Air travel with pram, travel cot and car seat

[talalia]

Hi all - DH and I have some foreign travels coming up next year with DD who will be 9-12 months. In an ideal world I think we'd take a pram, travel cot and car seat, but wondering how best to make that work with luggage restrictions.

Sounds like you can normally take two items for free in the hold. Assuming we only get her a lap seat, does car seat and travel cot make sense, then invest in a cabin suitable pram? Or ditch the travel cot, take car seat and normal pram in the hold, and hope the cots where we're travelling are suitable? I'm also a bit dubious about second hand mattresses when you're not even meant to keep the same ones between your own children!

Just trying to work out what we need whilst the sales are on 😅 thanks for any words of wisdom.

I have always used any travel cot provided but with my own bedding. I cannot for the life of me work out why we shouldn't, especially for mobile babies that crawl around on filthy floors and put shit (sometimes literal) in their mouths.....

I would look into hiring the cot in the places you go. Or co sleeping.
Id take the car seat and Pram - although these can also be hired. I’d definitely bring a baby carrier. Either a hiking one - the can double as backpacks or a front carrier one.

We bought the cuggl travelcot from Argos and it folds quite flat so could fit in the bottom of a big suitcase, if you were desperate to take one

Look at icklebubble 3in1 travel cobo

You could book a seat for the baby, and use the car seat on the plane (if it’s an approved model) - then check the pram and travel cot in the hold. I would think about the logistics of dragging all three + luggage around airports and cities though.
We’ve travelled a lot with our kids and never took a travel cot with us, with no problems. Of course they often ended up in our bed anyway! I’d much rather take my own car seat anywhere as we’ve had bad experiences with rental car ones. Depending on where you’re going, you could look at hiring a pram when you get there, and use a carrier through the airport.

We always picked places with a cot for this reason. Saves a lot of hassle. Also get a yoyo as you can take them on the plane (we opened our in the aisle when we landed and was a very smooth travel through passport control). We took a car seat once and it was a pain. Just that they put it in a special area, so we had to wait around for a while. We picked places that were easily accessible by public transport. Was so much easier. We did 6 trips abroad before they were 1yr!

We have always used the travel cot provided but taken our own blankets.

Definitely take a baby carrier as we didn't get the buggy back until baggage reclaim. I know you can get the onboard buggies like yo-yo but they are expensive and we just got a cheap one from marketplace specifically for holiday.

On our recent trip we had a coach transfer of only 20 mins so no car seat needed. If we needed a car or taxi I definitely would have taken ours (I may be wrong but I don't think RF infant ones are suitable for flying so would have to go in the hold)

IMO the most useful item when travelling with a baby under 18 months is a carrier (Ergobaby or similar). I always felt happier with baby safely in the carrier when getting on and off the plane, and it's easier to have the carrier if you don't get the pushchair back immediately.

A car seat is a must if you're doing any driving while there. It's easy enough to take an infant seat in the hold, you can package it carefully in a box or get a padded car seat bag for it.

Pushchair is optional but if you can't borrow or hire one at your destination, you'll probably want one (unless you're happy to carry baby a lot). Ideally you'd take a lightweight, compact one.

We've never taken a travel cot with us when flying; we've always used the cot provided.

Ive always used the cot provided but the baby bjorn cot lookd like it would fit in a suitcase. I always had a cheap stroller, most of thr time if it's not a budget airline, they will meet you with the buggy in the tunnel at arrivals

Thanks, all - really appreciate it! Food for thought re the logistics of dragging all this stuff plus other luggage through the airport!

The consensus seems to be that if we can leave anything out it's the travel cot (though I appreciate and will check out your recommendations for cots as we need to get one anyway for staying with family). I wondered how using hotel cots squares up with the safe sleep guidelines about mattresses ideally being new, but hopefully the SIDS risk at 9-12 months is sufficiently low, particularly if we take our own sheets etc. as many of you suggested?

Will need to look at easily portable car seats as we just have a heavy isofix one that's meant to stay put.

You need a Doona!

Ah, I'd assumed that you own an infant seat, but if you only have a stage 0-1 seat (up to 18kg) they are too much of a faff to travel with. Do you know anyone with a spare infant seat you could borrow? We kept our infant seat in-between children (planned to reuse) and would've been happy to lend it to a sibling or close friend. If you can't borrow one, you can hire one (if you're also hiring a car). Final option, if you intend to travel by plane quite a bit while your child is 0-3 (and/or might reuse a seat for another child in future) it might be worth buying a car seat just for travel. There are some good lightweight options.

About travel cots, I bought an expensive compact/light one but it was fiddly to assemble and only about 90cm long so DC outgrew it quickly. Then ended up buying a second hand cot in the standard style that everyone seems to have - they are bulky but easy to put up/down (when you know how). We only ever took it when travelling by car so the bulk wasn't a big issue. Standard cot size (120x60) so a cot sheet fits and it wasn't outgrown before we stopped needing it. Honestly I think a standard travel cot is all you need really. We did buy a separate mattress for it, DH thought the built in one was too hard, but I wasn't convinced the extra mattress was essential tbh.

Travel cot’s don’t often don’t really have thick foam mattresses - they have water proof thin things that wrap round the cot when you fold them up. The good part is that there’s less risk of mould growth because there’s less foam. The bad part is that they are not always very comfortable and baby might end up in your bed anyway.

Surely get one of the car seats that clips into the pram and then the two are just one thing?

For example the Joie Tilt is a good lightweight seat and not too expensive, looks like you can get it for under £87 atm
https://www.babyplanetonline.co.uk/joie-tilt-group-0-1-car-seat-pavement

We just brought the buggy with us and checked it as early as possible, then used a sling in the airport. You can hire a car seat from the car hire company if you book in advance, never had a problem getting rear facing and it's better than worrying that your seat is getting beaten up by baggage handling. Bring a bed guard and co sleep then you have more space and less stuff so it's easier.
Have a great holiday.

There is no "new mattress for each child" guidance any more, it was scrapped as found that handing down between family is very low risk. And even the evidence for using a second hand mattress being risky is low. Travel cot mattresses are also just usually a piece of plastic and board with a thin foam layer.

Anyway it will likely be fine in a hotel because it is only for a few nights and baby is older. However, I have sometimes felt uncomfortable using the provided cot at holiday accommodation - we had one that was so old once the gaps were massive like some ancient safety standard that had long been banished, it had a drop side which was not properly secure and because of those two things I worried about the overall age of the cot and whether the paint contained lead, so I did not use it and put DS to sleep in a single bed instead (he was over 2).

When we needed to take all three:

Babyzen yoyo - take on plane as hand luggage (we just upgrade hand luggage if cheap airline)

Babybjorn travel cot - folds small. Store baby sleeping bag inside. Goes as item 1 free baby luggage

Car seat - in car seat bag. Goes as item 2. If you have a baby style car seat you could also get adapter and use on babyzen yoyo if needed

My decision would be driven by where you’re travelling to. How the route is planned etc. Are you doing multiple European city breaks or a 3 month around the world trip.