Summer Travel Lessons Our Family Learned the Hard Way

Our travel-loving family of four regularly hits the road and skies in the summer. Here is what we've learned en route.

While it's tempting to hush impatient kids on a car trip with candy, the ensuing sugar rush will mean misery for the rest of the ride. (Are we there yet? What about now?) Since almost any food tastes good to children who are bored in the back seat, bring along portable cheese, individual Ziploc bags of homemade, nut-based trail mix and finger fruit such as grapes and cherries.

Don't assume there's going to be a gas station: We still torture ourselves with memories of our journey down California's Coastal Highway. None of us could enjoy the country's most dramatic scenery with our nearly empty tank and dread of getting stranded on the Bixby Bridge. We wrongly estimated the size of the tank on our rental car and location of the next gas station. When we finally chugged into the Big Sur Shell on fumes, we would have paid $70 per gallon, not just the $7 they charged. My son actually got out and kissed the gas station ground.

A regular dose of Dramamine might make your kid doze through the whale watch: Worried about our 12-year-old getting sea sick, we gave her the dose of Dramamine for her age and weight. It brought on a full sleep that we couldn't rouse her from even when Moby Dick swam under our boat. For sensitive children, a half dose might do it. Talk to your doctor or test this out before you spend $27.50 on your child's nap.

Audiobooks: Take advantage of them: Our very long cross-country car ride one summer was actually wonderful with Jim Dale reading the "Harry Potter" series. We still reminisce about what happened in various states. (Remember when poor Cedric Diggory died in Wisconsin?) If you have older kids try "The Hunger Games" or, for an inspiring memoir, "I Am Malala." If your teens resist listening, get their summer reading titles on Audiobooks.

Bring your own water bottles: Every family member gets a reusable water bottle. That's it. You are not buying 12-ounce bottles of Poland Spring for $2.50 at tourist sites and adding to the plastic disaster we've created in the world. This is the low bar of being green-ish on the road.

Your kids might care more about the free cocoa tea: You may be feeling ambitious to see every sight, but some of the best travel memories are made when you're just relaxing. I swear the thing my kids remember most about two weeks in Bolivia is not the amazing two-day boat tour of Lake Titikaka but rather hanging out and drinking the free cocoa tea in the hotel lobby.

Say yes to curiosity: If you hear, "Hey. What's that place?" in the back seat, consider investigating. You may just want to get to the hotel, but if your children are intrigued by an overlook or tower or inviting road, you are cultivating their curiosity by not rushing past it. Because my son spotted a sign for a small swamp, we ending up seeing alligators (live in nature, no admission fee) in the Florida Keys.

Kids love some lateral thinking: Enough with backseat boredom! You know those brain teasers where one person gives the bare bones of a story and the other people have to ask yes or no questions to put the rest together? Then the answer is usually cool and unexpected? We keep a lateral thinking puzzle book in the glove compartment and pull it out when we need a distraction from traffic.

Skip the souvenir shops and go to the grocery store: Last summer in England, we all found fun souvenir treats for our friends at the local Tesco Supermarket in London. Instead of bringing home more key chains, a few packs of McVities Biscuits and some strawberry liquorice, let us share the flavor of the place we'd been.

Ice cream helps you forget: When Bill Martin, the world's most boring guide, gave us the three-hour car tour of Gettysburg (he was driving our car so we couldn't just jump out) my kids almost wept from the mind-numbing dullness. As soon as it ended, we drove to the nearest ice cream stand and got huge multi-flavor cones to help us forget the erase the pain of America's bloodiest battle. It worked. Ice cream always works.