Travelling with newborn

[Coffeeorginplease]

Looking for some travel advice as a FTM of a 3 week old and unsure of how to plan a journey.

I want to take DS to visit family who live 200 miles away (takes about 3hrs). This journey will be by car and I will be taking him alone due to DH work schedule.

I’ve only driven him on really short journeys so far and unsure when is best age to leave this long journey until and if there are any key tips for travelling by car with a newborn! I understand the current guidance says to limit time in car seat to 30 mins but I’m not sure the journey would be possible if I had to stop that often.

Any advice welcomed! TIA

[MumJ21]

Hello - we currently live in Germany due to my husbands job. We took our daughter by car and ferry over when she was 8 weeks old. She was good as gold as they still sleep a lot at that age. So we probably stopped every hour for a nappy change or if she needed feeding. We have since done this journey 5 times by car and ferry and she is now 8mo. It gets much harder the older they get if you are on your own as ours gets bored sitting in the car even though I now sit next to her it’s still not the best!

Tips would be to set off just before their usual nap time if you have any set nap times at this stage but like I said ours slept loads at 3 weeks old so the journey was pretty easy!!

[teaandbiscuitsforme]

I had to travel that distance with a 3 week old. It's actually not as bad as you fear! 30 mins is the recommended maximum time in a car seat, but they must not be in it more than 2 hours. So I would plan to stop twice on your journey, feed, nappy change if needs be and he'll probably sleep most of the way.

[mindutopia]

Are you going overnight? If you hadn't planned to, I would definitely. I would leave in the morning, do 1.5 hours when he would normally sleep after a feed. Have a break for food for you and coffee, petrol, etc. and feed and change, and then when he's ready to sleep, carry on the other 1.5 hours. And then repeat on the way back. Or you could break if up into 1 hour segments if that works best. Basically, car travel takes probably twice as long with babies and small children, so plan for 3 hours to take at least 5 with all the stops and faffing around. It really is much easier if you can bring someone with you to share the driving as it makes it a pretty long day, especially if you are up during the night, so if you could plan it for when your dh is available, I would. Otherwise, just break it up over several days or you could plan to meet in the middle. 1.5 hours each way would be perfectly doable in one long day with a break for lunch with family in the middle.

[user1493413286]

I was told to stop every hour and basically stretch the baby out for 20 minutes so give a feed or just a cuddle for a while.
Does your baby sleep in the car? Hopefully would then just sleep through. If I’m honest I would have been reluctant to do it by myself but my baby was up a lot in the night so I would have been too tired and it’s very stressful when the baby is crying and you can’t do anything if you’re on the motorway etc.

[Coffeeorginplease]

Thanks so much for all your replies.

I’d be going down for 3-4 days so wouldn’t have to do two journeys in one day.

He does sleep in the car during the short journeys we’ve done so I’m hoping he would sleep for most of it. It’s just a bit daunting thinking of doing it alone and not having someone to keep an eye on him in the back.

He is awake crying a lot in the night at the moment which is definitely making me tired.

I may leave it a few more weeks and see if he is a bit more settled and do a few hour long practice journeys!!

[Caterina99]

The driving myself with noone else in car would stress me out (with my first baby anyway - now I’m way more relaxed with the second one), but my babies have always slept well in the car.

I’d plan to break up a 3 hour journey with one stop. Coffee and loo for you and feed for baby. And of course you may need more than that depending on how your baby does. But personally, if my baby was sleeping and I didn’t desperately need the loo or anything I’d just keep on driving.

[Sparklyuggs]

Do you have any other options other than the car? Do you know anyone who with a lie flat carseat that you could borrow?

[Coffeeorginplease]

I have worked out there are two stops I can definitely make where there are full services/toilets etc.
Sparkly I did consider a lie flat but as DS is a really sicky baby especially when led back I wonder if this may make me even more stressed during journey incase he’s sick! Train journey is two changes and is 5 hours and don’t think I’d manage all his stuff with me.

DH has put a headrest mirror in car so I can at least keep an eye on him throughout journey. We took a 40min journey yesterday as he was either watching the world go by or sleeping!