Mighty Girls On The Go, Part 1: Travel Games

By Katherine Handcock, A Mighty Girl Communications Specialist

For many families, summer means time to travel! But whether you’re driving or flying, visiting family or exploring a new area of the country or the world, one of the biggest challenges of a long trip can be finding ways to entertain kids on the journey, especially if you're trying to limit screen time. To make it easier, we've pulled together recommendations for travel activities that can keep kids of all ages content and busy on your trip — so many, in fact, that we can’t fit them all in one blog post!

In this post, we focus on travel games that are compact and perfect for tossing into backpacks and carry-on bags to be pulled out whenever you need them. We’ve included options for one person to use alone, as well as multi-player games, and even some fun learning and creative games that can give your kids' fun ways to build on what they learned in school over the year.

The games featured in this post are just a small sample of the games found on A Mighty Girl -- to browse our entire selection, visit our Travel Games section.

And stay tuned! Our second blog, featuring coloring books, art kits, and activity books, and other recommendations will be coming soon.

Flying Solo: One-Player Games and Puzzles

When you’re the only kid traveling, the upside is peace and quiet, but the downside is needing to find activities that only require one person. While portable video games — or educational game systems like LeapFrog’s Leapster Explorer (age 4 - 9) — can be helpful, it’s important for kids to learn to play without electronics too. These great one-player games and puzzles will help solo kids keep their minds and hands busy.

Even toddlers can entertain themselves for a while with a toy like the Buster the Square buckle toy (age 1 - 4). Lots of colors, shapes, textures, and buckles to fasten and unfasten provide intriguing options for little hands. Add a few small rattles or teething toys to the mix, and the youngest travelers will have plenty to do.

Older kids can learn a classic string game with Klutz’s Cat’s Cradle Kit (age 6 and up). The book includes a guide to common projects like the Witch’s Broom, Eiffel Tower, and Jacob’s Ladder — or, once she get the hang of things, she can start inventing her own!

Tangram puzzles are another classic game — some legends say that tangrams were invented as much as 4,000 years ago! With Travel Tangoes: Animals (age 5 and up), kids can solve 24 puzzles with seven magnetized foam pieces that stay put even on a bumpy ride. Once she’s figured out all the puzzles, challenge her to make even more shapes of her own invention!

For a modern puzzle with a challenging twist, check out the Unhinged puzzle (age 8 and up). Ten hexagons, each with two different colored sides, hinge together; flip and twist them to match one of 40 puzzle challenges. The fascinating combination of brainteaser and manipulative will keep her busy for hours.

For those who prefer pure logic puzzles, check out Visual Brain Storms (age 8 and up). Visual puzzles, logic problems, mazes, math challenges, and more are all combined in one 100 card deck. Bonus questions are included on every card for even more challenging fun!

For would-be detectives, check out Bella’s Mystery Deck (age 9 - 12). 50 unique mysteries starring Bella and her trusty dog, Noche, get kids honing their deduction skills and practicing reading for detail. When you think you have the solution, use the mirror card to read the answer and see if you were right! Fun illustrations and entertaining characters make these mysteries extra engaging. Fans of these mysteries can also get Bella’s Mystery Deck 2 for even more sleuthing.

It Takes Two (or More): Games for Multiple Players

When there are multiple kids to occupy during a trip, you can pull out the multi-player games! Many traditional games adapt well to traveling. For classic games like Scrabble (age 8 and up), Yahtzee (age 8 and up), and chess and checkers all you need to do is shrink the size or add some magnetic pieces, and they’re ready for use in the car, plane, train, or bus.

Similarly, many newer games exist in travel versions, like Quoridor (age 6 and up), Blokus To Go! (age 5 and up), Travel Qwirkle (age 6 and up), and Hive Pocket (age 8 and up). They’re great ways to bring along a family favorite — or try out a new game while you’re on the road.

Any compact game is a good travel option. Knot So Fast (age 8 and up) is a game that combines knot-tying and puzzle-solving; all the pieces fit into a cylindrical container that’s only 5 inches across and 9 inches high. It’s even better if there are no loose pieces to keep track of: the Flip to Win! Memory Game (age 3 - 8) features fourteen fun themes on cards with no loose pieces, and comes with a two-player scoreboard, although you can also play it as a solitaire challenge.

There’s almost no other game as compact and flexible as a deck of cards! Fans of Madeline will enjoy this Madeline card game (age 3 - 8) that comes with 48 cards and rules for three classic games: Go Fish, Snap, and Memory. The Wizard card game (age 10 and up) is called “the ultimate trump game” and becomes more challenging with every turn. Or, get a set of traditional playing cards with a Mighty Girl twist with card decks based on Studio Ghibli favorites like Ponyo, Spirited Away, Kiki’s Delivery Service, or My Neighbor Totoro (all age 3 and up).

For even more fun, pick a game that also works elements of travel into the gameplay! With eeBoo’s Travel Bingo (age 4 - 12) you try to complete a line by spotting common sights on the road: cows, airplanes, mailboxes, and more! Similarly, the Scavenger Hunt for Kids Travel Card Game (age 3 - 15) challenges you to find things like a red car, a license plate with the letter “Z”, or a bulldozer.

Spot It! On The Road (age 7 and up) can be played by the original Spot It! rules — finding the one matching symbol between two cards — but it also adds a road play rule set called Travel Bingo. Or, since all of the versions of this game are equally compact, get a few different ones to mix things up on the road: we also recommend Spot It! Jr. Animals, Spot It! Frozen: Alphabet, and Spot It! Doc McStuffins: Numbers and Shapes for ages 3 - 8, or Spot It! Spanish (age 6 - 12) for those working on their Spanish vocabulary skills.

Learn on the Go: Educational and Creative Games

Travel isn’t just fun — you can learn a lot too! And for kids who love telling tales, long hours in transit can provide a great opportunity to play with creative writing and storytelling with total freedom. These educational and creative games will give you plenty of ideas for using travel time for learning.

If you’re traveling within the US, spotting license plates from multiple states can become an opportunity to brush up on your US geography. With the License Plate Game (age 5 - 10) you flip over a plate every time you spot a car from the appropriate state — but, of course, you’ll have to find it first! You can also play this competitively, since there are two colored edges on each plate, or use it to plot the route you’ll travel or how far you’ve already gone. And best of all, there are no loose pieces!

If you’re traveling internationally, you can reinforce lessons about different cultures and countries of origin with eeBoo’s I Never Forget A Face memory game (age 3 - 7). While it plays like Memory, the cards feature faces of children from around the world, and the box includes a guide that introduces each of the countries represented in the cards.

Travels near and far will also introduce your Mighty Girl to the amazing breadth of animal life on our planet. With the Life on Earth Travel Memory Game (age 3 - 8), vividly colorful images of animals and plants from all over the world will captivate kids’ imaginations. And if you’re lucky, you’ll even spot real-life versions of some of the creatures from the cards!

You’ll probably learn a little history on your travels, but to expand your historical knowledge even farther — while passing the time on you trip — check out the addictive card game Timeline (age 8 and up). Try to get rid of the cards in your hand by putting them in the right spot on the timeline but as more cards go down, it gets harder and harder to know exactly where yours goes! This game requires a little space to play but it's extremely compact to transport making it a great game for airports or at travel destinations. The original game focuses on inventions, but you can also get sets focused on Discoveries, Historical Events, or a Diversity deck that mixes all of the above! Play the sets separately or mix them all together for a truly epic game of history.

Storytelling and creative writing can be a great way to pass the time on your travels, but we can all use a little inspiration sometimes! There are a number of great storytelling or writing prompt toys that work brilliantly as travel games — all you need is the prompt, your imagination, and maybe pencil and paper if you want to preserve your ideas for posterity.

eeBoo has a series of Tell Me A Story Mix-Up cards that provide great inspiration for little storytellers aged 3 - 8! Each set is focused on a theme — Fairy Tales, Circus Animals’ Adventure, Mystery in the Forest, Animal Village, and Little Robot’s Mission; organize and reorganize the cards to create the framework of your story, then add reusable stickers for the finishing touches. Colorful images with repeated characters in multiple cards help kids learn to build structure into their stories.

For more flexibility, check out The Storymatic! Kids (age 5 and up). Pick a handful of cards out of the 360 options, figure out how they’ll go together, then draw, act, write, or sing, your story! The set includes a booklet with suggestions for how to use the cards, as well as 20 blank cards for creating your own prompts.

For the ultimate in flexible storytelling tools, check out Rory’s Story Cubes (age 6 and up). Roll the cubes, look at the images, and find a way to piece them into a story! Use them alone or in a group for all sorts of fun activities from writing prompts to icebreaker games. Nine cubes offer lots of inspiration, but they all fit in the tiniest of boxes; you can even use the box to make sure you don’t lose any cubes when you roll. Three additional sets are available: Actions, which includes images of 54 everyday verbs, Voyages, meant to inspire stories of adventure with images like treasure maps and desert islands, and Max, designed for classrooms, large groups, or anyone who would like a larger sized cube.  Three sets -- the Original, Actions, and Voyages -- are also available in one affordable collection, the Rory's Story Cubes Complete Set.

Traveling with kids can be daunting, but with the right games to keep them busy, “Are we there yet?” might just turn into “We’re there already?” Happy traveling!

Additional Recommended Resources

• For even more travel toys, games, and activities, check out our list of Travel Toys, Games, & Gear for Mighty Girls.
• For dozens of other games to bring with you on the road, visit our Travel Games section.
• For quiz books, puzzle books, and more to keep your kids' minds busy, check out our selection of Activity Books.
• To get creative with everything from popular characters to important women of history, visit our Coloring Book section.