Hey, I'm Lisa! Welcome back to my channel. We have just gotten home from a
very fun, sunny holiday in Southwest Florida, and in today's video I'm going
to talk about the pros and cons of driving to Florida. [FLORIDA!} Our family has done
this road trip now four times where we've driven from our home in Toronto
Canada all the way to Southwest Florida, and I really love it. We've gotten much
better at it over the years and I would say that this
time was honestly our best time for a couple of reasons that I'll definitely
share in another video some hacks associated with making a road trip
really successful. If you like travel videos and are interested in more travel
tips let me know in the comments below and I can definitely share some of the
experience that I've had with traveling with six small children. So whether or
not you fly or drive to Florida I think is impacted by a couple of important
factors. The first factor is how much time you have. So we have done our drive
to Florida, from Toronto to Florida a couple different ways. One year we stayed
overnight in Atlanta and made it like really fun and did Atlanta, like that
all the kids things that you can do in Atlanta. Other years we have driven
completely straight taking turns driving and I actually prefer the latter because
you get there faster; you are fresher, if you will, because you're not extending
the amount of energy you need while you're traveling. But it does come at a
cost, obviously. So we are able to do it in about twenty seven, twenty eight hours
with two adults alternating, taking turns driving. My husband, I'll be honest, does the
bulk of the driving and I usually can only do
three to four hours in the middle of the night... it's so bad, I feel so bad.
And then I'm sleeping, like, the whole time but then I'm able to be kind of
awake and alert when we get to our destination and then my husband can
crash for several hours in order to refresh. So the first factor to
really consider is how much time you have. So if you only have like a
week-long vacation, you really have to budget about 27, 28 hours depending on
your location obviously, again I'm in Toronto, Canada and then you really do
have to buffer a little bit of time to kind of recoup on sleep, recoup on energy
you might have to put a movie on for the kids or whatever so that you guys can
get some sleep, but that's the first factor that I really consider is: how
much time do you have? And is it worth it to you to eat up quite a bit of that
time with driving? Flying of course takes up some time, but it is a little
different, like, you are not taking as much mental and physical energy.
Certainly with children flying requires all kinds of things like going through
security, packing bags, putting bags through check in and whatnot. So there's
other logistics involved in flying but certainly you're not expending the same
amount of physical and mental energy that you do with a long drive. The second
factor I think people need to consider whether you drive or you fly to Florida
is your budget. So I have six small children, and for us to fly as a family
down to Florida from Toronto, I would imagine that would be at least... I want to
guess at least $6,000 depending on the time of year, and then for us it would mean
that we would have to rent a car big enough for our family as well as rent
all of the car seats. So I think you want to really take into account your budget.
It's an interesting thing that we have talked about quite a bit, my husband and
I, you know, if we were going to a resort or some kind of place that potentially
provided a shuttle from the airport or where we weren't really doing much
transportation, I could I see the merits in flying, and why that
would be cost-effective, in a way, to a family. If you want to see different
destinations while you're in Florida and you need a car, you need car seats, all of
these costs are gonna add up depending on how large your family is. The third
factor you want to consider is your sense of adventure!
So we LOVE adventure. We are not afraid of it. We are not afraid to sort of, you
know, take the path that has not been traveled. We're not afraid of what
happens with weather or with detours. We kind of roll with things. With six
children, six SMALL children, you kind of get very good at rolling with the punches, if
you know what I mean! So we really love adventure. We love that we discover
random, you know, restaurants and cafes and monuments and different things
around the United States. So for us it's like a real fun adventure, very
spontaneous as a family. So these are some things that I would think about and
consider if I was to give any advice to a family that wants to drive. You know, how
much do you really like to control things and make sure that you know
exactly where you're gonna go, at exactly what time, exactly, you know, where the gas
stations are... You can certainly do a lot of planning, there are a lot of books out
there, especially around the highway, so you can you can definitely plan in
advance, you know, all of your stops on a road trip. But you know, we just as a
family are very spontaneous. We embrace adventure and we really like that. And it
provides like really fun memories for children. Like we've now done this four
times and we have so many stories from every single trip. And so I would
definitely say, take into account your love for adventure and how much that
might sort of stress you, or if you are okay to kind of go with the flow in
terms of things that could happen unexpectedly when you're driving. We have
all kinds of crazy things happen to us on different road trips, um, obviously
some good and some not so good! Our van broke down one year in Jacksonville,
Florida, and we were only, maybe, five hours away or something from our
destination of just outside Naples, Florida. So that was, you know, quite a
thing to navigate, but then I'll be honest it turned into an adventure
because then we stayed in hotel for two days and Jacksonville, we did things in
Jacksonville, we met some incredible beautiful people, so even in the
unexpected I think a family can find fun and find adventure. It really just
depends on your propensity for stress and how much you are willing to go with
the flow. And then another factor I would say a family should consider is how much
energy you have. So it does take quite a bit of energy to drive to Florida, so
obviously you need mental and physical alertness to drive if you're driving on
highways, driving at night, you have to kind of you know plan for that so make
sure you have coffee, water, I put in an audio book to keep myself entertained
while driving through the night. And so it does require a bit of energy,
certainly flying requires energy, too, but it's very different um but if you were
to ask me, we prefer the drive and for us obviously that's very much impacted by
how many children we have it may be very costly for us to fly, but even then
like, if I was given the option to fly or to drive I think I would pick to drive
MAINLY because of the adventure and the sense of accomplishment you feel, and how
many memories that you get to make as as a family. A couple of fun tips to make a
drive just successful and fun that we found this year
were, like, so invaluable, and I would tell any family:
Number one: we pack the night before. It was, like, a huge game changer for us to
just get in the car the morning, load the kids up with easy breakfast food that
they could have in ziplock bags, and start driving. And we were on the road
basically by 8 a.m.-ish, both leaving Toronto and leaving Florida, and it made
a huge difference in everybody's energy. For mom and dad's energy, we weren't as
tired and overwhelmed and we just got there with like much better spirits. It
was less grueling of a drive, packing the night before. The other thing that we did
this year that I thought was successful compared to years past is that we
limited TV until, like, that afternoon. So our kids are generally in ok moods in
the morning. They were really happy and excited especially as we were beginning
our trips both ways. And so we just held off on screen time until the
afternoon when people are starting to... obviously get a little bit more cranky,
people have been cooped up for longer, and so I found that was a really good
strategy. We just sort of saved it all for the
afternoon and then by the time bedtime rolled around, you know, everybody was
happy and asleep, and they slept through the night and we were able to get a lot
of driving done through the night, with limited stops for bathrooms and what not.
So yeah, limiting screen time was another really good strategy. And then
another thing that we did that really made the experience super fun was we
just made sure to have fun at our stops. So whether it was on a highway rest stop
we would, you know, bring out a football, bring out a frisbee, the little kids
would just run around and have a grand old time the big kids would explore the
rest stop. It was honestly, like, SUPER fun to do it this year with children who are now
older school age and can take care of the little kids so it was
yeah a really interesting experience. I really do believe that
travel one of the things that we can spend
money on that will make us richer. And so I just believe wholeheartedly, (it) doesn't
matter how young the kids are- I do believe that even in little infants the
joy and the love and the sense of wonder and awe is definitely, you know, impressed
on their hearts, even when they're really small. And so I believe in travel and for
children of all ages as a really good thing. If you liked this video I would
love for you to give it a big thumbs up, and if you're interested in more travel
videos I will definitely link them in the cards. We have done this trip now four
times, like I said, and honestly it's just gotten more fun every single time. Some
people think we're crazy to drive the twenty-eight hours it takes to get from
Toronto to Florida, but we have just, you know, embraced it, and we continue to do
it, so I guess I'm still crazy! It's something that has gotten easier over
time. I remember the very first time we did it I was so much anxiety about if it
would go well, if my children would be fine, would we be able to sleep in the car
would anybody get carsick, and we've had it all! We've had kids puke in
the car while driving (which is not fun!), but you know, you clean it up, no big deal
you make sure you bring I got a bottle of spray cleaner that I make sure I
bring with me, um, anyway just kind of embrace it as an adventure, where are you
excited to go with your family and maybe you've been like a little bit afraid or
um you know just tentative to do it because you've got young kids, let me
know in the comments below: where you would just LOVE to take your family, and
if you want to know specific things in regards to traveling with small kids- if
you have specific questions about how to make it easier on yourself
based on my experience doing this a couple times with six children, let me
know in the comments below and I'll make sure to answer them in a future video. I
wish you all the best on all of your future travels, whether you are flying or
driving! And CHEERS to designing your beautiful life.