5 Essentials for a Road Trip, According to Experts

Take these 5 things with you on your next road trip to make it a successful – and fun – ride

You’ve packed your bags, planned your pit stops, and loaded your playlists. But before you head out on that next road trip, there are a few things you might want to add to your car or RV to make your journey go even smoother.

From emergency essentials to front-seat organizers, kid-friendly entertainment, and more, here are five things travel experts always pack when traveling.

An essential road trip organizer

“One thing that really changed our road trip experience was having a car organizer,” says Kimmie Conner, a full-time traveler, travel blogger, and road trip enthusiast.

There are many options to choose from, depending on your needs. (A trunk organizer is great, but are you really going to stop every time you need to get to it?)

Organizers that hang from the backs of the front seats can be great for storing books, toys, and kids’ activities (and the shotgun driver doesn’t have to constantly pass snacks back). And for the driver and passenger, an organizer that fits between the two front seats is essential, says Conner: “It allowed us to have our road trip gear right next to us and kept things from sliding between the seats and getting lost. We kept phones, snacks, money, maps, drinks, pens, glasses, hats, and more in there for easy access.”

Another thing to throw in your organizer, says Vanessa Gordon, CEO and publisher of East End Taste and a mother of two, is extra plastic bags (save them from a few weeks of grocery shopping) and lots of napkins. This, she says, is especially crucial if you’re traveling with kids who can get carsick. It’s also handy for all the food you’ll be making in the car, whether you need a solution for messy hands or a bag to collect everyone’s apple cores. “No one ever seems to have napkins or paper towels when I drive with them,” Gordon jokes.

You can also throw a paper map in the organizer in your front seat, a move that Alicia Simms Breland, full-time Airstreamer, TV host, and producer, swears by: “I feel like everyone relies heavily on maps on their phone for navigation on a road trip, but depending on where you’re traveling and whether it’s more remote than urban, you could lose cell service,” she says. She also recommends downloading your route map to your device before you set off: “That way, if you lose service, you don’t get lost.”

Entertainment for those who don’t drive

“Create a specific road trip playlist of podcasts plus music plus audiobooks using an app like Spotify,” says travel influencer Raimee Laofano. “I recommend getting really detailed with it because it helps you de-romanticize the fact that you’re going to be in the car for so many hours.”

During a recent seven-day road trip along Ireland’s Wild Atlantic Way, Laofano put together a few different playlists that got her excited for all her car time. One playlist featured Irish hits, including tracks from The Cranberries, Hozier, and Two Door Cinema Club. The other was a playlist to capture the mystical feeling that Ireland evokes, which she called “Irish Folklore,” and featured tracks from Taylor Swift, Joni Mitchell, Lizzy McAlpine, Fleet Foxes, Sufjan Stephens, Phoebe Bridgers, and Angel Olsen.

“And for the days when I didn’t feel like listening to music and had to drive 3-4 hours to my next destination, I downloaded a few audiobooks in the A Court of Thorns and Roses series — fantasy and Ireland go really well together, so I loved listening to these books while I was on the road,” says Laofano.

For the kids, lifestyle influencer and RV road tripper Veena Crownholm likes to make activity bags. For every trip, she packs a bag for each of her kids, filled with items that will keep them busy and screen-free. “For my 4-year-old, I do a bag with LEGOs, Crayola Mess Free Markers and a coloring book, magnetic building blocks like MAGNA-TILES, Squigs, which are fun to suck on car windows, a Yoto Player with a binder full of stories he can choose from, and Cheerios with a clear tube that he can turn into a bracelet,” she says. “And for my 13-year-old, I have his books, an adult coloring book like Star Wards, a Spot It game, LEGOs, and other travel games like Rubik’s Cube or road trip bingo.” And when they get tired of that, she pulls out two iPads with old sunglasses cases, which she uses to store each of their batteries and headphones.

An ‘I need to pee but there are no toilets for miles’ kit

Truck stops, fast food restaurants, gas stations… Anyone who’s ever been on a road trip knows that there’s an endless supply of them as you drive—until you need to use the restroom. The urge always seems to strike when you reach those stretches of road where there are no stops for miles. In those cases, stopping to pee in nature might be your only move. If you don’t want to go primal and do a squat, listen up.

“There are great urinal stands and pee devices that you can easily stash in a glove compartment for road trips or in a backpack for hiking, so you don’t have to worry about not being able to get to the bathroom,” says Simms Breland. And if you’re still not convinced after reading that, Simms Breland adds, “Many of these portable urinals also come with a sanitizing spray and bag, so you don’t have to worry about storing them after use.”

Curious folks can head to YouTube, which she says is full of tutorials on these handy devices. These attachments come in everything from buckets with handles to funnels for better aiming. It’s a big Google dive when you’re ready to go down that rabbit hole. Oh, and don’t forget the toilet paper. “On any road trip, we always make sure to have either a box of tissues or a roll of toilet paper in the car—usually both!” says Simms Breland. “And a pack of baby wipes never hurts to have on hand if you’re feeling really diligent.”

Homemade car repair kit

You’ve checked your oil, filled your gas tank, and fired up your smartphone app. You’re ready to go. Right? Probably not.

Flat tires, overheated cars, deer in the road, a dead battery: these are just a few of the many vehicle-related adventures that can bring your road trip adventure to a halt.

While you can’t anticipate every mishap, you can certainly fix tire problems. In addition to checking your tire pressure before you set off, throw a few items in your trunk that can help you if you get a flat tire in the middle of nowhere. (And you might: seven flat tires in the U.S. every second (could occur!)

“Never underestimate the power of a pair of pliers and a tire patch kit,” says Simms Breland. “I can’t tell you how many times we’ve picked up a bolt or a nail or whatever that’s resulted in a flat tire. Have a tire patch kit handy so you can hopefully avoid a costly tow and drive to a nearby town.”

She remembers being in the middle of nowhere on the prairies a few years ago when her husband heard a strange clicking noise and thought the truck didn’t feel right. The couple pulled over and sure enough, they had picked up a screw somewhere. “My husband got his pliers out and got the screw out and patched the tire right there,” she recalls. “We were able to get to the nearest town and find a mechanic who could fix it for us before the rim got damaged.”

It may also be a good idea to have a portable pump in your vehicle. “These can be battery powered or plug into your vehicle’s 12-volt outlet,” Simms Breland says. This can help you fill up a tire you forgot to put air in, or inflate the spare tire if it’s been sitting so long that it’s lost some of its buoyancy.

Some tasty snacks and a way to transport them

You can stop at a gas station every now and then to grab a sweet treat, but if you’re on the road for a long time, at some point you’ll crave something with more nutritional value.

That’s why it’s a good idea to pack some healthy, protein-rich foods in the car to help keep you full and energized during the ride.

“I use reusable silicone bags like Stasher to carry snacks every day,” Crownholm says. She fills them with finger foods like popcorn, fruit, crackers, and leftovers or a sandwich, or she fills the bottom with hummus and stuffs veggies in there. Once she runs out of snacks, Crownholm pops them in a coffee pot to reheat, microwaves and freezes food in hotel rooms or an RV, and even marinates meat or veggies to grill while camping. “Wash them and repeat the next day,” she says.

To keep everything cool, Crownholm recommends a smaller soft-shell cooler in the car for drinks and snacks, and a hard-side cooler in the trunk. “The Yeti hard-side stayed frozen for about five days — great for a road trip,” she says. To keep drinks cold, consider bringing a mini-fridge that plugs into your USB port. And stash non-refrigerated snacks in a Snackle Box so each compartment has a different flavor. Bonus points for mixing sweet, savory, and healthy.

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