Tips for surviving car/ferry/car to France?

[hiveofactivity]

We've never done this sort of trip before - 2 hr drive then 6 hr ferry then a 200 mile drive in France to a campsite.
We didn't really think it through and probably should have flown but too late now...

Dp will have to do all the driving (I can't drive). Oh and dd (5) will be sitting in the front as she gets badly car sick (even when dosed up on the drugs).

Any tips for saving our sanity?

I realise you are in a really difficult position. However surely the reason that parents are discouraged from putting the children in the front is that they are safer in the back particularly at speeds of 80mph on a motorway? If adults are in the front they have some protection from air bags but a child wouldn't as it would have to be switched off. Hideous as the sickness sounds I would rather risk that than put a child in the front on a motorway.

when my daughter was little she was into littlest pets. They were always in the sale so I'd buy a load of bits and bobs like that - polly pocket etc, stocking filler type things and wrap them up as "holiday" present. I'd let her open a few at a time throughout the journey. Wasted a little bit of time!

My eldest gets car sick. To prepare for any long driving holiday, she stays awake the night before, doses herself up with travel sickness pills before travelling and then sleeps for as long as she can during the whole trip. So, try to keep her up late the night before?

My dd and dh use to sit outside on ferries as that helped dd but dd1 prefered to lay down or keep herself occupied reading etc

Before smartphones and ipads I use to make little activity packs for the dc with new pens, activity books to keep them occupied

A firm favourite was when we purchased them a clipboard each and print out of map of france correlating to the number plates origin of cars, they loved competing with each other to find a car from each region