Long hault flight with 14 month old or not??

[skandi1]

Help! DH and I cannot agree on holiday destinations for this year. We're planning to go in autumn when DD will be 14 - 15 months old.

DH wants to go to Egypt (Red Sea) but I'm a little reluctant due to potential for tummy bugs (even in 5 star hotels - seen on Tripadvisor) and recent oil spill covering most of Hurghada and spreading.

DH's only reason for going there is flight is only 5 hours. We've not been to Egypt before so its all a bit of an unknown and a risk as we don't know what it will be like.

I am keen on Maldives or Mauritius - particularly Maldives. They're both places we've been many times before so we know what to expect and know several hotels in both which would be great and are suitable for children with kids pool/club/toys etc.

DH's reasoning for not waiting to go is that Maldives is a 10 hour flight and Mauritius is 12 hours.

I know both flights are long but we'd be flying business whichever of the 3 destinations we'd visit and I'm the one who'll deal with DD in any event.

I want to canvass MNer opinions on this. Am I indeed unreasonable to want to take a 10 hour flight with a 14 month old or have others done this and its been just fine??

Please let me know your experiences with regard to air travel.

morloth, true. This is the attitude I would expect from a business class flyer. So maybe I should enjoy (if I could afford it) inflicting screaming kids on them - but I'm just too darn NICE!

What's with the screaming kids? Most kids love being on a plane so are either fiddling with the TV or asleep. And most people take earplugs on a plane - your own screaming child is completely different to someone else's I just zone it out unless it's right next to me.

Admittedly, at 18 months there might be no reasoning with them, but they'll fall asleep eventually, and you can always take them by the loos to jiggle them till they fall asleep.

Lizzy, your post sets out all the reasons people cite for not flying with children - but you've just talked yourself out of trying it, I think. You're not talking from experience, and those of us who have done it are largely positive about travelling with children.

Just came back from Greece with my now nearly 18 month old (and 4 year old) Going was awful and so was coming back. She refused to sleep on the plane and got more and more tired and more and more stroppy and hated the seatbelt, kicked the mans seat in front.....I swore she was not going on a flight longer than 3 hours til she could be glued to a dvd for that time or could be entertained with colouring/books/get really excited by plane food. She's only been walking a couple of months and does not understand the concept of sitting down for a long time in a confined space on Mummy's lap. Even the evening flight returning which was way way past usual bedtime left her awake until the equivalent of about 1.30am in the morning. She was bonkers by the time we got in the car at the airport to get home (she then fell asleep as my DH's foot touched the accelerator .....

We did have a fab holiday though and all of the above was well worth it as we had lots of lovely childcare and lots of time with the kids (a nice balance) whilst away....

Not all kids are the chilled out placid/ hey man I'm a traveller type....and you just don't know how it'll go but if you can find something a bit nearer which ticks all the boxes maybe you should go for it. Holidaying with little ones is hard enough so we try to make the holiday itself the least stressful we can.

grumblegrumble....I tried the jiggling by the loos however on a tight squeeze A340 Airbus with the charter company trying to sell you everything under the sodding sun so manouevring those trolleys up and down and up and down, it is almost more stressful standing there with the horrible glares they give you when you're in the way than fighting a toddler in the cramped seat !!!

If they are babies and have ear pain or are bored and tired, then they cry. I agree that older children are fine. But my 2 hour experience with my 13MO was long enough for me.

Morloth - I admire your sangfroid. I do not cope well with frosty looks

I flew to Bali with a 12 month old, for a 4 week trip on my own.
I had nothing booked other than flights, and I changed them and stayed for 10 weeks.

It was a doddle, honest, but then I'm so laid back I'm horizontal.

DD was fine on the flight, I flew with Garuda and the Air hostesses were begging to play with her-I let them.

We had a stopover in Bangkok, lots of Japanese girls wanting to play with DD and have photos taking with her-again, I let them and read a magazine.

It depends on the child I guess but mine was so easy going at that age, still is really.

I'd travel again in a second.

Screaming kids? Well mine are fairly 'good', but 3 kids under 5 + 12 hours = at least some screams some of the time. It is a lot easier with 1 OP, so if it's what you really want I would go for it.

I love Egypt it is amazingly child friendly. Used to live there, and now been there pregnant/with 6 month DD/pregnant+ 18 month DD.

I own the villa in Dahab, in South Sinai (ie far from Hurghada) on the Red Sea that was plugged earlier to my surprise by lowrib (thankyou! I think I have worked out who you are!) so am obviously prejudiced in favour of the country...

Never had stomach bugs with me or DD or DH, but then we never go to the large hotels which often bizarrely enough have the worst hygiene (especially those buffet meals that get left out for hours).

Lucky that DD is a great traveller. I bought lots of new mini books (tiny versions of classic kids books) plus crayons and surprise new cheap toys. Made sure that she was bfeeding (when 6 months) or chewing snack (at 18 months)for take off/landing so ears popped ok. We took a pillow that stretched over my/DH's lap so she could sleep on that. Worked well but tiring for us.

If you do go, Easyjet do really good flights to Sharm, the planes are old BA ones so there is lots of room. And October - April are best times to go (too hot mid summer).

It is lovely going to a country where people love kids and expect them to be part of everyday life - ie if your child starts crying in a restaurant the staff will run over and beg to be allowed to play with child/carry them round restaurant/bring them toys/sing to them etc. My daughter loves going there- sun, sea, sand, camels, everyone chatting to her...bringing her back to rainy London in November was depressing as hell last time.

do you think your 14 month will enjoy a long haul flight?
I wouldn't consider any flights with children this age unless it was family/work/emergency.
If you want a nice holiday, think about what a 14 month old will enjoy. Long hours of travel is not fun for a child of that age. They don't understand what's going on.

TBH, I just think it's a bit selfish.
I agree with the poster who said Wales is nice.

As for the destination, I think somwhere that hot is unsuitable. YOU won't enjoy it because you'll be worried about the heat/bugs/insects etc.

We went to Miami in June. DD is 4, and she was perfectly fine on the flight. Spent the 9 1/2 hours on the way out sitting in her chair, perfectly relaxed.
The heat and time difference though in Miami was far too much for DD, she was hot and miserable for the first few days.

I loved Egypt. We went when boys were 3 and 5 year old though, not babies. The Egyptians were great - totally kid friendly, but we did have a touch of tummy trouble sadly!

Flight out was brilliant, - day time. Flight back hellish. Delayed, screwed up all my meal/sleep time plans and kids howled all the way back. Too tired and hungry to eat or sleep until they collapsed in a heap. Bloody flight attendents worse than useless. But that was the airline's fault - not Egypt's. Would def go again despite the horrid journey home.

Did Sharm - Ritz Carlton - with a 15 month old. Lovely - only 5 hours on the plane - short transfer. Childrens club brilliant. They weren't supposed to take kids so young but as they were very quiet and as long as the carers could see us they were happy. We got the same girls to babysit in evening or we brought dd out to restaurants in hotel.
Tried Sharm itself - not for us.
Did Maldives when dd was 2. Great holiday. Was desperate to go but now will def not do it again until they're much older and we can go without them. Flight was not horrendous but too much of a feature for a weeks holiday.
However would happily go back to Sharm - might try Four Seasons next....

Hiya weliveonpastaandtoast nice to see you here

Shame I buggered up the link the first time though.

I'll try again

Sea View Villa - lovely villa in Egypt.

I'm not sure where people get the idea that most people in premium cabins are a) actually travelling on business and b) completely unsympathetic wankers with no politeness.

Travelling on business? That may be true on some routes, but not, I suspect, on flights to the Maldives or Mauritius. I fly long-haul business a lot (10-20 return journeys a year), and IME, a considerable number of people in the cabin are on leisure breaks (including expats on home leave) who have paid for themselves, have premium cabin flights as part of their expat package or use airmiles to upgrade. Its only a few long-haul routes that I've flown (eg Tokyo, NY, Singapore) that the majority are on business.

Unsympathetic? Not in my experience. I nearly always get people coming over to say hi to DD (who I admit is particularly charming!!!), to offer their assistance if I'm travelling on my own with her, and to generally play with her until its lights out time (as I said, night flight are the way forward). I've had professional sportsmen en route to playing in a big tournament reading her bedtime stories, a very famous captain of industry (this was in first class)take her to play games on his laptop so I could eat my dinner, and a film director walk her up and down the aisle in his arms until she fell asleep.

I've only once had a fellow passenger complain that kids shouldn't be allowed in business (we had only just boarded at this point, and DD was already asleep) and he was loudly told off by another passenger for doing so. A lot of the travellers are parents, and, especially on businessy routes, a lot of them spend time away from their own children (I get shown kids pics a lot!) so are very approving of a working mum who takes her kid with her on business as much as possible, and like a bit of kiddy interaction.

In fact, I've found travelling economy worse as far as dirty looks from other people goes. Not because they aren't so nice as people, but mainly, I suspect, because they are younger as an average so less likely to have kids and because the whole experience in economy is a bit stressful, cramped, and generally makes you grumpy.

Firstly - sounds lovely to have the choice of somewhere so beautiful and to fly business - can we come too?!

We flew to the Turks and Caicos with DD when she was 18 months old. Things I would and wouldn't do again.

Definitely make sure you get the bulkhead with the bouncy chair attachment - BA's fits up to 18 months I believe (we were in Economy which was fine). It's probably even more comfortable in business though.

Day flight only - napping, eating, playing, gives you and DH some time to relax / take in turns to look after. This was in direct contrast to the night flight home where DD got so overtired (flight left at 7.30pm but touched down in the Bahamas for an hour en route - by the time meal service came round the lights were still on full and it was the equivalent of 10pm. DD was like a drunken crazy person wanting to run the length of the plane and explore everything up until about 2am whilst everyone else was trying to sleep - we swore we'd never do a night flight again! However, if the flight leaves more like 10pm am sure it wouldn't be so problematic as it would be deep into their night time.

Plenty of games, stickers, toys, books, anything to keep them occupied plus Play Doh is miracle stuff.

We load the iPhone up with Maisy / Mr Men / Pixar films which also kept her occupied.

Snacks snacks and more snacks - raisins, cereal, cooked pasta, fruit, smoothies ... anything tasty that will keep them busy plus you can't beat the exciting rustle of something else coming out of the bag.

The longest short haul we've flown was to Tenerife - no problems there except the terrible 2s tantrums which stopped once we got on the plane (except there were a few worried looks from passengers who'd seen us struggling in the airport before boarding)!

Good luck with whatever you decide to do!

A big thank you to you all here. You can always rely on MNers to tell it like it is! And that was exactly what I was hoping for.

So it could be a bit of mare but as many of you say, its only a few hours of your life/holiday and worth it for a good destination.

I neglegtected to mention that one of the main reason for the 3 choices of location is that I am totally mad for diving and snorkelling. And as you can probably guess (with a DD of currently 12 months), the last time I got to do any diving was well Sept 2008 so almost 2 years ago. Hence willing to suffer a bit on the flight to get out there again.

We looked at all the fab advice provided and looked at destinations again. Ruled out pretty much any part of EU as have already travelled extensively plus lived in various parts and diving not that fab.

Looked at Caribbean but its hurricane season in Sept so discounted that.

We chose 3 resorts - one in each country - Four Seasons in Sharm, One & Only St Geran in Mauritius and Four Seasons in Maldives. Then wrote the name of each country on a seperate piece of paper, put them in a bowl and let DD pick out the country.

Well, I will come back in mid October and tell you all where we went and how many people we upset in First Class on the way there and back.

Thank you all for your kind advice.

xxxx

good luck skandi, have a fab hols x

Have a fabulous break - I've been to all three places, and they are all awesome!

grumblegrumble, I am talking from experience. I have been on flights (before having my own kids) where two small boys were allowed to run up and down constantly or have a tantrum. Another trip involved a small baby sat in front of me that possetted a lot - it's mum was so embarrassed about the smell. There are many other examples. All I am saying is that I know it would be unreasonable of me to expect my 2 younger kids (3 and 7 year old energy buckets!) to sit still and quiet on a long haul flight. Even on a car journey, they and my 9 year old DD need to stretch their legs and have a run about outside when they get bored, and restless and start bickering. Short haul flights will be the first venture abroad as a family, probably next year

longhaul is achievable,but tiring.take snacks,drinks,few books,fave blanket etc

Mauritius all the way. The flight out is pretty easy because it's overnight. Flatten the seat after take-off, make the baby a nest to sleep in and hopefully he'll sleep the whole way. On the way home seat your husband a bit away from you. If he wants to swing by and take the baby for a walk every now and then, then great, and at least if the baby isn't in great form you aren't dealing with a cranky husband as well!
The big bonus of Mauritius is no jet lag. Keep the routine the same and you'll get a decent lie in in the morning, and time to spend with him in the evening when it's cooler. If your son is chilled then the kids club creches often take babies from 6 months, if not go somewhere you can hire a nanny so you can keep him with you, but someone else is making sure he doesn't fall into the pool and eating the sand.
Relax...enjoy!

I know it was a year ago but look for holiday ideas on www.doindubai.com esp for exotic destinations

we took DS to the maldives in november when he was 14 months, the flight out (BA) was superb, he had one of their bouncy chair things and slept the whole way whilst DH and I drank wine and watched films, the way back (day time flight) he slept half the time and was happy with toys/books/snacks the rest of the way

the maldives was still superb even with a baby (it was our 7th visit so we knew what to expect) the staff adored him and fussed over him all day, he loved swimming in the pool and the sea, being on the beach and we could also take him to the kids club to play with their toys but had to stay with him as he was too small to be left, they had babysitters in the evening for $10 an hour so we could go out to dinner

i am also a keen diver and having not dived for 2 yrs being pregnant etc could not think of a better place to get my tank back on again.....it was a superb holiday and I wouldn't hesitate to go back