Road Trip - Essentials

Planning a nice, long drive? If you are about to embark on a road trip with your children, check out these tips for keeping everyone happy when you’re on the road. Here are some ideas on what to take with you.

• Frisbee – Frisbees are great and very compact and perfect for some quick exercise when making a stop.
• Plastic boxes – Pack one for each child to hold their supplies - the lid makes a great desk. Fill with crayons, mechanical pencils, highlighters (great for word search games).
• Puzzle books and coloring sheets – Bring along a selection of puzzle books and colouring books, alternatively you can print a few coloring pages and activity sheets online. At sites like Disney Coloring Pages you’ll find the best just click on the coloring picture you like best and print.
• Clean, fresh water - Several small bottles of water work well and much better than taking a few large bottles. Use the water for drinking, a quick wash up, cleaning a scrape wound and so on.
• Lightweight blanket – Take along a small child’s blanket for cuddling at naptime, blocking the sun or to fold up and use as a pillow.
• Paper towels and wet wipes - For quick clean ups.
• Snacks – Pack a lunchbox for each child that contains their favourite snacks.
• Compass – This is great fun for the kids if they want to help navigate and provides you with a teaching opportunity.
• Zip lock bags - These are handy for collecting items such as sea shells and fossils, storing food, wet clothes. Bring several different sizes.
• Garbage bags – Use these to store laundry and wet items and generally to keep the car clean.

In addition to these items, you should always travel with the following: first aid kit, antiseptic hand gel, small tissue packs, sunscreen, sunglasses and hats.

As you plan your journey try to allow enough time for rest stops. Two hours of driving time, then a break, makes a good pattern for car travel with young children. Bon voyage!

Car insurance could help you more than you think

Car insurance is very important for several different reasons. The first of which is that your car is likely to be something you are either still paying for or have spent thousands on. The last thing you want is someone to crash into the back of it or for it to unexpectedly to go wrong and having to pay out yet more money to fix the problem.

This is where car insurance comes in as it can provide a fallback option if something seriously goes wrong with the car, no one really needs it in life and with the times how they are at the moment there is no way that someone can afford to go out and pay the costs that everyone charges to have your car fixed.

So what exactly happens if you do have car insurance and something does go wrong with it? Well a lot of the time break down is not covered within the car insurance but it is possible to have it included which can become very useful if the parts that go with your car are very expensive which is most cars.
However if you do have insurance and you are sadly involved in a collision or even a bump that causes damage to your car then all you really have to pay for is the excess charge rather than the whole bill. Without insurance you are going to look at a nice bill for the entire cost of the damage to the car.

Of course if it is the car abroad you are trying to look after then car hire insurance may be a better idea for you. This will cover you from any accident you have when away. Then again if you are planning on staying at home this summer when maybe it is actually worth looking at the current home insurance policy you have, it may not cover everything you think it does.

Car rental is very expensive

If like many others you are intending to travel away this year then stop and think about how exactly you are going to get around. If you are staying in an hotel or villa that is central to everything then it is safe to say you are only likely to need a taxi to and from the airport cause you certainly will not be wanting to walk those cases with you after a long flight.

If like most people this is not an option then you are likely to hire a car for the either the entire of your holiday or for at least a duration. Of course there is a major issue with this in 2009 and that is that British travellers could be hit with an excess fee as high as £1,600 when they are actually hiring their car.

Although most car rental prices do tend to include collision damage waiver which will cover you from accidental damage to the car as well as theft protection they do not often make it known that you will be liable for the excess in the same way you would be for your own car which isnt good. Car rental companies will help you out on this but will charge you anything between £500 to £1600 just for this excess which is certainly enough to ruin the holiday for everyone if something bad does happen.

The excess is usually not explained to you until you actually collect your car which by this stage the car company will try to sell you their own form of insurance which isnt cheap. This is going to cost you a lot extra and surprsingly will not often cover you for everything.

Sometimes it is best to actually fix this insurance before you go and can actually work out from as little as £2.98 a day. Gadget insurance can also be useful when going away as it will cover you from all those technological things you like to take with you.

Of course if you are not going away then why not check your home insurance policy. Is it really covering you from things like pest invasion? If it isn’t then you are going to need something known as home emergency insurance.

Car insurance could help you out a lot

Car insurance is extremly important for several reasons. Well, your car is likely to be something you have spent a lot of money on or are still currently spending a lot of money on so you really dont want to see it go. The last thing you want is someone to crash into the back of it or for it to unexpectedly to go wrong and having to pay out yet more money to fix it which is going to be a pain.

This is where car insurance comes in as it can provide a fallback option if something seriously goes wrong with the car, no one really needs it in life and with the times how they are at the moment there is no way that someone can afford to go out and pay the costs that everyone charges to have your car fixed.

So what exactly happens if you do have car insurance and something does go wrong with it? Well a lot of the time break down is not covered within the car insurance but it is possible to have it included which can become very useful if the parts that go with your car are very expensive which so happens to be most cars.
However if you do have insurance and you are sadly involved in a collision or even a bump that causes damage to your car then all you really have to pay for is the excess charge rather than the whole bill. Without insurance you are going to look at a nice bill for the entire cost of the damage to the car.

Of course if it is the car abroad you are trying to look after then car hire insurance may be a better idea for you. This will of course cover you from any accident away. Then again if you are planning on staying at home this summer when maybe it is actually worth looking at the current home insurance policy you have, it may not cover everything you think it does.

Watch out for those car rental companies

If you are planning on going on holiday this summer then stop and think about how you are going to get around once you are out there. If you are staying in an hotel or villa that is central to everything then it is safe to say you are only likely to need a taxi to and from the airport cause you certainly will not be wanting to walk those cases with you after a long flight.

For the majority of people this really is not an option and you are likely to actually rent a car, this is more important for places like the USA where driving is essential. However there is a major issue with this in 2009 and that is that British travellers could be hit with an excess fee as  high as £1,600 when they are actually hiring their car.

Although most car rental prices do tend to include collision damage waiver which will cover you from accidental damage to the car as well as theft protection they do not often make it known that you will be liable for the excess in the same way you would be for your own car. Of course car rental companies will help you out on this but will charge you anything between £500 to £1600 just for this excess which is certainly enough to ruin the holiday experience if something like that does happen to you.

The excess is usually not explained to you until you actually collect your car which by this stage the car company will try to sell you their own form of insurance which is not cheap. This is usually expensive and quite often will not cover you for everything.

{Sometimes it is best to actually fix this insurance before you go and can actually work out from as little as £2.98 a day}. Gadget insurance can also be useful when going away as it will cover you from all those technological things you like to take with you.

Of course if you are not going away then why not check your home insurance policy. Pest invasion can be nasty, does it cover you from this? If it isn’t then you are going to need something known as home emergency insurance.