Kid Travel Tips from Travel Savvy Parents
Posted on July 12, 2018
Going on a summer vacation with the kids? Flying with a baby? Want to hug those two dads and be their straight ally for the cruise? Here’s some tips before you go a-hugging, a-lugging, a-traveling from PepePopo’s top family travel contributors (and dear friends), who agreed to answer a few questions and offer priceless insight into their successes – and sometimes failures – of traveling with kids.
Brian Lila is a filmmaker and storyteller who travels with his wife and two toddler-aged daughters.
Allegra, her wife, and two kids, have family on both US coasts and internationally that they visit multiple times a year.
Brian (insta @brianinoakland), his husband, Ivan, and their two children have travelled for the last decade and a half, since their children were babies, everywhere from local destinations in their home state of California to remote parts of Egypt.
PepePopo: What is your top tip for family travel?
Brian:
Is it terrible to say that I often try to find places that are NOT geared towards “family” ?!? I plan a trip according to where Ivan and I want to go. It’s a better vacation for all of us that way.
Allegra:
A friend with a child of a similar age recently said to me, “I feel like you and your wife make the worst travel decisions of anyone I know” so maybe we are not the greatest folks to be doling out advice, but what we lack in making practical decisions we make up for with sheer volume of experience. Our 4.5 year old has been to 3 continents, 4 countries and on around 35 flights.
I think what I would have liked to know is that, age/developmental stage is everything when choosing mode of travel and how ambitious you can be with your destination and timeframe.
Traveling with young infants (as long as they are not screaming the whole time) is a cakewalk compared to early toddlers. If they are still comforted by having some form of nipple in their mouth and prone to sleeping for long stretches, it is fairly easy to get from one place to another by plane. Once they are walking but not at a stage where they have an attention span, then plane travel is a form of torture – so plan shorter flights or layovers. We tried to pack as many flights as we could into that timeframe when they are still free to sit on a lap, but this turned out to be uncomfortable and exhausting.
My other tip is always leave a day of recovery back at home. Even if it’s only a short trip. You will all need it.
Brian Lila:
Travel in the earliest time of the day as possible. A child’s sleep tank is full and they are more likely to roll with long drives or flights than in the mid-day when hardcore meltdowns are brewing.
PepePopo: What goes in your carry on to avoid complete melt down?
Allegra:
Stickers, all the stickers (don’t think in double digits, think in hundreds). Snacks, all the snacks. Also, something new can buy you a good amount of time. I take a similar approach to traveling with kids that I do with myself. To whatever degree I can afford (unfortunately this is not an upgrade) I spoil myself in airports and on planes. If there is a way to make your kids excited about travel, I say do it. Make sure you are clear these are travel treats and not to be expected in general.
PepePopo: What’s the easiest family vacation?
Brian Lila:
The beach. Nature’s sand-box and the ocean puts our entire family in a happy place.
PepePopo: Biggest mix up/mess/horror and how you avoided it (if you did!)?
Allegra:
Our first international trip was to Mexico with a 3 month old. We packed about 12 diapers and two changes of clothes in our carry-on and felt pretty smug and prepared. Our daughter managed to blow through or spit up on all of the diapers and spare clothes and we ended up landing in mexico with a naked baby. At least it was warm there in December…but we were a bit less smug.
Brian:
To date, I just scheduled spring break this year on the wrong week. Both kids had their break the week before we went on our trip. I had a great trip to Palm Springs all planned and paid for, so we got independent study packets for each of them and off we went. Two weeks of spring break!!!
PepePopo: What was something you learned the hard way while on vacation?
Brian Lila:
Well, this is not really a tip, but it was learned the hard way on vacation; while visiting my wive’s family, she told me she had pumped breast milk and put it in a container in the refrigerator so I could feed our 4 month old baby while she went out to lunch with her sisters. Our baby happily took down an entire bottle of milk while my wife was gone. My wife returned and asked why the breast milk was still in the refrigerator. I quickly learned that I had fed our baby an entire bottle of Trader Joes Hazelnut Creamer that had been put in a Tupperware container.
PepePopo: Best improvisation that saved the vacation?
Allegra:
I have two words for you. Instant. Oatmeal. Our child expects to be fed within about 10 minutes of waking and this can feel impossible and not at all relaxing on vacation. Instant Oatmeal can be made literally anywhere- with a hotel coffee pot, a quick coffeeshop run, a microwave. This allows us to gather ourselves and get ready for the day and sometimes, when the stars align, it also allows us to have the most sacred of gay meals – Brunch – at a semi-normal hour.
Brian Lila:
The illustrations on an airplane safety manual made our up-set daughter happy when I spent 20 minutes explaining how sometimes it’s fun to land in the ocean so people can slide off the wing of the airplane and land in a raft floating in the sea. I now have to tell the airplane evacuation party story every time we fly.
PepePopo: What not to say to families on vacation?
Brian:
We have one thing in common with other parents – we have kids. It’s hard. It’s not always glamorous. It can take a village….just be normal. There are those clingy few who want to befriend the gay couple poolside….don’t come on too strong! We will run the other way. And don’t make awkward small talk full of assumptions, like “look…giving mom a break!”, “what good dads you are” (as if there was an option to be a bad dad) “who’s going to breast feed?” I was pissed with that one! We’ve travelled around the world with our kids, Mexicans are ALWAYS welcoming….Croatians were great…. the French can be….it takes a minute….Italians have been LOVELY….the Egyptians were something special….I would say almost anywhere we have traveled we have always been welcomed….the only time we have felt harassed and or asked about where the mother is….is here in the States…TSA mostly….sometimes the passport check point…..it’s a thing here in the States.
Brian Lila:
I bet you wish you left your kids with their grandparents.
Allegra:
This would likely have a lot of overlap with other things not to say to queer parents like this and this. If there are questions you wouldn’t ask a straight couple, don’t ask a queer couple. And while I would obviously prefer people are excited about our family rather than homophobic and against our rights, when folks are overly enthusiastic it can feel really objectifying, and does not make for the best conversation. Lastly, remember that to our children our families are not exceptional, inspiring, or in need of explanation, we are just their parents so be extra mindful of what you say around our kids.