Mumsnet Talk

My DD is 6.5 months old and hasn't yet met my granddad. He lives a 3 hour drive away, which would mean 6 hours travel in the one day, and DD really hates car drives. We'd been hoping to wait to visit him until she'd gotten better with travelling, and she has a little bit, but not enough to not be concerned that she might spend the entire trip screaming inconsolably. Our options as I see it:

1. Take her anyway, have DH in the back, and hope it's one of her better days.
2. Get my mum to take us, which will mean I can sit in the back and hopefully have more luck at keeping her calm. Also hope she's having a good day.
3. Get a B&B half-way up and stay for 2 nights, so on any one day we're only doing 1.5 hours travelling. This will give us more time to stop and take a break if she needs it. However, researching this it would cost us £150 minimum for petrol and accommodation and we really don't have that much money spare.
4. Go by train. This would mean either 10 hours train travel in one day and only getting to see my GD for less than 2 hours due to train times, or splitting the travel over 2 days and staying over a B&B for the night. Again this would end up costing us around £150 and we really don't have that much money.
5. Ask my GD to come down to my aunt who lives about half way between us. This would really cut down on how much we had to travel and make it a lot easier to stop and give DD a breather as needed. My aunt is quite nice and would probably go and get him, however he never travels ever so is unlikely to agree to this and I'd also feel guilty for 'making him travel' even if he did.
6. Say we can't visit him until DD is better with travel, though he is 92 and I've no idea how long it will be before she gets better in the car.

Very stressed out.

Could you do it at night/ early hours in the hope she might sleep?

I'm sure you've tried everything - my DS was just the same but this eventually worked for us:

- no one in the back (then he didn't cry to be taken out)
- books to read on his knee
- toy to play with on his knee
- nice cd of nursery rhymes playing
- us singing to him
- starting 30 mins before he was due a nap and he would go off in the car

If its any consolation at 8 months he was fine with the car

TBH if he really wants to meet your daughter I'd go for the meet half way at the aunts , if he doesn't want to do that then I'm afraid he'd have to make do with photos and DVDs .

Rather than ask a 92 year old to travel in cold weather, I'd give your baby some breakfast, kick about, change, then get in the car, with one of you in the back if need be, and hot foot it to your aunt's. Hopefully DD will have some of her morning nap during the journey.

Get out at aunty's, stretch legs, cuppa, feed etc. then back in. Possibly baby will have a lunchtime nap at some point. See grandad for a couple of hours, then go back to aunty's for tea and bath, baby in sleep suit, and head off after baby's usual bedtime. Hopefully she will sleep for some or all of the travelling. And for the rest of the journey, be prepared to hear a bit of crying and to sing yourselves hoarse. I know her crying is like a knife in your stomach, but it's really hurting you more than her and won't damage her psychologically or physically.

In years to come, you'll look back with pleasure at the photos of your DD perched on grandad's knee. I have pics of mine with their great grandmother, and it makes me happy to think she held them. I know it also gave her an inordinate amount of pleasure, at a time when 'her future was in her past' (as she used to say) - seeing the generations ahead of her.

Hadn't thought of that, it is a possibility thanks minicc. I might still need to do the journey with my mum in that case though as DH doesn't have a license and if we were setting off extremely early and driving back quite late then doing the driving alone may be a bit much. It's definitely worth considering though.

Wow responses faster than I anticipated, thanks all.

OP have you tried travelling at your baby's usual nap times? How about setting off at bedtime, staying with your aunt then biting the bullet at naptime the next morning, returning at bedtime and repeat on the way back?

I would really try and go, your grandad is 92 and I am sure it will bring him a lot of joy to meet your dd.

Could drive part of the way and get the train the rest of the way? Eg drive to aunt's, train from there? Where are you? Where are you going?!?

We've driven at her nap times before, and also tried putting her in the car whilst she's asleep before as well. Quite often she'll wake up and then cry throughout the entire journey. Sometimes she'll actually cry for a little bit but then go back to sleep, I guess it depends on how 'determined' she's feeling at the time but we can't really predict how she'll be until each journey. I guess staying with my aunt is another option that we hadn't thought of, I'll ask my mum about that as well (will be phoning my mum tomorrow, we'd been talking about a trip to my GD over the weekend and I said I needed time to decide what was best).
Part driving part train is also another good idea thankyou janek! Just checked the train fare and it's a lot lower than expected as well, I reckon DH will feel much better about this idea.

Thankyou MN, so many good ideas that I'm wondering why me and DH didn't think of any of this ourselves.

Oh and we're in Hampshire janek, we'd be driving to Suffolk.

I think you are handing over far too much control of your brain cells to a 6 month old baby. Is she your first-born ?

here is what you do

1) put baby in car

2) drive to destination

The end.

Just to clarify, by "over the weekend" I meant we'd been talking about it last weekend, not that we were intending to go see him this coming weekend. The trip would be late Feb.

Is it not feasible that your grandad could come to stay with you or your mum for a couple of days , he might be more inclined to travel if he's staying and that way he could spend more time with you all .

I would be ensuring that a 6 month old baby be "more inclined to travel" (what with them being pretty portable'n'all) than a 92yo.

Do you take her swimming?

DD used to do those water baby classes and always napped really well afterwards. I can remember taking her to class on the morning we were going on holiday and people were I had come but it meant we got a good way there before she woke up.

It might be hard work, but I would make the effort to do the traveling. He's 92 and doesn't travel.......your baby might surprise you. Is there anywhere you can stay nearby? Hope your journey goes better than expected!

What legoballoon said. Just put her in the car and drive; it's one day and it's important.

AF there is no way you could have driven for 3 hours with my DS in the car on a bad day - he wailed like a banshee

What AnyFucker said. She's a baby, even if she cries a bit, she'll get over it. Just turn the radio up and drown out the noise.

I would have done it anyway, WLC

Thanks all for the responses, it's helped get an idea of the general consensus. I think we'll probably do half/half travel and pull over in the car as needed. It's not just about getting there regardless of whatever state she's in by the end of the journey. It's also, much more importantly, about my GD having a pleasant time meeting my DD - which he won't if I arrive with an inconsolable, hysterical baby who proceeds to be volatile and scream on and off throughout our visit. Whatever mood she arrives in will be the mood she takes into his house with her, so hopefully by keeping the journey as pleasant and relaxing for her as possible we'll be arriving with a pleasant and relaxed baby. A lot of these ideas didn't even occur to me and DH, but hopefully now we'll be able to make that visit and leave my GD with some wonderful memories as well, thanks MN.

Just to labour the point - if you look on nationalrail.co,uk and get up the 'details' for a particular journey, you can then get it to 'show all calling points', and you could then decide using the gift of google directions which would be the best station to aim for, to do half drive/half train.

If you choose to follow this advice come back to me, i have lots of other ideas about where you can get even more comprehensive train information...

Gah nationalrail.co.uk