I am about to drive 2000 miles by myself with my 2 kids: UPDATE
Hi everyone! I posted here about four weeks ago questioning my sanity for planning a 3 week road trip with my two pre-teen kids and I am happy to report we have survived! Thank you for all the tips and advice, I ended up giving one kid an atlas and making him my navigator and giving the other one control over a Spotify account for music selections, and while we listened to "beep beep I'm a sheep" more times than I care to think about, and once ended up going 20 miles on a dirt road (that my kid still swears was labeled a highway), and I , personally, will be delighted to never drive highway 50 again in my life, we have indeed survived and have had epic adventures to tell stories for the ages!
Highlights:
Gandy Hot Springs in NV - swimming under the ferns and discovering an entire cave back there has to be one of the cooler things I have ever seen.
The astrology program at Great Basin - we went to both their constellation talk and my kids were surprisingly excited to learn how to ID constellations, and then we went to the one where they show you things on the telescopes and that was super cool!
The Loveland aquarium in Salt Lake City - we spent an entire day here and it was awesome, both my kids loved it. The aquarium tunnels are super cool!
Lava Hot Springs - I probably could have skipped this myself, but it was my kids favorite overnight, they absolutely loved taking the swim day, so I am happy we stopped.
Yellowstone - this was our goal and we were so proud when we got there! We stayed 6 days, and there was a winter storm! Snow and sleet and omg, at first I was bummed about it because I was the one that had to drive in it, but it was actually amazing, Yellowstone in the snow was gorgeous, it was a whole other world. I think it also cut down on crowds, because we were able to pull in and park everywhere, but the day the storm cleared, it was PACKED. So I think the storm actually worked in our favor. Also, when I asked the kids what their favorite part of Yellowstone was, they both immediately started talking about the snow days. Yellowstone was seriously amazing though. Parts of it are just absolutely surreal. We had so much fun exploring around it.
Craters of the Moon - we almost skipped this but we really needed a break on our way back and I am so glad we stopped. This place was wild looking! Both kids loved it, and sidenote, they had the BEST gift shop!
All total, we actually ended up at 4 national parks total, 1 State Park, 21 days, 3100 miles, zero car issues, and a whole lot of stickers. 😂. Thanks for all the words of encouragement, I am happy I didn't chicken out and proud we did it! Also, thank you for whoever had the idea to let them bring a toy or plush and take pictures of it everywhere, my youngest brought his favorite Pokemon plush and was super into taking pictures of it everywhere. 😂 My oldest is already plotting where he wants to go next year, so wish me luck!