We’ve recently gone on a few long days out- trying to make the most of the unseasonably clement weather before winter hits with it’s usual severity. This has inevitably meant an early start, somewhat bleary eyed kids and the usual complaints that the car ride is boring and all there is at the other end is a stupid old Anglo-Saxon village or something similar.
West Stow- more fun than the kids thought
We don’t have any swanky in car media systems for long journeys, nothing sort of a bit of a radical rethink and some rather extensive car finance will resolve that one but we usually let the kids read a book in the car or fight with each other instead. Last time we plugged my smartphone into the AUX out on the stereo and made the boy do a times table CD until Ned almost murdered him. I don’t think I’ve ever had the 6 times table on repeat as often as I did on that journey, it’s like I’m suffering post traumatic stress disorder or something.
As I get older though, I’m finding it harder and harder to ignore the shouting, hitting and general fuss coming from the back of the car. We’ve got a 53 plate Vauxhall Zafira, so in theory I could pop up the seats in the boot and relegate a child to that but I’ve resisted it on the principle that the boot is sort of the crumple zone and I’d never forgive myself is someone drove in to the back of us.
In the medium term, before we buy a nice shiny new motor (it’s coming, we’re approaching 100,000 miles on our plucky little 1.6l petrol engined car), we’re looking at using a cunning wireless hard drive to let the kids stream video to their tablets without the need for downloading it on to the tablets or have an in car internet connection. Keep your eyes peeled for a review in the next day or two…