My kid is grown now, but has gone with me on all sorts of trips from the time she was a baby. Long distance week long drives, short overnights, flights across country, everywhere. Usually just me and her, though a mess of trips with my girlfriend and her kid too, who was same age as my daughter.
For long distance driving, two of the best things I learned to do were cookie sheets and a dictionary.
- Cookie sheets go in their lap as a drawing/work surface. The little lip around the edge does wonders at keeping crayons, markers and colored pencils from rolling away and getting lost. Some trips all we'd bring, seriously, was a ream of copy paper, a mess of crayons, markers, colored pencils, a pencil sharpener, and manila folers or envelopes they could keep all their art in. Works for kids as soon as they can hold a crayon and can keep them busy for hours. They start to get bored, ask them to draw this or that, or draw what they see out the window, or tell a story and have them draw what they hear you say.
As soon as she was old enough to read, the dictionary was often the only book we'd take on a trip. She'd ask what some word on a sign or that she heard on the radio meant, and I'd hand her the dictionary and have her look it up. Then we'd talk about word derivation, different meanings, slightly different spellings, etc. We had a blast with the dictionary. To this day she's terrific at research and writing.
Also great is books on tape for kids. Load it up to your iTunes. Neil Gaiman stuff is a hit with my kid and now her kid too. Even Aesop's Fables, or Cherokee Indian Myths, or Classic fables . . . all can keep a kid mesmerized so long you'll be shocked. The stories you listen to often gives you something cool and unusual to talk about over meals or when walking, too.
I also would let her have her own music player and headphones so she could listen to her stuff and I could listen to news, or my music, etc. It was a riot . . . she'd be drawing and listening to her tunes and every once in awhile she'd blurt out "...goes the weasel!" . . . "mulberry bush..." She had no idea, and I'd be cracking up.
She would sometimes take a car blanket and stick one end into the glove box and the other end over the headrest so she had her own private little tent space and she'd draw and sing and just have a grand old time.
Another good trick is to not leave until 4-5 in the afternoon. Drive a couple hours, stop for dinner somewhere, then drive a couple more and they typically zonk out. That's when you make good time and have quiet time for yourself.
Another, if you like making stuff up, is to create a story together. We have some we still retell, like Buzzer the Cross-Eyed Bumblebee, or The Three Indian Sisters, or Emerald Island. We'd always start by one of us saying "Ok, what should we tell a story about?" Then we'd come up with a main character, a location, then talk it back and forth. She learned about classic storytelling, the power of myth, protagonists and antagonists, crisis, solving problems, the works. Amazing how much time will slip by when engaged in creating a story together.
Teach her about maps, too, and let her mark the spots you go to. Let her choose a road one day, or a little town off the main road. Make her part of the process and she'll likely be fascinated.
That's all car stuff. There are a TON of things to do in camp that can be exciting and keep a kid engaged. Bug jars, flower and bird and tree identification. If in a national park, have them get into the
Junior Ranger program. I know kids that can't wait to get to the next park and get another stamp in their park passport.
Or, find cool camp stuff like the pic below. That was those cyalume glow sticks with, if I recall, glycerine and sparkly powder. Made very cool nightlights.
Here they're hard at work.
The final product
The winner!
