The mention of yellow cars on ths superstitions thread and with lots of Easter journeys with kids in the offing, I thought Id start one on games to play with kids in the car.
Our fave is Yellow Car. First to spot one gets a point. One on another road, crossing on a bridge etc gets 2 points and for some random reason of my wife's a Macdonalds lorry gets 5 points. It is massively adictive! There seem to be just enough on the road to make it worth playing.
Pretty simple, although much controversy over cars (mainly French and Toyotas) which are odd greeny yellow colours.
|
We always used to play "balance the little yellow bucket" - it had to be close at hand for me to puke into, as I did regularly, the 'best' time being when I'd consumed a quantity of tomato soup before the journey (only to the shops 10 minutes away, so no bucket) - tomato soup came out on the seatbelt every time you put it on for weeks afterwards, despite the whole thing being taken apart and scrubbed.
I was such a lovely child... and I still have that little yellow bucket. :)
But seriously...
First one to spot the sea (I imagine this one could keep them quiet for ages if you start it on the M40)
Spot the names on caravans and Eddie Stobart lorries
Animal, Vegetable, Mineral
There are lots more that involve looking at maps and books, but if your children are anything like me, that will mean the bucket is needed.
|
Like PG, we used to play Animal, Vegetable, Mineral ... except that we added an extra category of "abstract", which could include sounds or lights as well as thoughts. That category got banned when I led everyone down a long path to discover that the thing in question was a vacuum, or rather a specific vacuum ... the one inside my brother's head.
So instead we played "I Spy", which rapidly gets really irritating. When you've heard "I spy with my little eye something beginning with" three hundred times in one morning, tempers can start to fray a bit.
Like PG, I was such a lovely child :)
|
We have often played Yellow Car.
Another favourite is Sweet & Sour. The children wave hard at a pedestrian or another driver, and try to provoke him into waving back. If so, he is pronounced Sweet. Those who look away, or get cross, are of course Sour.
|
We used to play 'match the number' getting two and three numberplates with the same numbers on. Kids have now wised up to the new number plates, they couldn't work out how I always won!
|
|
One of us used to look at the wheel of the car behind, pretend to nudge the next one and we'd all point to the tyre and try to get the person behind worried enough to pull over and check! Didn't work very often, but was joy when it did!
|
Making witty phrases from the letters of reg numbers...
And, starting at one and in sequence, spotting numberplates to see who can get to the highest number. (I'll admit to playing this one solo for about 8 months then tiring of it, having reached only 200 or 300).
|
Use the letters from the numberplate of any passing car to make the longest word you can. They must be used in the same order as on the numberplate, but can come anywhere in the word.
Hence, USL once gave me "pusillanimous". Then, of course, you get the joy of a ten minute argument about whether what you've said is a real word.
V
|
|
|
Pub Cricket anyone?
Whoever is "in" gets a point for each leg in the name of every pub they spot - eg 4 for "The Red Lion" & 8 for "The Coach & Horses" (any plural is deemed to be 2). If they miss a pub that someone else sees or if there are no legs in a pub's name (eg "The King's Head") then they are out.
|
We played pub cricket which for many years reduced the boredom of
long car journeys, usually a 3 way match between my father, brother and myself. Most are obvious, 'fox and hounds' = 12 runs and 'the plough' = out, but after a very long argument we adopted the following rule for 'the kings head' = 2 runs and out since the legs were not part of the pub name.
Mind you this game sort of ran out of steam when the motorways and dual carriageways started replacing the old A38 down to devon and cornwall. (memories of traffic jams at North Petherton)
Shame there is no motorway equivalent.
Ian L.
|
Shame there is no motorway equivalent.
Closest we have achieved for the little patentlies is to guess how many motorway bridges til we get home.
It should be pointed out that oldest is nearly 5, so counting bridges was a new and interesting experience for him! All credit to Mrs P for managing to stay awake and keep counting...
|
|
|
|
|
|
I like to remove the boredom by playing pretend to be an unmarked police car.
When on a long, night time journey, on relatively empty roads, sit in lane 1 of the motorway and wait until a car goes tearing by. Quickly accelerate to match it's speed. They soon get into lane 1 and drop to 70. See how far you can follow them before they realise that they aren't being tailed by police.
Great fun!
|
In days of yore when childhood was fun and road safety wasn't invented, we used to sit on the lowered tailgate of a LandRover with our legs dangling on the road and throw lumps of sheep dung at following cars.
Don't try this now!
|
|
This must qualify as one of the strangest posts for the "What I carry in my Boot" Thread... :-)
|
|
Hehe... I can remember a long time ago on wet, icy roads skiing along behind a Land Rover. ;)
|
|
|
|
