Long haul travel with small people – more tips for taking your kids to Australia
Travelling with a baby or toddler to Australia can be fun (honest — it’s not that bad!), and I’ve got some tips we’ve worked out to make it a bit easier. I’ve written about travelling with babies lots before here, here and here for example, but I’ve got a few new hints…
- If you are hiring a car, pack some stick-on roller sun blinds in your suitcase. They don’t take up much room in your luggage, and mean you don’t have to rig up a sarong-shut-in-window-to-block-out-streaming-sun scenario when driving
- Take more than one sun hat that fits. Alex has a collection of the JoJoMamanBebe ‘flap’ hats as they’re a great fit with elastic, tight enough to stop the hat flying off, but not so tight to leave a groove in her head!
- Take your own formula milk if you have a fussy tot. The same brands aren’t easily available in Australia (Alex drinks Hipp, and I didn’t see this, or SMA or Cow & Gate in many — or any — places). Alex was fine on other brands, but now we just take (and declare at customs, don’t forget!) our own, as it’s easier.
- A fold-up travel-friendly buggy is a very good idea. We’re still loving our Quinny Zapp as it folds up so neatly into its bag, which protects it when chucked around in the airplane hold, but it’s robust enough to plough its way across most terrains when you get there. It also fits neatly into the boot of a hire car. The only whinge we used to have with the buggy is that you can’t hang much from it (bags), but all that is now solved with the amazing Buggy Baskets we’ve got. Fab accessories that you can fit LOADS of stuff in for a day out. We tested them out for trips to the beach in Mallorca last month, and they’re brilliant. Well done ladies at Buggy Baskets!
- Reins for your toddler at the airport are pretty necessary, in my opinion. Alex always wants to be running around everywhere now, and without reins this is hard work at a busy airport (and if you forget to pack them in your hand luggage… ahem like I might have once… you’ll be pleased to hear they sell them in the Boots in Terminal 3 at Heathrow!).
- Don’t underestimate the need for stopovers. They make it all much easier… for Mums and Dads and little ones too!
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| Alex sporting her favourite pink hat on the free bus in Adelaide |
Read more posts in these categories: Babies, Children, Flights
Lucy your site is fantastic and I have been pouring over it trying to make the most of all your advice. We are travelling to Melbourne for Christmas with our bub who will be 3 months at that stage. We are wondering what to do about car seats and I hoped you could give me some advice. We won’t be hiring a car during our holiday and so the car seat would be for taxi rides from the airport and if friends and family want to ferry us around. Mostly we will use public transport in Melbourne or people will come to visit us! I have heard that it is illegal to use car seats in Aus. that do not meet Australian safety standards and so wondered if there is any point taking one with us or if we should we hire one there? That would mean that we would have to pre-book cabs with car seats from the airport and I wondered if you had any experience of doing that in Aus? If we did take a car seat does that take up some of our baggage allowance? Sorry if there are obvious answers to these questions, I am just getting really nervous!! Many thanks, Dana.
31 Oct 2008 at 7:15 pm
Thanks for your comments on the site – glad is useful!
In terms of car seats then we took our own over with no probs when Alex was 4 months old (we had a cabrio fix that clipped into our Quinny buggy). I think provided you have bought a decent car seat it will be fine (I would imagine any EU/UK standards are just as strict as Aus ones).
Because we took a seat that clipped into our buggy we took both of them on the plane checking them in at the gate (the car seat wrapped up stylishly in a black bin liner – take your own to do this!).
You can book cabs with car seats but I am not sure they would always have infant ones (unless you book a limo-type transfer which is much more expensive and specify is for a 0-12 months seat). No cab we ever took ‘checked’ our own car seat but did know they couldn’t take us without one so it was great to have it when out and about as we just unclipped it from the buggy and chucked the ‘wheels’ in the boot and then the car seat went in the back.
Also just FYI they call them ‘capsules’ in Australia so if you do decide to get one over there then that’s what you need to ask for so they know what you want!
Car seats don’t take up baggage allowance on most airlines as they take them as ‘baby-related’ equipment (but like I say we took ours as ‘part’ of our ‘buggy’ and was not a prob). Always best to double check with your airline but I see car seats coming off flights all the time. (We were with Emirates on that trip when we took a car seat and was no prob at all).
No need to get nervous it will be fine. And trust me although you might not think it will be – its a lot easier with a baby then a toddler!!
02 Nov 2008 at 12:50 pm
Thanks Lucy for all your great tips re flying longhaul with babies. We live in Australia and are making our first trip with 6 month daughter back to Scotland for Xmas. So I am following all your tips
Lucy can you give me advice on whether to check our stroller at the gate or at check-in? We are travelling Emirates with a Bugaboo, and will be taking the baby bjorn as you recommended. And did you try the complimentary stroller at Dubai?
Also I just wanted to say re the above question on car seats that Australian safety standards on baby seats are more stringent than UK standards, so strictly speaking a UK car seat might not be legal. Of course who is going to check? And taxis here are exempt from using baby seats so you can legally take a taxi that doesn’t have one.
19 Nov 2008 at 10:17 am
Thanks for your comment on the blog Jo. Hope its all useful info for you.
Here’s the answer to your question about strollers – we usually keep hold of our stroller until the gate as its easier to get around (those departure gates can be far away!) but if your baby is still small enough to be fairly portably in your baby bjorn you might prefer this to have less ‘baggage’ with you in the airport. It might be a good idea to have the buggy if its nap time, but really its up to you. We keep ours now as Alex is too heavy for too much carrying these days:) (reins are a good investment for toddlers in airports!).
We didn’t use the complementary strollers in Dubai with Emirates because Alex was too small for them (they are basic umbrella style strollers so probably not great for a 6 month old – I would say better for 1-3 year olds). That said there weren’t actually any available when our flight landed either so we carried Alex! Don’t rely on the strollers being available and I would just use your Baby Bjorn for Dubai airport.
Thanks for the info on car seats too. Now we always ask for one with the hire car but being first time parents we Alex we probably got one that has every safety standard there is (for any country!) when we bought ours!
Any more questions as you get ready for your trip let me know.
21 Nov 2008 at 7:48 am
Just got back from our trip with our 7 month old from Oz to UK. Great trip with lots of attention paid to the littl’un by assorted grandparents etc. Wanted to let you know that the Baby Bjorn was a definite goer at the airport, much easier than a stroller. And all your other tips were very useful on the plane.
We had a bit of a disaster re the car seat in the UK, as the car hire company couldn’t fit it for insurance reasons(jobsworth b’tards), and even though I now see how simple they are to strap in, I couldn’t for the life of me work out how to do it. The 24 hour flight, lost luggage and pissing down rain may have contributed to my general ineptness. Fortunately a forgiving fellow car hirer showed us how.
Now we are planning next trip in June for my brother’s wedding, and Emirates will prob be too expensive – have you heard anything re El Etihad whose flights are really cheap at the mo?
14 Jan 2009 at 9:29 am
Thanks for a fantastic blog! We are travelling from the UK to Australia next week and you have answered ALL my questions!
27 Feb 2009 at 10:17 pm
PS. Our baby is 8 months old
27 Feb 2009 at 10:18 pm
[...] written about this before, like here, here and here, but from all the recent questions I’ve had, it seems there’s more to [...]
23 Aug 2009 at 2:58 pm