Fifty things to spot from a car window on a long drive: vehicles, animals, signs, bridges and barns. One different card per passenger, no caller, and a reason to look out of the window instead of at a screen.
Road Trip Bingo
| B | I | N | G | O |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Cell tower | Windmill | Tractor | Airplane | Fire truck |
Convertible | Dog in a car | Hay bales | Exit sign | Stop sign |
Gas station | School bus | FREE | RV | Lake |
Ambulance | Barn | Mile marker | Water tower | Hawk |
Cornfield | Railroad crossing | Motorcycle | Billboard | Train |
Card 1 of 30
Road Trip Bingo
| B | I | N | G | O |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Deer | River | Boat on a trailer | Flag | Toll booth |
Yellow car | Out-of-state plate | Church steeple | Roadside fruit stand | Police car |
Semi truck | Detour sign | FREE | Helicopter | Horse |
Sheep | Rainbow | Rest area | Speed limit sign | Bike rack |
Tunnel | Red car | Traffic cone | Bridge | Mountain |
Card 2 of 30
Road trip bingo is spotting bingo. Everyone in the back has a card, and the road provides the calls: a motorcycle, a railroad crossing, a boat on a trailer, a dog with its head out of a car window. When you see the thing, you say it and mark it. A line wins the leg; a full card wins the trip. The game needs no adult attention beyond settling the occasional argument about whether that was a hawk or a crow, and it quietly teaches children to look at the country going past.
The list is built from a real long drive: things that turn up on most highways within an hour (red cars, semi trucks, billboards, exit signs), things that turn up a few times a day (water towers, tunnels, a church steeple, hay bales) and a handful of genuine finds (a rainbow, a helicopter, a roadside fruit stand) to keep the full card out of reach until the last hour.
Print one card per passenger, including the front-seat passenger, who will otherwise be appointed referee full-time. Give each child a different card so they aren't racing for the same square, and a crayon or pencil rather than a marker that can migrate to the upholstery. Fold the cards in half and they fit in a seat-back pocket. Print a spare set for the way home; cards get lost under seats and rained on at rest stops.
Edit the list for the route first. The prefilled version is a general one for a rural highway. If the drive is through cities, swap the farm squares for urban ones; if it is a night drive, swap in lit things (neon signs, headlights, a lit water tower, a lighthouse).
Choosing the next playlist, the next snack, the window seat after the next stop, or who gets to pick the restaurant. For the overall winner, first pick of beds at the destination. The prize should be something that happens in the car, so the next leg starts with a reason to play again.
Cards are 5 x 5 with a free centre square. Edit the list, add your own squares or change the card size above; the cards update as you type.
Nobody calls. Each passenger watches the road and marks a square when they see the thing on it: a red car, a water tower, a tractor. The first to a line wins that leg of the trip. Because the calls are the landscape, the game can run for hours with no adult involvement, which is the entire point.
The rule that you must say it out loud when you see it ("Windmill!") so a second person can confirm. It also means the whole car looks up, which is the nicest thing about the game. Disputes go to the front-seat passenger, whose decision is final.
Edit the list for the route: a city drive wants taxis, cranes, buses and bridges; a desert drive wants cactus, mesas and dust devils; a coastal drive wants lighthouses, boats and surfers. Keep at least 30 squares (48 or more keeps the cards varied) and keep them things that appear every hour or so, not once a trip.
Each passenger can open the share link and find their card on a phone or tablet, but the squares can't be tapped to mark them, so paper is better: it survives low battery, it can be marked with a crayon, and a card held up against the window is a reminder to look out of it.