What games to play on a long car journey?

The following games are great fun and you can always adapt them to suit your family. Most of them require very few props and rely mainly on imagination. Try our travelling games. Talk to the animal Nominate a player to be an animal character for the first round. The other players have to ask questions until they guess what the animal is. I went to the shop and bought… Each player has to choose something they had bought at the shops. Two facts and a fib Each player gets a chance to make three statements – two which are true and one that is false. Word association One player says a word and the other player responds with the first word that comes into their head. Buzz words Children need to be quiet to listen for words in this game. Road cricket Each child chooses a colour – all oncoming cars in their colour passing you on the road counts as a run. I-spy This old favourite needs no introduction – one player gets to start with the magic words, “I spy, with my little eye, something beginning with H…”. Broken telephone One player starts by whispering a message, only once, to the next player. Clouds Watch the clouds – what do they look like. Guess the letter One player gets to draw a letter in their hand. Maps Children can use maps to trace out their journeys or one player can have look at the map and then choose a town on the map.

The picnic game is a memory-based alphabet game that requires you to pay close attention to both what you and those around you say. One player starts off with the line “I went to a picnic and brought…” followed by an object beginning with “A”. The next player has to repeat all that went before and end with an item beginning with “B”. You can also try the shopping list car game – same idea but “I went shopping and bought…” which increases the potential for imaginative items. The word association game is another option, where one person starts this car game by saying a word, then the next person says a word that’s related to it and so on. For example, person one says “grass”, person two says “leaf” and person three says “tree”. The banana game is also a fun option, where points are awarded to whoever spots a vehicle with all or part of it in yellow. Add to the fun by awarding different points for specific cars, trucks, lorries, motorcycles and taxis. Other games include Pub cricket, where the aim is to spot pubs along your road trip, and successfully count how many arms and legs are in each name. Name that tune is another option, where someone simply hums or whistles a song and the rest of the car have to guess what it is. The number plate game is a great game for long car journeys and sparking the kids' imaginations, where everyone chooses a passing car and memorises the last three letters of the number plate, then you make up a story with the letters. Car colour race is a simple but fun car game for the whole family, where everyone chooses a colour and counts the number of cars of their colour that drive past. Car bingo requires a little bit of preparation before you set off on your car journey, where you make a list of things you might see on your journey and children simply cross off their score cards as they spot each item. Never miss a beat is a game where all you need is some music, put on a song which everyone knows and start singing along, then turn the volume down for 10 seconds but carry on singing. 20 questions is a popular one for car journeys as it can take a while so is good for passing the time, where one person needs to think of a person, place or thing, and the others in the car take turns questioning the person to find out what they are thinking of.

Luckily, there's a whole host of fun games you can keep the whole clan entertained with along the way. You could play the number plate game, where you find number plates on cars from different countries and score points based on the amount everyone finds. For a more creative version, why not have everyone memorise the last three letters of a passing car's number plate and make up a story using the letters to form your yarn? Other games include I Spy, which is a car game classic for a reason, and the Memory game, where one player starts with the line "I went to a picnic and brought..." followed by an object of their choice. You could also play Would you rather, where you come up with silly and unpleasant choices, or Pub cricket, where you spot pubs along your trip and count how many arms and legs there are in each pub's name. Word association is another classic, where one person starts by saying a word, then the next person has to come up with a word that has some sort of link to the previous word. Road trip bingo is also an option, where you make a list or picture card of things you might see on a typical journey and cross them off as you see them. The quiet game is also a good option if you need to focus on the road, where you challenge the kids to stay quiet for as long as possible.

Fortunately, you can split up those longer road trips with friends by playing a few fun car games. I Spy is a game everyone loves, and a quick game of I Spy can act as a welcome distraction while you cruise down that stretch of motorway that seems to go on forever. You can also play 21 Questions, which is a handy game you can play while driving, where someone thinks of something, and then the rest of the car passengers ask questions to try and guess what the person is thinking about. Never Have I Ever can just as easily be played behind the wheel, where one person says, "never have I ever", and anyone who's done it needs to take an action. The Movie Game is another option, in which players connect actors through movies they've been in. Other games include Don't Say It!, The Alphabet Game, Human Jukebox, Radio Roulette, The Counting Game, Movie Quotes, and Animals on my side. The Alphabet Game requires you to start with a category and see if you can go all the way down the alphabet, naming things related to your chosen subject. Human Jukebox starts with one person in the car singing a line from a popular song, with the next person connecting the last word from that lyric to another song. Radio Roulette involves randomly changing the radio station as your road trip advances, and you could find yourself listening to just about anything from 80s rock to Christian radio and everything in between.

If you have some pop culture fans in the car, play The Title Game. The Game: Try to guess song, movie, or book titles that have been rephrased. You can also play French toast, where The Game: Try to guess an item by asking if it’s more like one thing or another thing, starting with the question “Is it more like ____ or French toast?” Another option is to Change ONE letter of a title and get people to guess it by describing the plot. The Rules: Pick a movie, video game, TV show, or book title and change one letter of it. Get people to guess it by describing the plot of the new title you created. Adding or subtracting a letter from the title also works, just as long as it's still only one letter.