Are you preparing for an upcoming road trip with your children? This road trip scavenger hunt for kids is the perfect printable to bring along on your next family adventure.
Long car rides can be a challenge when you have children. Being confined to a seat for hours on end can be a difficult task for most kids (and adults). Having young children myself, I know just how important it is to have activities for my kids to do during the long road trip. That is why I created and am sharing with you this fun road trip scavenger hunt for kids.
This is such a great activity to occupy the time spent confined in the car. There are four different free printable road trip scavenger hunts each designed for different ages. This makes the activity enjoyable for toddlers all the way to adults.
Trust me, your family will thank you for bringing along this fun printable on your next long trip!
This post is all about road trip scavenger hunt for kids.
Best Road Trip Scavenger Hunt For Kids
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This road trip scavenger hunt is an awesome car ride activity for SO many reasons. First, it helps pass the time much faster because it lets everyone focus on finding the objects rather than focusing on how much longer the ride is going to take.
Second, the entire family can join in on the fun because it is suitable for all ages. Another wonderful thing about this family activity is that you can literally do this over and over and over again!
Supplies Needed for the Road Trip Scavenger Hunt For Kids
- Printer
- 8.5 x 11 Printer Paper
- Dry Erase Pocket Sleeves or Laminator/Laminating Sheets
- Vis-a-vis Markers or Dry Erase Markers
- Dry Eraser (or paper towel)
- Clipboard (optional)
Directions
First thing you will want to do is decide on which of the four scavenger hunts below you want to use for your next car ride. Next, print off enough copies for every member of your family. You can either preserve these car ride printables to reuse or print off extra copies in case you want to do it more than one time.
If you would like to be able to reuse the scavenger hunt instead of reprinting every time you take a long car ride, there are a couple different methods to protecting the printables that you can do.
- Laminating
- I am a huge fan of laminating any activities or materials I print off for my kids. Printer ink can be SO expensive so I hate reprinting when I could just laminate and reuse.
- I have this Amazon Basics 9 Inch Thermal Laminator and I absolutely love it. I have used both the Amazon Laminator Sheets and the Scotch Laminating Pouches. I have yet to notice a difference between the two protector sheets so I just go with whichever one is cheaper when I need to buy them.
Amazon Basics Laminator
- If you decide to laminate the scavenger hunt just make sure to bring along a Vis-a-vis marker for each person to use on the laminated scavenger hunts.
- Dry Erase Pocket Sleeves like these are a heavy duty transparent sleeve that you can just slip the printable right into. Amazon sells these. Otherwise, if you wait until the end of summer you can usually find them in Target’s Back to School Dollar Spot section for super cheap.
- You can write on these sleeves using Dry Erase Markers like these.
- To erase, either use a dry eraser specifically designed for dry erase markers or you can just use paper towel.
Dry Erase Pocket Sleeve
*Tip: If you forget to erase afterwards and the marker becomes hard to get off just squirt a little hand sanitizer on it and use paper towel to wipe, it comes right off!
If you have young kids you may not feel comfortable handing them a marker to use unsupervised in the backseat. If this is the case, you can always just make extra copies of the scavenger hunt printable for them. This way they can still do it more than once if they choose. Make sure to bring along a writing utensil for them such as a crayon, pencil or colored pencil.
An optional item that goes great with any of the above methods is a clipboard. Having something hard to write against makes it SO much easier. Some clipboards also have a spot to clip the marker or writing utensil when it’s not being used so it doesn’t fall or get lost.
If you don’t have any clipboards at home, you can also just give everyone a hard cover book to write against.
Now that you have all the scavenger hunts prepared, put them in your vehicle so they are ready for your next road trip.
Before you hit the road, make sure to give each family member a copy of the scavenger hunt along with a writing utensil and optional clipboard.
Then, once you start going see if you can work together as a family to find all of the items on the list. Once you’ve finished, have everyone erase their scavenger hunts and do it all over again.
It is such a fun way to pass the time while bonding with your family.
Road Trip Scavenger Hunt for Families
CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THIS FREE PRINTABLE
This road trip scavenger hunt is my favorite of the four because it is perfect for the entire family. From adults down to toddlers you all can play and enjoy this game.
It has 26 items written out along with a picture to match each of the items. This allows toddlers and preschoolers who may not be able to read yet, participate in this scavenger hunt.
There are a few tough ones you may not be able to find depending on where you are traveling. For example, if you are driving in the city it is highly unlikely that you will be able to spot a cow, silo or windmill. You could always swap these items out for other ones such as a jet trail, train track or moving truck.
Road Trip Scavenger Hunt For Toddlers
CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THIS FREE PRINTABLE
This road trip scavenger hunt is ideal for toddlers (although anyone can do this one). It has 18 items to find ranging from a police car to a construction worker. All of them have pictures instead of text.
This makes a great activity for your longer car ride trips. Some of the items may take awhile to find such as a gas pump or water tower. The gas pump will be an item they can spot when you stop to fill up. The water tower can be spotted when you enter the next town.
I’ve also created a road trip scavenger hunt your kids can play on shorter trips.
CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THIS FREE PRINTABLE
This one has items that are more commonly found so it does not take as long to finish. Some examples are a pedestrian, evergreen tree, house, flag and more!
What I like about this scavenger hunt is that it is perfect to have on hand in the car for short outings like trips to the grocery store.
It makes running errands feel a little less of a chore and more of a fun bonding activity for you and your kids.
Road Trip Scavenger Hunt for Kids and Adults
CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THIS FREE PRINTABLE
This road trip scavenger hunt is great for older kids and adults who can read because there are not pictures to go along with the items. This hunt includes 48 items to find such as a moving truck, train tracks, and a person on a phone.
Although there are no pictures, toddlers and preschoolers can definitely play too. They will just need some help with the reading part!
You could have someone read off all of the items before starting. This way your younger kiddos know what to be on the look out for. You may have to read off the items periodically throughout the game just to refresh their memories.
It also is helpful if they have a sibling who can read sitting next to them in the vehicle. My two oldest sit next to each other in the back so when my 4 year old needs help reading my oldest will look over and help her which works great.
Now that you’ve seen how fun these road trip printable scavenger hunts are make sure to download, print them off and take them along on your next trip.
I hope you and your family enjoy all of these printables. I would love to hear about the fun your family has playing them together. Safe travels!
This Post Was All About A Road Trip Scavenger Hunt For Car Rides.
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