Travelling with school-age kids: getting the most from 6 to 10
Six to ten is the easiest age to travel with. They walk, they remember and they are still happy to be with you. Use these years for the bigger trips.
The short version
- This is the age for big sightseeing cities and long-haul trips.
- Two activities a day work, as long as one of them involves moving.
- Give each child a job: navigator, photographer or keeper of the budget.
- Book the famous sights with timed tickets. Queues still wreck the day.
The easiest age to travel with
No stroller, no naps, no nappies. A seven year old can walk for a morning, carry their own bag, eat at normal hours and sleep on a train. They are also old enough to care about what they see, especially if school has touched on it: Romans, volcanoes, castles, dinosaurs.
If you have a trip you have been putting off since they were born, this is when to take it.
- Big cities with famous sights and good public transport
- Road trips with drives of two to three hours between stops
- National parks with short marked trails
- First long-haul trip with a real time difference
- Active holidays: cycling, snorkelling, skiing, kayaking
Give them a job
Children this age behave better when they have a role. It also turns a day of following adults into a day they helped run. Hand out jobs on the first morning and rotate them if you have more than one child.
Let each child pick one activity for the trip, within limits you set. They will put up with a lot of cathedrals in exchange for the thing they chose.
- Navigator: holds the map and finds the metro line
- Photographer: an old phone or a cheap camera and a daily brief
- Treasurer: a small daily budget for snacks and souvenirs
- Journal keeper: three lines and a drawing each evening
- Ticket holder: scans everyone in at the gate
Museums and sights that hold up
They can manage a real museum now, for about 90 minutes, if you prepare. Choose five things to find rather than walking every room. Many large museums publish a family trail or offer a children's audio guide on their official site, and those are usually worth it.
Places with a story work best: a castle with a siege, a ship you can board, ruins where someone can explain what stood there.
- Science and natural history museums
- Castles, forts, ships and submarines
- Towers, domes and viewpoints you climb
- Short guided tours built for families, an hour or less
- Workshops: cooking, pottery, mask or chocolate making
- One art museum, with a list of five paintings to find
Pace and screen time
Two activities a day is realistic: a sight in the morning, something physical in the afternoon. A pool, a bike ride, a beach or a big park lets them burn off the hours of walking slowly and listening.
Screens are a tool on travel days. Decide the rule before you leave so it is not negotiated every evening. Many families allow them on flights, long drives and the hour before dinner, and nowhere else.
- Start early, finish sightseeing by mid-afternoon
- Alternate a heavy day with a light one
- Keep one unplanned afternoon in every three days
- Bedtime can slide by an hour without much damage. Two hours and you pay the next day.
Walking, transit and distances
They can walk a fair distance across a day if it is broken up, though they will tell you otherwise. Plan routes with a stop every 45 minutes or so: a snack, a fountain, a shop with something odd in the window.
Public transport is part of the fun at this age. Let them work out the route. For road trips, keep single drives short and put the long one first thing in the morning.
- Check child fares: many city transport systems are free or cheap up to a set age
- Scooters fold into a bag and double the distance they will cover
- Trains beat cars for anything over three hours
- Booster seat rules vary by country, so check before renting a car
- Audiobooks the whole family can stand, for drives
Long-haul and jet lag
This is the first age where a flight of ten hours or more is easy on the plane. They watch films, eat the meal and sleep. The harder part is the first three days on the ground.
Build the itinerary around it. Put the least demanding days at the start and save the booked, expensive activities for later in the trip.
- Get outside in daylight on the first morning
- Keep the first two days free of fixed bookings
- Eat at local mealtimes from day one
- Expect early waking after flying east and plan a breakfast picnic
- Trips shorter than a week with a big time shift are rarely worth it
Food and money
Most children this age will try something new if nobody is watching them do it. Order one unfamiliar dish for the table alongside something safe and say nothing. Markets and street food stalls are good for this because portions are small and cheap.
A small daily allowance in local currency ends most souvenir arguments. When it is gone, it is gone.
- Big breakfast, picnic lunch, proper dinner is the cheapest pattern
- Carry water and a snack even now
- Let them order for themselves, in the local language if they can manage a word
- One souvenir rule agreed before the first shop
What they can carry themselves
Common questions
How many days do we need in a big city with kids this age?
Four or five nights is a good length for a major city. That gives you one or two big sights a day with park time in between, and one slow day in the middle. Three nights tends to become a rush.
Are family city passes worth buying?
Only if you add up the entries you will really use. Children often get in free or cheap at the main sights anyway, so a pass can cost more than paying as you go. Check each attraction's official ticket page and do the sum before buying.
What if siblings want different things?
Give each child one choice for the trip and put them on different days. On other days, split up for an hour or two with one adult each when you can. It is less efficient and everyone comes back happier.