Travel sure has changed!
Remember the days when we would make lists of things to bring that would occupy our kids as we travel to our destinations? Well I do…just 13 short years ago my list would have had things like snacks, toys, coloring books, items to open as “surprise” activities along the way, CD’s to listen to, music and more! I remember dreading long drives with the all ever popular: “Are we there yet?” or “Mom how much longer?” I would spend weeks thinking up ideas of things to do in the car, songs to sing and places to stop along the way. Well that has changed a lot in a short amount of time.
Packing for road trips now involves less time, shopping and planning. Why?
Because our kids are a bit older now, but more importantly because of technology. One device and you can load games, songs, books, movies and more. Now-a-days instead of endless trips to the Dollar Store it is an hour or so of loading some new content onto the devices. Of course we can’t (and shouldn’t!) spend the entire time on our tablets, Kindles or IPads so we still pack coloring books and, of course, at least one regular book. No more surfing the radio. We have Pandora. We pick a favorite artist or genre, and boom, we have an endless supply of our favorite music.
Maps!!!
Remember the days of laying a map out on the table and highlighting your route? Then as you are on your trip trying to read the map from the passenger seat? Well I do!
Now all we do is ask Siri or Google and off we go. They even redirect when we have taken the wrong turn or gone too far. And can even direct us around traffic jams and road work. Technology has changed much for the better but without some monitoring and willpower we can become too dependent on them.
I empower you all to take those gadgets away after a bit and have a good conversation with your kids. Better yet, play a road trip game like the ABC game or Slug Bug. For directions always go prepared with paper directions or a map of some sort in the event you lose that signal on your cell phone…you might just end up at the wrong destination.
Technology is fantastic…foresight and planning make it even better as it marches to the beat of our own drum…or playlist.