How to Survive a 37 Hour Road Trip with a Teen

Published on December 2, 2021. Last Updated on April 24, 2025.

We love to travel. And we love family road trips so much so that we even road trip with our cat! On average, we take about 15 family road trips a year that average 4-14 hours a driving round trip. We love road tripping so much, we have even driven around Scotland and Ireland. However, our longest road trip to date was a drive from Southern Arizona to South Dakota. When all was said and done, we survived a 37 hour road trip with a teen!

After being confined in a car with a teenager for hours and hours on end, I am sharing with you my Top 10 Tips for surviving a road trip with teen. Buddy is also sharing his Top 5 tips for surviving a road trip with parents as well.

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Mom’s Tips for a Road Trip with a Teen

1. Have your teen help with trip planning

It can be challenging to get teens excited and motivated to do anything. That includes travel and exploring new places. Involving teens in trip planning means that they are more likely to be interested and engaged when exploring new places.

What does this look like?

Sometimes Buddy helps us choose a travel destination. If the family votes on a place to visit or where to stay and what to do, we ask him for his input and take his preferences into consideration. I also show him YouTube videos of destinations before we travel to get him interested and engaged.

Other times, this means we give him a paper map and ask him to navigate and give us directions. Yes, we did get lost, but only once. And it was nothing that we couldn’t easily undo. We have only done this domestically as we don’t trust him to navigate our international road trips – yet.

Most recently, Buddy and I sat down and planned our day-to-day itinerary for our summer road trip. Buddy took the lead on creating and downloading offline maps so he was aware of the full itinerary and was best prepared to be my co-pilot.

2. Pack lots of easy to access snacks

Pack lots of snacks and keep them in a place that is easy for teens to access in the car.

When we road trip, we travel with a small storage container with a lid packed with non-perishable healthy snacks (granola bars, apples and oranges, jerky, trail mix). I prefer a clear container so that Buddy can see what was in the box and reach for it rather than rummage through the box and create a mess!

3. Share the radio

Let’s face it, not everyone in the family is going to want to listen to the same music for the entirety of a road trip. So how do you overcome the battle for the radio?

What worked for us? Radio take overs!

During the road trip to South Dakota, each passenger would take over the radio for 1 hour at a time. When that person’s hour was up, we move on to the next. This was a way to ensure that everyone had a chance to listen to something pleasing to them.

We downloaded music and podcasts and shared the radio, rotating every hour. This is a great way for us to experience and learn about each other’s music.

Because we travel so often, we now have a two playlists that everyone in the family contributes to year round so we are ready for our road trips! And the playlist shuffles the music so everyone gets to listen to something we like as we travel.

However, 37 hours is a long time, and after a few hours of dubstep and hard bass, I needed the next recommendation.

4. Pack headphones

If you can only take a few hours of your teen’s music of choice. Or if you just want to sleep when it isn’t your turn to drive, headphones are a must!

I usually pack two sets of headphones on the road trip, the XM4s, which I use for mostly noise canceling, and my earbuds, which I used to do yoga at campgrounds or hotels while the family rests. I did use to have fancier earbuds, but after leaving two pairs of very expensive earbuds in two different hotel rooms, I stick with a more affordable brand. Either type works for a quiet moment!

Buddy also travels with noise canceling headphones.

5. Keep the teens comfortable

Having comfortable, yet durable, pillows and blankets are very important if you want your teen to sleep on the road. The more time the spend sleeping, the less time they are asking those dreaded four words, Are we there yet?

If you are flying to a destination and road tripping there, a smaller airplane travel pillow and blanket works well and does not take up a lot of space.

6. Pack books for road tripping teens

Traveling with books can be cumbersome, especially on flights as hard copies of books can take up precious space on a carry-on. However, it is nice to have something to read in case of travel delays. And the best thing about books is, you don’t have to charge them!

That said, we always travel with at least one book. On our road trip to South Dakota, we were not limited by the amount of books that we could bring in the car. Buddy packed four books to read on the trip. All of which he finished on the road. Some of these books he packed were on his school’s recommended summer reading list and they were:

• The Hunger Games
• Hatchet
• The War of the Worlds
• The Titan’s Curse (Percy Jackson and the Olympians, Book 3)

When Buddy was younger, he always traveled with a copy of one of his Diary of a Wimpy Kid Books.

And now that he is older, his standard summer reading are AP prep books.

On our road trip to South Dakota, I also traveled with the book Dona Flor and Her Two Husbands, which I read during the brief moments of relaxation at the campsite. However, on our most recent road trip, I was the sole driver and did not take a book. Unlike Buddy, I cannot read in the car.

7. Yes, take the teen’s phone

As much as I would have loved for our South Dakota road trip to be a phone free road trip with the teen, it was very important to Buddy that he stayed connected with friends back home. That meant sharing photos of his trip with his friends.

For our South Dakota trip, Buddy carried his phone to take photos and we allowed one hour of screen time each day of the trip. Although he snuck a few extra hours in here and there! At the time of the trip, Buddy’s phone did not have a SIM card and only works with WIFI, which helped limit the screen time to WIFI areas only.

Now an older teen, there is less restriction on his phone use. On our more recent road trips, Buddy uses his phone but only at rest stops or after we arrive at the campsite or hotel for the evening. When just the two of us road trip, Buddy acts as my co-pilot helping with navigation. For this reason, e does not use his phone on the drive.

8. Road trip with a teen? Give them chores & responsibilities

Chores

Oh geez! Every teen is gonna love to hear this!

I know, I know bear with me.

When you arrive at your destination for the evening, your teen may have pent up energy from sitting in a car all day. How to channel this extra energy? Put them to work!

During our Arizona to South Dakota road trip we tent and cabin camped along the way. And tent and cabin camping road trip is not an all inclusive vacation! It involves a lot of packing and unpacking of tents and preparing and cooking meals. Buddy helped with unloading and packing up the car, setting up the tent, helping with meal prep, washing dishes, and throwing the trash every day of the trip.

On other non-tent camping, Buddy helps us do laundry on the road, unload and load the car, carry suitcases, pumps gas, and other chores as needed.

Other responsibilities

As a young teen and middle schooler, Buddy also completed one page of activities from the Summer Bridge Activities Workbook each weekday of our road trip. He completed these workbooks each summer since 1st grade through 8th grade, even when we traveled.

But now as an older teen, he is off the hook from this work because he takes summer classes.

9. Start them young, if you can

If at all possible, start them young. The earlier that kiddos begin traveling, either by car or by plane, the easier it will is for them to travel as teens.

Teens who traveled as kids are accustomed to sitting for hours on end, carrying their own suitcase and backpack, packing and living out of a suitcase. This will make it easier for parents on longer trips.

10. Have fun and enjoy these moments!

A road trip with a teen can build memories to last a lifetime. Some of the best memories I have with my dad is when I road tripped as a teen with my family from Albuquerque to San Diego (a 28 hour round-trip drive).

So enjoy every moment of your road trip with your teens. Soon your teen will be all grown up and these road trips will be cherished memories.

Check out our Movement Postcards to see how silly 37 hours on the road together made us!

Bonus Tip: Let the teen drive!

If you are the parent of an older teen who has a driver’s license and some experience under their belt, share driving responsibilities with your teen!

Having your teen help out with driving is a great way to build confidence and gain experience behind the wheel. That is of course if you and your teen are comfortable with them driving. And the roads on which you travel as driving small rural back roads is different than road tripping on Highways and Interstates.

Buddy has driven on two road trips so far gaining experience on state highways and major interstates. It has been a fun experience!

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On our road trip adventure from Arizona to South Dakota, we road tripped in our family vehicle – our old reliable faded green Toyota Highlander. But, sometimes we road trip in a rental car. If you are planning on renting a car for your road tripping, Discover Cars is a good place to compare prices.

Are you planning a road trip with a teen? Let us know in the comments below.

Do you have questions about family travel or traveling with teens? Feel free to reach out! We are happy to chat and share our experiences and look forward to connecting with you.

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