All of the details, pitstops, and routes taken while our family packed up the minivan and drove from Wisconsin to Arizona over Spring Break
You might be thinking driving with four kids in a cramped minivan stuffed full of your stuff over the course of 2-3 days (in one direction) sounds a little rough… and you might be right. But between poor planning, finances, and apprehensive flyers, we’ve sort of gotten this roadtrip thing down. And you know what? There are a lot of perks you might have never thought of when you go on a road trip! (No, really.)
How To Find a Route to Drive
We have taken a route to Arizona from Wisconsin a few times, but we’ve also driven brand new routes to Montana. Even the easier, shorter ones all follow the same simple method:
Just Plan Your Stops
You can expect to either need food, a bathroom or a break from sitting every 3-4 hours. When we drove to Montana, we had an 8 month old who needed to nurse and come out of her carseat every 2-3 hours. Once you figure out how to search for what stops really matter to your family, you’ll find your road-tripping groove. For us, that meant looking ahead to whatever next city we were coming up on, and searching for parks and playgrounds nearby. You’d be amazed over the hidden towns and amazing parks you’d otherwise never stumble on! You can pack a cooler with sandwich supplies and snacks as a bonus and turn your pit stops into picnics. (Check the weather first.)
With the general pit-stop plan in force, we also kept in mind some bigger “planned pit-stop” destinations that we wanted to route to. We start with the framework of those stops to route our direction, and then sprinkle in the little park stops as needed.
In the little map above, you can see that we start in Madison, Wisconsin and then our first stop is in Des Moines, Iowa. We like to start our trips really early (like 3:00 AM) in order to keep everyone sleeping for the first long leg. Each little dot was a pre-planned stop we knew we wanted to take, but there were plenty of park visits sprinkled in between.
Pit-Stop 1: Des Moines, Iowa for breakfast at Drake Diner
From there, we drove on with the pit-stop principle of stopping when we needed and trying to get as far as we can. We approach hotels similar to finding the pit-stops– we look for hotels in major cities for around when we’re feeling done and ready for dinner and to get out of the car. We try to end the day by 6 or 7 in order to get dinner and get to bed for another early(ish) start.
Pit-Stop 2: Breckenridge, Colorado
We wanted to drive through the mountains for a change of scenery and to set us up for our planned day in Moab, UT to hike. However, we didn’t expect to have the kids struggle with the altitude and ear pressure.
Pit Stop 3: Moab, Utah for Arches National Park
This pit stop was the priority for the grown-ups in the car. During our last road trip to Arizona, the mountains in Colorado were closed with heavy snowfall, and we had to miss the route that would bring us through Moab. This time, the weather was sunny a gorgeous, and Moab did not disappoint! Driving through the areas around Moab were often as stunning as inside the Arches National Park. We planned for extra time to spend in Moab and hike. The hiking path we chose in the Arches National Park was the Sand Dune Arch because of the shade and kid-friendliness we had read about. I wouldn’t necessarily call it a hike more than a really cool sandbox for kids to play in, but the whole family enjoyed this stop!
Moab had some great restaurant and hotel options, and we could have easily spent another day there. With only 10 days off of school for Spring Break, though, we had to keep it moving.
Destination: Phoenix, Arizona
After Moab, we knew we had around 7 hours to go until we reached our final destination (at least for the next few days until driving back home). We packed up in the morning, hit the road, and reached Phoenix by dinnertime. We made the choice to skip exploring Sedona, which was a bummer, but at that point we REALLY wanted to be done with the driving for a bit!
Shockingly, road trips have really won me over with getting to see the things that we’d never otherwise stop for, and having the flexibility to stop whenever you need makes it one of the easier ways to get somewhere with kids in tow.
I hope this trip breakdown helped you realize how approachable a family road trip can be with little kids, and make sure to check out my other posts and content around what made life easier inside the car!