We have dozens of family travel tips on New Orleans Mom. If you are looking for longer adventures, check out this list of budget friendly road trips from New Orleans. You may also enjoy visiting Fontainebleau State Park and Oak Mountain State Park.
Easy Road Trip From New Orleans :: Tishomongo State Park
As much as I love living in New Orleans, I absolutely love to travel. I also love planning trips and sharing all of my best tips but restricting my passion in both of these areas has been budget. We are a family of 5 on a modest budget, due in part to medical residency (more about what that’s like here), so extravagant family trips are just not always doable for us.
My children, the boys especially, could live outside. I love being outdoors but I’m not so sure I would be ok sleeping in a tent and far from home for more than a night, if even at all. So recently we rented a cabin and camped in Tishomingo State Park. It was lovely. I just happened to stumble across this state park’s website and saw they had cabins and booked our stay. I hadn’t known anyone who had stayed before, but after a quick glance at the TripAdvisor reviews I decided to take a chance.
Budget Friendly Cabins Near New Orleans
For $140, my family was able to book a 2 night stay (talk about budget friendly) in a one bedroom cabin. The cabin itself was plenty spacious for the 5 of us and also included a kitchenette. Truthfully the kitchenette could use sprucing up, but overall my family was very happy with our trip and would do it again. If you are intrigued by the idea of budget-friendly road trips and want to go a little bit farther, I do have a list of road trip ideas from New Orleans that are anywhere from four to nine hours away. We really enjoy staying close to New Orleans, but we also love getting a little bit further away, too!
Once we were settled into our spot, we only left the cabin once over the two days; we grabbed some firewood and breakfast one morning, and then quickly returned to the park. It was nice to get a break from life’s usual obligations. We ate s’mores and drank hot chocolate by the fire. We hiked, climbed rocks, discovered waterfalls and splashed in creeks. We took our time and explored. We found a sandy spot on the side of Bear Creek and my boys spent 4 straight hours splashing and playing in the sand. The park has gorgeous rock formations as well as a large swinging bridge that crosses a very wide creek; my kids loved giving mom a heart attack by jumping on the bridge as we were crossing.
Road Trips With Kids From New Orleans
The truth is it doesn’t take much to make kids happy. Having their family with them and exploring a new place is really it all it takes. A similar recommendation that is within driving distance of New Orleans is Oak Mountain State Park. There are cabins, and the experience is likely to be similar to this one.
My family has also made a goal to try and support and visit more state and national parks. It’s an inexpensive way to teach our family about the Earth and this gorgeous and geographically diverse country we live in. If you are interested in learning more about the national parks passport, check this information out.
Finding parks and researching their accommodations online has been one of the bigger challenges honestly. I was happy when I finally found a website that seemed to be a centralized database of these parks with photos and information on lodging options. ReserveAmerica is the largest provider of campsite reservations in North America. I will certainly be booking us more quick cabin trips in the future.
