Travel Games for road trip

It never, ever fails: Within 30 minutes of stuffing the car to its gills with luggage and people for a getaway, you're left wondering how you can get away from everyone's complaints of boredom. And to think, only hours more to go! Despite popular in-car entertainment such as DVD players, truth be told, not everyone's crossover is equipped to offer the convenience of penguins or Dora as a babysitter for the next 50, 100 or 200 miles.

That's why we've compiled a list of road trip games that don't require any tools, paper or accessories beyond the open road. We have suggestions for passengers at every age level, although each game can be tweaked accordingly. Even if your vehicle features the latest in onboard entertainment technology, playing a road trip game can be a fun way for you to tune in with your kids during your journey, instead of having them tune out on a movie or a video game. For fun, we've also suggested vehicles that are ideally suited for the road trip games on our list.

Probably the classic make-time-go-by game of all time. One person looks around and chooses an object that the others have to guess, with their only clue being these words: "I spy with my little eye something that begins with (insert the first letter of the object's name)." Or the clue can be the object's color. The player who guesses the object gets to go next. The tricky part? It's not fair to "spy" something that's whizzing by the car at highway speeds. A landmark (mountain range, forest) that will be in the players' view for a few minutes is best.

Ideally suited for: A vehicle whose excellent visibility facilitates easy spying, like the Subaru Forester.

"Are we there yet? Are we there yet?" Only 18 more times to go! In 20 Questions, whomever goes first thinks of, well, anything. The first question is always, "Animal, vegetable or mineral?" After that, the players can ask pointed questions to try and guess — go around the car in a circle asking for clues such as, "Does it bark?" or "Can you peel it?" for example, although the answer to those questions can only be "yes" or "no." If you reach the 20th question without a winner, everyone has one last chance to figure it out before the "thing" is revealed and another person starts a fresh round.