Minnesota to LA with small kids

Hi everyone. I'm traveling from Southern Minnesota to LA in June. I'll be with another adult, a 3 year old, a 7 year old, and a medium size dog. I'm looking for any helpful advice on places to stop along the way. I'm not under any sort of time constraint and money isn't much of an issue either. We'll be in California for most of the summer so we don't have to worry about getting there and turning right back around.I traveled this route without kids a month ago and our only overnight stop was in Vegas, so I didn't do much for sightseeing. Neither of my children really love the car so this will be very interesting. I plan on finding pet friendly hotels to sleep at night, but if anyone has suggestions for family and pet friendly places to stop and burn energy during the day I would love to hear your input! Thank you for your time!

Welcome to the RTA Forum!

Lets start by asking that you please never consider driving from Las Vegas to Minnesota again without stopping for the night. That's extremely dangerous, and it's really by grace and luck that you survived.

For this trip - I think it's time to show your kids that Roadtrips can be fun! That means stopping at least every 3 or 4 hours to explore something - be it a National Park, a roadside oddity, a museum, or even a city park! (and stopping for the night after no more than 500 miles!)

Without a time frame, basically the entire American West is available to you. We really can't narrow things down much from that for you right now, but pull out some maps and just start brainstorming. Sit down with your kids and find a few places that look really interesting, get them excited about seeing them, and start building from there. Once you have a few of those building blocks down, we can help you find even more ideas to help fill your plan out.

The three-year-old probably won't care if it's a city park or a national park, or even a rest area - as long as s/he can get out and run. The 7-year-old may have other ideas. Just let him/her go over the map with you.

When I was a child, my parents did a similar run to what you made (LV to MN). I was NOT very happy about it, but fortunately, they never repeated that either. Your children probably don't want you to repeat it, either. At 2000 miles from MN to LA, you'll want to do that in at least 4 days, probably more.

Throwing out a few ideas: South Dakota's Badlands and Black Hills (Mt Rushmore, Wind Cave, Custer State Park), Yellowstone, Grand Tetons.


Donna

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I plan on finding pet friendly hotels to sleep at night,

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To the right of this page you will find a 'Search Roadtrip Motels' link and once you have selected a City you can filter your search to include 'Pet friendly', 'swimming pool' etc.

Once you have a few dots on the map and an idea of the time you want to spend on the road, we can then offer meaningful suggestions.