Tips for Road Tripping with Kids (#8)

We're all for trying out local restaurants and hotels, but sometimes you've got to stick to what's predictable. Because let's face it, road trips with kids aren't.

The eighth in our ongoing series on travel-tested tops for road trips with kids. Stick to what you know and trust:

Tip #8. Residence Inn and Cracker Barrel
Residence Inn is ubiquitous, very kid friendly, and has a breakfast bar in the lobby that is maybe not great, but its fine. Fresh fruit, cereal, espresso machine, english muffins, monster waffles, scrambled eggs, bacon... in other words, it's great for kids and fine for parents. And they allow dogs as well, which is important to many family road trippers. Maybe the best thing is the roominess of the suites. Kitchenette with dishwasher, bedroom, and two bathrooms in many... lot's of room to spread out and build pillow and blanket forts.

Kids love eating breakfast for dinner, and Cracker Barrel serves breakfast 24 hours. Breakfast for supper is especially fun if the kids are already in their jammies. Pull in to Cracker Barrels around 4:30 or 5:00 to beat the rush, fill them with food before they get crazy and get out on the road early enough to let them melt slowly off to la-la land. We're all for eating at local restauraunts, but when you're trying to make time, sometimes its best to stick to what you know. When you've got time to burn, explore for food (try Bubba's Barbeque). Tip: When in the South, order the fried catfish, beans n' greens, and sweet tea. When in the northeast, stick with the meatloaf, (Northeasterners don't know how to do beans n' greens).