Virginia With Kids Family Travel Guide

🏔️Virginia
Blue Ridge Mountains seen from an overlook along Skyline Drive in Shenandoah National Park, Virginia

An overlook along Skyline Drive in Shenandoah National Park. The road runs the length of the park and every overlook is a different mountain view.

State Guide

Virginia With Kids Family Travel Guide

“Colonial history two hours from mountain overlooks two hours from a beach boardwalk, and none of it fights for the same week.”

By Nicole Damiano, ASTA Verified Travel Advisor · Virginia is a state I build for families within a tank of gas of it, so what is here is built from what our agency books and what I have verified myself this season, against the ticket office and the park service.

Rows of grapevines at a vineyard near Charlottesville, Virginia, in the state's wine country

Nicole’s Perspective

Virginia is the state I plan for families who want the founding era without a flight. A meaningful slice of the families I plan for are within a tank of gas of it, and Loudoun County’s wine country markets itself hard to the same DC-metro parents I talk to every week. I taught the colonial period for eight years before I priced my first trip, and Williamsburg in its 250th anniversary year is the version of that lesson I would pick for a ten year old.

Everything below is checked against the park service, the ticket office and the county tourism board directly, not pulled from an old blog post. The prices are this season’s, and the one piece of routing advice I give every client is the same one I give you. Pick one region and do it properly.

Beyond the Bookshelf

A shelf of Virginia stories, the movies that put Hidden Figures and Remember the Titans on the map, and the musicians who grew up there for the drive.

Beyond the Bookshelf Virginia: The Known World, Big Stone Gap, Wish You Well, Prodigal Summer, The Wettest County in the World, Chesapeake, Misty of Chincoteague, Bridge to Terabithia, The Wanderer, O Is for Old Dominion, Good Night Virginia, Remember the Titans, Hidden Figures, Loving, Pocahontas, Wish You Well film, Dave Matthews Band, Pharrell Williams, Missy Elliott, Ella Fitzgerald, Patsy Cline, Jason Mraz, The Virginia Housewife, Virginia Hospitality, The Colonial Williamsburg Tavern Cookbook, Victuals, Moon Virginia and Maryland, Backroads of Virginia, DK Eyewitness Washington DC, Virginia A History, Virginia's Blue Ridge
Read

Kids

Watch

Listen

Cook

Explore

Book links go to Bookshop.org, which supports local bookstores. Film and music links go to JustWatch and Spotify. As an affiliate we may earn from qualifying purchases.

Virginia, Place by Place

Six regions, and they do not overlap much. Coastal Virginia Beach is a beach week. Richmond and Williamsburg are a history week. Shenandoah is a mountain week. Loudoun is a long weekend, not a full trip on its own.

Duke of Gloucester Street in Colonial Williamsburg, Virginia

01

Williamsburg

The Virginia State Capitol in Richmond, Virginia

02

Richmond

View from Hawksbill Mountain in Shenandoah National Park, Virginia

03

Shenandoah

The fishing pier at Virginia Beach, Virginia

04

Virginia Beach

Monticello, Thomas Jefferson's home near Charlottesville, Virginia

05

Charlottesville

Photo coming
06

Loudoun Wine Country

Photo coming
07

Alexandria & Mount Vernon

Photo coming
08

Virginia’s Eastern Shore

Those eight are not next to each other. Williamsburg to Virginia Beach is under an hour. Williamsburg to Shenandoah is closer to two and a half. Build the trip around one region and treat the rest as a future visit, not a single week.

Must see and do

Six things worth building a Virginia trip around, picked for families, with what they cost where a cost exists.

View from Hawksbill Mountain, the highest point in Shenandoah National Park

See: Skyline Drive through Shenandoah National Park. $30 a car for 7 days, 105 miles end to end, over 70 overlooks. Stop at Hawksbill, the park’s high point at 4,051 feet, and let the kids scramble the rocks at the top.
Costumed interpreters on Duke of Gloucester Street in Colonial Williamsburg

Do: Colonial Williamsburg. $37.50 for adults and $10 for ages 6 to 12 for a single day, and 2026 is the 250th anniversary year, so book ahead and expect it busier than a normal summer.
Shoppers on the brick walk through Merchants Square in Williamsburg, Virginia

Eat: A sandwich from The Cheese Shop in Merchants Square, Williamsburg, with the house dressing on it. $11 to $15, eat it on a bench outside, and buy a bottle of the dressing to take home.
Monticello, Thomas Jefferson's home near Charlottesville

Splurge on: The Highlights Tour at Monticello, $42 adult, $13 for ages 12 to 18, $4 for ages 5 to 11, under 5 free. It’s the only way inside Jefferson’s house, and summer time slots do sell out.
Chincoteague ponies grazing on the salt marsh at Chincoteague National Wildlife Refuge

Hidden gem: The wild ponies at Chincoteague National Wildlife Refuge on the Eastern Shore. $10 a car for the day, the ponies graze the marsh along Beach Road most evenings, and the last week of July is the Pony Swim.
The boardwalk and fishing pier at Virginia Beach

Free / with kids: Virginia Beach. The sand is free, the 3 mile boardwalk is free, and it’s about 3 and a half hours from DC. Make it the beach week, not the day trip.

Photos: Merchants Square by Ser Amantio di Nicolao, CC BY-SA 3.0. Chincoteague ponies, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, public domain. Both via Wikimedia Commons.

Virginia by the numbers

Facts to know before you go

178810th stateVirginia ratified the US Constitution on 25 June 1788, becoming the tenth state, and it had already been the largest and oldest of the original colonies.
1699Williamsburg becomes capitalThe colonial capital moved from Jamestown to Williamsburg in 1699, which is why Colonial Williamsburg’s historic area looks the way it does today.
1.68MShenandoah’s 2025 visitsShenandoah National Park logged 1,682,152 recreation visits in 2025, most of them driving some or all of Skyline Drive.
8.88MVirginia’s populationThe Commonwealth’s population reached 8.88 million as of July 2025, per the University of Virginia’s Weldon Cooper Center, up more than 248,000 since the 2020 Census.
50+Loudoun County wineriesLoudoun markets itself as DC’s Wine Country and counts more than 50 wineries and tasting rooms, about 25 miles west of the capital.
17.6 miChesapeake Bay Bridge-TunnelThe bridge-tunnel connecting Virginia Beach to the Eastern Shore runs 17.6 miles and ducks underwater twice for shipping channels, which the kids will want to know about in advance.

Getting around

How families do Virginia

Nothing in Virginia is more than about a four hour drive from Washington DC, which is exactly why it works as a road-trip state for East Coast families rather than a fly-in destination.

Road trips

DC to Shenandoah is about 2 hours, DC to Williamsburg is about 3, and DC to Virginia Beach is about 3.5. All three make a real loop with a car.


Walking and hiking

Colonial Williamsburg is entirely walkable once you park once, and Shenandoah has trails from a half mile boardwalk to an all-day Old Rag scramble.


Flying in

Richmond, Norfolk and Washington Dulles all have direct flights from most of the country if you are not driving from the DC corridor.

When To Go

Virginia has four real seasons and each region peaks differently. Fall foliage and summer beach weeks are not the same trip and should not be planned the same way.

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Mid-October is peak leaf season

Skyline Drive gets seriously crowded the second and third weekends of October. Go on a weekday or book Williamsburg instead that week.

☀️

June through August for the beach

Virginia Beach’s water is swimmable and the boardwalk is in full season. It is also the most humid stretch for Williamsburg and Richmond, so plan indoor breaks.

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April and May for Williamsburg

Mild temperatures, gardens in bloom, and school groups mostly gone by late May. This is the best window for a history-heavy week with younger kids.

Interests

What draws families to Virginia

Living history, real mountains, a real beach and a real capital, all inside a state small enough to combine two of them in one trip.

History

Colonial Williamsburg, Jamestown, Yorktown and Monticello cover more than 150 years of American history without leaving one state.

Nature

Shenandoah’s Skyline Drive, Old Rag Mountain, and the Blue Ridge Parkway give families real elevation and real trails within a half day of DC.

Beach

Virginia Beach’s boardwalk and the Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel out to the quieter Eastern Shore cover both a busy boardwalk week and a slow one.

Food and drink

Chesapeake blue crab and Virginia ham on the coast, Loudoun’s wineries and breweries inland, all within reach of Richmond’s growing restaurant scene.

Government and civics

The Virginia State Capitol, Jefferson’s Monticello and Washington’s Mount Vernon give older kids a hands-on civics unit that a textbook cannot match.

Small-town charm

Alexandria’s Old Town and Charlottesville’s downtown mall are both walkable, historic and sized for an afternoon rather than a full day.

Only in Virginia

What you cannot get anywhere else

A few things about Virginia are specific to it, not a version of something better done elsewhere.

🏛️

Colonial Williamsburg is a living history site, not a museum with actors. Interpreters stay in character, the trade shops make things, and the town itself is the exhibit. There is nowhere else in the country doing this at this scale.

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Loudoun County calls itself DC’s Wine Country and the branding is earned. More than 50 wineries sit within about an hour of the capital, which is not something most major metro areas can claim.

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The Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel is one of the few in the world that goes underwater twice. It links Virginia Beach to the Eastern Shore over 17.6 miles, and there is a rest stop built on an artificial island in the middle of the bay.

🏔️

Skyline Drive is the only road that runs the entire length of a national park end to end in this part of the country. Over 70 overlooks in 105 miles, with a 35 mile per hour speed limit that gets enforced.

🏡

Two presidents’ homes are open to visit within an hour of each other. Jefferson’s Monticello and Washington’s Mount Vernon both sell timed tickets and both are built for a real family visit, not a quick photo stop.

George Washington's Mount Vernon estate on the Potomac River in Virginia

Let’s Plan It

Virginia trips work best when you pick one region and build around it rather than trying to string Williamsburg, Shenandoah and Virginia Beach into a single week. I can help you decide which region fits your family and get the timed tickets booked before they sell out.

Start Planning Virginia

Poppy, the Damiano family's Cavapoo, our real dog

Poppy marks the family parts. Wherever you see her, that section is written for travelling with children.