What to take with you on a road trip?

Trav­el­ing by car has many advan­tages — free­dom of move­ment, the abil­i­ty to go around more inter­est­ing loca­tions, vis­it non-tourist places and spon­ta­neous­ly change the route. A roman­tic idea, but one that requires seri­ous prepa­ra­tion. Our check­list will help you take into account the nuances of a road trip and make it as com­fort­able as pos­si­ble.

✅ Vehicle inspection and preparation

A manda­to­ry rule for long trips is to check the con­di­tion of the car. The safe­ty of trav­el will large­ly depend on the tech­ni­cal ser­vice­abil­i­ty of the car. If any prob­lems are iden­ti­fied in the car ser­vice, they must be elim­i­nat­ed in advance. So that unfore­seen sit­u­a­tions on the road do not spoil your plans, take an ambu­lance kit for your car with you.

✅ Spare tires and pump

Stone, glass or hot asphalt can cause seri­ous wheel dam­age. If you have a spare tire and a set of tools for chang­ing a wheel — a jack and a spe­cial wheel wrench, this prob­lem will not take you by sur­prise. And if the wheel is blown away, you don’t need to change it — use the pump. It is bet­ter to pur­chase an elec­tric one — it con­nects to the cig­a­rette lighter and in a minute pumps up the tires to work­ing con­di­tion.

✅ Canister with fuel

If you linger in places where there is no gas sta­tion near­by, you will need addi­tion­al fuel. A ten-liter can­is­ter in the trunk will be enough to fill the car your­self and get to the near­est gas sta­tion.

✅ Set of responsible motorist

Wheel wrench, warn­ing tri­an­gle, reflec­tive vest, jack with spare tire, tow rope, com­pres­sor, coolant — these are the most basic. It will not work to take every­thing into account and grab a portable car ser­vice, so dur­ing the tech­ni­cal inspec­tion, con­sult with the mas­ter what else to take with you.

✅ Documents

Care­ful­ly check the pack­age of doc­u­ments for the car — you need to have a pass­port, a dri­ver’s license, a vehi­cle reg­is­tra­tion cer­tifi­cate, a pol­i­cy of com­pul­so­ry motor third par­ty lia­bil­i­ty insur­ance (OSAGO) with you.

✅ Route and maps

Think over the geog­ra­phy of the places you want to vis­it, get direc­tions through Google Maps or Yandex.Navigator, and find out how long it will take to move between loca­tions. Write down the route — how much you will spend on the road every day, where you plan to make stops and for how long. peo­ple. Make time for spon­tane­ity in your plan — there may be places that inter­est you along the way, and minor changes in the route will only ben­e­fit. The more diverse loca­tions you put on the route, the rich­er the trip will turn out. Vis­it cities, vil­lages, nat­ur­al sites — auto trips allow you to see the life of entire regions.

✅ Housing

Make a plan for overnight stays and book accom­mo­da­tion in each loca­tion in advance. This will help to avoid unpleas­ant sur­pris­es and road­side motels, which for the most part turn out to be uncom­fort­able. You can stop in nature in any place you like and rent a place for a tent.

✅ Gadgets

Sev­er­al gad­gets, well-cho­sen specif­i­cal­ly for trav­el­ing by car, will help improve the car’s equip­ment, nav­i­gate the ter­rain and increase trav­el com­fort. What devices to take on the road? • DVR. When choos­ing a device, pay atten­tion to the video qual­i­ty and mem­o­ry capac­i­ty. An effec­tive ori­en­ta­tion assis­tant — it will lay out dif­fer­ent route options, help you avoid traf­fic jams and feel con­fi­dent in new areas. devices will be almost at eye lev­el. • Split­ter and USB adapters for car cig­a­rette lighter. The split­ter allows you to con­nect sev­er­al devices to the cig­a­rette lighter, and with the help of USB adapters you can charge smart­phones, tablets and oth­er devices.

✅ Apps

Down­load sev­er­al appli­ca­tions on your smart­phone that will help you orga­nize your trip and feel con­fi­dent on the road. • Maps.Me (iOS and Android). Offline maps with guides — down­load Maps.Me in advance and you won’t be affect­ed by inter­net out­ages that are sure to occur along the way. In addi­tion, thanks to detailed guides, the appli­ca­tion will tell you how to plan a route and take into account all the sights. Despite the amount of data, the appli­ca­tion does not take up a lot of smart­phone mem­o­ry. • Wi-Fi Map (iOS and Android). If you urgent­ly need fast and free inter­net, the appli­ca­tion will find the near­est access points.

✅ Food and water

Stock up on plen­ty of prod­ucts with a long shelf life — snacks, dried fruits and nuts, bananas and apples, seeds and crack­ers. Get a cool­er bag if you want to take snacks, sand­wich­es, or oth­er gro­ceries. But do not take food with a pun­gent odor on the road — for exam­ple, fish, and throw away spoiled food on time. There should be plen­ty of water — it will come in handy both for drink­ing and for wash­ing hands, fruits or dish­es.

✅ First aid kit

Sud­den health prob­lems can spoil the impres­sion of a trip, but with a well-thought-out first aid kit, you can help your­self in time and quick­ly for­get about unpleas­ant symp­toms. We rec­om­mend tak­ing with you on your trip:

• reme­dies for motion sick­ness;

• anti­sep­tics for treat­ing scratch­es and cuts — hydro­gen per­ox­ide, alco­hol wipes, patch­es with an antibac­te­r­i­al effect;

• med­i­cines for flu and cold symp­toms;

• reme­dies for prob­lems with the gas­troin­testi­nal tract;

• painkillers;

• anti­his­t­a­mines;

• means against insect bites;

• sun creams;

• wet wipes — sev­er­al pack­ages of wet wipes, includ­ing antibac­te­r­i­al ones. Use them for hygiene and water sav­ing.

✅ Playlist

Music will help cre­ate the right atmos­phere. Ask your fel­low trav­el­ers to share their favorite tracks and make a big playlist for the trip — it will make it spe­cial. Take care of your­self and get plen­ty of rest! The most impor­tant thing in a road trip is safe­ty, so the dri­ver must get enough sleep. It’s good if there is a per­son among the trav­el­ers who can replace him — it’s best to take turns dri­ving.

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