but if you're going through the Badlands, there's Wall Drug. Gotta go there. Just because. We were in Yellowstone a few years back. It's so close to the Grand Tetons (like literally right next door) that you'll want to drive over there. We just drove around and saw all the sights in one day before heading back to our hotel (Jackson Lake Lodge in the Tetons). We saw lots of animals - everything but a moose. Crazy. I was so thrilled when we saw a buffalo way off in the distance that I made DH stop while I tried my best to get a good photo of it. Long story short - about 1/4 mile away we were driving among the buffalo. They were everywhere! It was an amazing experience, but just make sure to stay in your car! We did a river rafting trip (well, the boys did since we girls got sick!), and a breakfast horseback ride. THAT was fun with oh, so much food! You'll have to plan for Old Faithful, of course. And years ago (when I was a teen) they had stagecoach rides available at the lodge, which I thought was a ton of fun, even at that age. --------- IF you made it into Jackson, WY, then I have ideas. Stop in the Saddle Rock Family Saloon at the Jackson Hole Playhouse (with swinging saloon doors for both adults and kids!) for draft root beer on tap where the kids could sit on saddles at the bar, or even catch a play there at night (they might even have dinner theater - I can't remember). You'll need to get your photo taken at the antler arch in the town square. Go to Jackson Hole Resort to take the gondola up the mountain for the amazing view. Visit the National Museum of Wildlife Art - it was one of the biggest highlights of the trip. See the shoot out in the town square. And there's a fish hatchery that you can visit. We were there for July 4, and they had a parade through town where they continually threw candy to the kids. They were in candy heaven!
Sounds like an amazing trip! Definitely on our bucket list, and our last daughter will be in 4th grade next year, so I feel like we will need to take advantage of that!!! I never knew of this "4th grade for free" thing, so that is new to me! Sorry, no tips from me, but will definitely be following this thread!
Sounds fun! I am jealous as I have never been. My parents did yellowstone, glacier, grand Tetons last fall and loved it. Just want to say have fun!
I so want to do a huge long road trip with my family! I'm so jealous! I hope it's fantastic! Some of Laura's and Jan's suggestions sound perfect - the private guide and river rafting! I must make a mental note!
I'm with the jealous crowd. We've done very little traveling for years now. Have fun planning and have a great time!
I know Carilyne! Yellowstone is only 6 hours from our house here in the valley! Here's the link- it's for ALL national parks so I'm sure there's some in your state too! https://www.nationalparks.org/our-work/campaigns-initiatives/every-kid-park Thank you everyone else for the tips & suggestions- River raft sounds AWESOME & I know that we'll be doing some hiking too! Can't wait!
This sounds like so much fun! We were going to do this as a family when my kids were about 2 and 4 because our best friends moved to Washington State. We were going to drive and meet at Yellowstone (we are in Michigan). But then I remember my youngest screamed bloody murder in the car for trips over 15 minutes so we decided to wait. Plus, they wouldn't have remembered it. Now they are 10 and 12 and I think it would be the perfect time to do it. I just don't want to plan it. I want someone else to do it all and then I'd really love to rent a motor-home. That would be awesome.
I would love to do a trip like this!! Back when my children were younger and every summer we drove to our family camp. It took 10 hours. They each had a bag they could pick what they wanted to put in it, some had handheld electronic games some coloring books some reading books and treats. This was one time I just figured for long road trips you get to eat junk food lol.
I haven't done any of them and am quite green with envy. Go, enjoy, take loads of photos and then scrap them so we can live vicariously, pretty please?
We just roadtripped to Glacier National Park last summer. Amazing trip!! We're trying to decide what to do this summer and were torn. Half of us want to go to Yellowstone/Grand Tetons and the other half want to lay on the beach in either Alabama (Sugar Beach Condos) or Florida. Your vacation sounds amazing. Have fun and share pictures!!
From your list, I've done Mt. Rushmore and Badlands. I love Badlands as it's just gorgeous and quiet to hike around. There are boardwalked trails if you're not into hiking, but most of the trails are pretty easy. Just wear protective foot gear if you "off road". I did the whole kitsch and went to Wall Drug (in Wall, SD) and the little shops nearby. I'm crazy about dinosaurs, so I went to see the "dinosaurs" in Rapid City, SD (at their tourist information center). The little kitschy stops break-up the drive, too. I highly recommend the lesser populated paths at Mt. Rushmore, too. I also did Rushmore Cave and enjoyed that (I like caves). Didn't do the amusement park part of it, though, just the cave. I didn't enjoy Rushmore as much as Badlands, because I'm much more of an open nature girl, but it was great to see. I didn't like all the people, though. I did love driving through Custer and Black Hills - especially further North in Black Hills as the scenery is gorgeous, but that might be off your route.
We just got home from our little hospital stay, so I'm just catching up on posts here. We did a big road trip to Yellowstone a couple of summers ago. I no longer keep up with my blog, but I did then a bit so I blogged about my travel journal I made. It has a lot of the details of what we did... http://tkradtke.blogspot.com/search/label/road trip 2014 Here's the link to my shutterfly trip album as well (it has less detail because I printed a copy for my parents and didn't want all of my journaling in their book)... https://share.shutterfly.com/share/...a626ecfb8abcfd7207a7b1fe91&sid=8AcuW7li0btWcj My kids LOVE to earn junior ranger badges at the parks. I think they ended up with five or six new ones by the end of the trip. As for getting carsick... my daughter swears by Queasy Drops and Pops. I'll add more detail later... but as for right now... my patient keeps texting me stuff I need to bring her :-/
@tkradtke Your book is SO awesome! I might have to steal your idea! So fun! I read something about the ranger badges for the kids- I'm sure they'd love that! Thank you for sharing!
I haven't done any of those! It sounds awesome. I do know we river rafted in Zion on the Colorado River and it was a blast! So I totally recommend that.
We took a road trip a few years ago to those same places (plus a few more). It was the most amazing vacation we have ever taken! Are you staying in hotels along the way or camping? We towed our camper with us, and it was the best thing ever. It let us stay in some places that we otherwise wouldn't have (we could have also tent camped, but I am not really a tent person). The most amazing was staying at Devil's Tower between our stops at Rushmore and Yellowstone. We were able to camp where we could see the tower out of our window! The biggest reason we took our trip was to see the Tetons (my husband worked at a camp there during the summer in college but hadn't been back since), which are really close to Yellowstone. In fact, we stayed at the Lizard Creek campground in Grand Teton National Park and used that as a jumping-off point for both Yellowstone and Teton adventures. If you have the time, I highly recommend checking it out- the Jenny Lake area is especially gorgeous and has some great hiking! We did the Amphitheater Lake hike (switchbacks for DAYS!), and it was so amazing!
