If you have children, you know that a long car ride can bring out the worst in them. This, in turn, can bring out the worst in you. The next time you want to avoid incessant questions about the intolerable length of the trip or the status of future sandwiches, try setting up the kids with a few of these fun and easy games.

Twenty Questions

A classic game both on the road and beyond, Twenty Questions challenges players to try to guess something that someone is thinking of, using Yes or No questions as their only guide.

The first player thinks of a person, place, or thing. The second player then asks Yes or No questions in an attempt to identify what the first player is thinking of. If the second player can guess what the first player is thinking of in twenty questions or less and keep in mind, a guess counts as a question then the second player wins. If twenty questions are reached without a successful guess, the first player wins.

To ensure fair play in this game, the first player can be forced to write down what he or she is thinking of before the game starts this will prevent an obvious way of cheating. An acceptable variation of this game also involves allowing the first question the second player asks to be if the object is a person, place or thing. The first player must then answer this question, though all remaining questions must remain strictly within a Yes or No scope.

Punch Buggy

While not recommended for siblings of widely-varying ages, or for young friends who have a propensity to rapidly escalate disagreements into fistfights, Punch Buggy is a perfectly acceptable game for two reasonable children to play. Probably.

The rules are simple: Volkswagen invented the Beetle to promote peace and love in the 1960s. Because that didnt work out, the car now exists to make people hit each other. As such, the first person to see a VW Beetle on the road announces the colour of the car following the phrase Punch Buggy, i.e. a purple VW Beetle would induce an announcement of Punch Buggy purple! To avoid being punched back, the player can also append the phrase, No punchbacks!

Upon completion of the phrase, the player then gets to softly punch his or her competitor in the shoulder area. The competitor cannot do anything in response, save for visualize the satisfaction of when they will receive an opportunity to hit the other person back.

Nobody has ever kept score in Punch Buggy, and no game of it has ever actually ended. That being said, the steely intensity with which players will have to watch out for VW Beetles all but ensures that the hours of a long journey fly by!

The Alphabet Game

In this game, all players in the car are challenged to be on the lookout for things on the road with attention to what letters in the alphabet they start with. The object of the game is to start at the letter A and make your way to the letter Z before all other players. The intensity of the game is in the fact that an object seen can only be used once, by the player who spots it first.

For example, if Billy sees an alligator before Sally, and calls out Alligator, he now advances on to looking for an object that starts with the letter B, whereas Sally is still stuck on looking for something that starts with the letter A.

To make some of the tougher letters in the alphabet easier to get by, its also important to relax the rules somewhat. For example, a sign by the side of the road that says Zekes Non-Stolen Crawfish could technically count for the letter Z to avoid arguments, however, make sure that every player understands this type of flexibility before the game starts!

The Quiet Game

When all else fails, and your mission descends simply to the level of wanting a little peace and quiet in the backseat, nothing beats The Quiet Game.

A favourite of hard-partying summer camp counselors around the world, the rules are very simple: the first person to talk loses, and the winner receives a cone of ice cream the size of their own head. See if that doesnt motivate them!

This article has been created on behalf of Insurance Hunter, an online brokerage offering auto insurance Ontario quotes. For more information on car tips, trips and tools, check out InsuranceHunter.ca