Traveling with Kids: Challenges, Rewards, and Why It's Totally Worth It

Traveling with kids is even more fun then traveling without them.

As a travel influencer on social media, I follow so many other travel influencers. More often then not they are single or couples that travel the world together. These couples mottos are that they want to someday have stories to tell their kids or they want to see the world before they have kids. My question is instead of putting off kids to have adventures, why not create these adventures with them?

I am a family travel influencer. I have 4 soon to be 5 kids and we LOVE to travel. Sure I traveled before I had kids, but if anything having kids has actually pushed me to travel more! I have been on countless adventures and have experienced amazing things and so have my kids. These are memories that we have together that will last forever.

So the question is, is it easier or harder to travel with kids? What do I need to plan for when traveling with kids? What changes when traveling with kids? I hope to answer these and any other question you might have about traveling with kids.

Table of Contents

Things That Are The Same:

I think a lot of people think that once they have kids they won’t get to do the things they did before when traveling. In a way you are right. Sure you can’t really take a toddler bungee jumping or zipline with a baby, but honestly the list of things you can’t do is a very short list.

Just because you have kids doesn’t mean you can’t travel overseas. It does not mean you can’t go on incredible hikes or visit monuments and museums. You can still eat what you usually eat, go where you would normally go, and have fun; even with a couple little feet following you around.

Even after having 4 kids I still do practically everything I would do without them. I have still hiked to the waterfalls of Yosemite National Park, I still swam next to dolphins in the ocean, and I have even handed my kids a baby alligator to hold in Louisiana.

Your traveling plans and itineraries will not change significantly just because you have kids, in fact it will just add to them. Having kids will make you want to do more and experience more, so your children can experience it too.

Traveling with kids is one of the best experiences you will have.

There isn't much you are going to change when traveling with kids. You can basically do all of the same things.

Things That Are Different:

It takes longer to do everything. Kids are practically little turtles! They are easily distracted, drag their feet, lose things constantly, and their legs some how are always tired. Add an extra hour onto your hiking time, plan to leave your hotel 30 minutes early to get to your schedules tours, and don’t count on Google Maps arrival time estimation being correct due to the number of bathroom breaks you will have to take. No matter what you are doing just go ahead and add time to it, cause kids are so slow.
It costs more. The obviously thing that changes when adding more people to your travel plans is cost. Traveling is expensive just as a solo traveler, and it doubles when you add a spouse. Adding a kid is going to triple the cost, a 4^th will quadruple it, and so on. Traveling gets so expensive the more kids you have.
It is harder to find places to stay with your size of family. Finding accommodations for 1-2 people is SO easy, but the more you add the harder it is to find a place that will accept a family size. Most hotels and resorts, for instance will accommodate up to 4 people per room and even a lot of campgrounds only allow 6 people per site. This kinda sucks for us as a family of 6, soon to be 7. While there are places for larger families like mine, they are way more expensive and harder to find.
You may have to take a break in the day. I am the type of person who loves to plan every second of the day. When I travel I want to do and see as much as possible. While I do still plan the entire day out, I do add a break in the day so my little ones can take a nap and relax so they don’t get overstimulated. Usually this just means I pick an activity that is a 30 minute and an hour drive away so my kids sleep in the car.
The list of things you can’t do is very short, but there are thing you won’t be able to do. Depending on the age of your kids, somethings may not be possible. A lot of adrenaline activities are not available for small children due to the hazards of them. So maybe plan to go skydiving and whitewater rafting on a couples trip instead.
You will probably be doing kid things that you wouldn’t do as an adult. This is not necessarily a bad thing, but something that will be different when you travel with kids. Since having kids we have added activities that we normally wouldn’t do, like children’s museums, theme parks, children’s gardens, and splash pads. Just because they are a kid activities does not mean they aren’t fun though! Doing these activities with your kids makes them SO fun!
You will have to deal with meltdowns and tantrums. You are a parent so you are going to have to deal with kid behavior bad or good. While kids make everything so much more fun, they can also make things very unfun when they are grumpy. No matter what you do there will be times that your kids throw a fit and ruins the activity, but I am going to tell you this does not happen very often.

Tips For Traveling With Kids:

Traveling after kids is even better than traveling before kids.

A way to really love travel, is to start traveling with your kids.

Spend about 30 minutes to an hour driving at some point of day. To keep my kids from being overstimulated or over exhausted, we take about 30 minutes to an hour in between at least one activity to give my kids a break. If you try to take a break at a park they are just going to play, if you take a break by just sitting for 30 minutes they will get bored and grumpy. In the car they can play games, take a nap, and can’t go anywhere; they just have to sit and wait until we arrive to our next destination. It is a mandatory break for everyone and a perfect naptime for little ones.
Invest in a carrier of some sorts. Strollers take up so much space aren’t all terrain friendly. If you have small children, bring a carrier instead of a stroller. There are so many options and they take up way less space when traveling. There are shoulder carriers, hiking carriers, baby front carriers, hip carriers, slings, and even piggy back rider carriers. So many options that are so much more practical than a stroller or wagon.
SNACKS! Kids are always hungry! If you want to keep your kids happy, the secret is keeping snacks on you at all times.
Rewards! I am not against giving my kids a sucker if they finish a hike or getting them ice cream for behaving in a museum. I don’t do it every time, so they never known when their good behavior will be rewarded. They do know that rewards are a possibility and so tend to behave better. I am no above a little bribery now and then!
Do not skip meals! Its funny how food is a magic weapon for keeping kids happy. As long as you keep your kids fed, they tend to be better behaved. When my husband and I have traveled alone in the past we sometimes would eat meals later than usual to do certain activities. This is not a good idea with kids, they still have a basic schedule and skipping meals will throw them off and cause more tantrums.
Visit playgrounds where ever you travel to. I have taken my kids to do incredible things, but nothing is more cool to them than a basic playground. In a way I feel like playgrounds are almost like a reward to my kids. It is a perfect way to run out their excess energy and its FREE!
Screen time isn’t always a bad thing. This my be an unpopular opinion, but it is not always bad to use tablets or movies to entertain your kids. I mean we as adults use technology to entertain ourselves, so it isn’t bad to give your kids screen time when traveling. My kids are awesome at long road trips and I attribute part of that to having tablets and the switch to play on. Don’t get me wrong, there should be limits, but screens aren’t always bad.
Camp! There are SO many reasons I suggest you camp with your kids over hotels, resorts, and Airbnbs! For one amping is cheaper than anything else and camping doesn’t have such a small limit of people allowed. The main reason those is that your kids will love it! In a hotel they have to stay quiet to keep from waking people. In an Airbnb you are just constantly trying to keep them from breaking things. When you camp your kids don’t have to be super quiet. You don’t have to try to glue them to a TV to keep them from breaking things. They can explore and enjoy nature! It is the best environment for a perfect stay with kids.
Play games. Make everything you do a game. If you are standing in line at a theme park, play I spy. If you are hiking have races. Instead of a boring long car ride, play the travel bingo! Make everything you do exciting and they will love traveling.

Is It Worth It?

Traveling is fun, but traveling with kids is a thousand times more fun! When I travel with my kids I create memories with them and bond with them in a way I never would just hanging at home. My children have become my best friends and I like to think I am theirs as well. We spend so much time together doing things we love. It is a way create a connection with your children.

While I love traveling with my husband, there is nothing more magical than traveling with your kids. They have such an enthusiasm and excitement about everything we do. They just make things fun! We could go to the lamest museum and I will leave thinking it was so fun, because of them.

Traveling with your kids creates amazing memories.

While traveling with kids you will probably go places you would never go with out them.

It is amazing to see a giant waterfall, but as a mom I get to see the amazement of it not only for myself, but watch the same excitement on each of my children’s faces. It amplifies each experience and adventure because I get to experience it through each of my children.

I could go on and on about the beauties and wonders of traveling with kids. Yes it is harder, not significantly like you would think, but there are complications. Isn’t there the saying though that the best things in life are the ones that require the most work. This is 100% the case with traveling with kids. It is a lot, but it is something you will never regret doing.

So the real truth about traveling after having kids is that it is more work, but it is so much more wonderful! It is two of life’s greatest adventures combined into one epic life!

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