Family-friendly campgrounds with real bathrooms

The single best predictor of a good first family camping trip is not scenery — it is a flush toilet within a two-minute walk of the tent. Filter for 'developed' campgrounds with showers, and you have already removed most of what goes wrong.

Look for loop roads closed to through traffic. Kids can ride bikes and roam without you tracking every car. Sites in the interior of such a loop, with neighbors on both sides, feel far safer to a seven-year-old than a remote pull-out.

Plan for the two hours after dark. That is when a trip either becomes magic or falls apart. A lantern, a card game and one guaranteed treat is the whole strategy.

The Family Package includes a room divider in the tent, which is quietly the most valuable feature we rent — kids on one side, adults on the other, everyone sleeps.