Planning your next road trip adventure? You know I love to take one-day trips (and longer ones), but I always say that you need to be prepared. There’s nothing quite like hitting the open road, taking in the scenic views, and discovering new destinations.
Whether you’re travelling solo, with your family or with a group of friends, planning is key to making sure your road trip goes smoothly. To help you get started, we’ve put together a list of essential items that you might not have considered for your road trip.
From comfort and safety to entertainment and convenience, these road trip essentials will ensure that you have everything you need for a successful and enjoyable journey.
Whether you’re heading out for a weekend getaway or a cross-country adventure, it’s important to be prepared for anything that comes your way. To make sure you have the best road trip experience possible, I’ve put together a comprehensive list of essential items for road trips that you might not have thought to bring along.
This list is based on my experience, as I needed those items at one moment or another. Sometimes I was lucky enough to have them with me, while on other occasions I ended up saying “next time, I’ll pack this.”
Road trip basics packing list
There are some items that can be considered a must when travelling by car.
And yes, the list is different based on the time of the year and destination. You will need different things for a trip to the beach and others for a mountain hike.
As I want this article to be focused on road trip essentials with unusual items that you may not even know you need, I am recommending you to read the two dedicated articles for road trip packing lists:
Now that I covered the basics, let’s move on to the best road trip essentials that you didn’t know you needed.
A printed map
We all rely nowadays on digital maps (and I too use Waze when travelling), but your battery may die, your signal may be lost and in those situations, a printed map becomes crucial. And yes, we took a wrong turn, and ended up on a forest road, with no wi-fi (even no mobile bars) and we needed a map. Luckily, my husband always keeps one in the glove compartment so we were OK.
An air compressor for inflating tires or air mattresses
At one point we needed to inflate a tire. And we only had a leg pump. Oh, joy! Since then, we have an air compressor – a small one – we can use.
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