Long haul holiday (from UK) with a 1.5 year old

[Beaufort89]

Hello!

Looking for advice on a semi adventurous holiday with a 1.5 year old.

I have a BA reward flight to use and I want to use it on a long haul business class flight. I have to use it within a year which for certain destinations it means booking now. We had a baby at the start of this year so she will be around 1.5 when we travel.

My husband and I travelled a lot before baby. We’re from the UK and spent a couple years travelling so have visited South America, Asia, Australia etc. Lots of Europe of course.

I would love to go to Japan but I don’t know if that would be amazing with little one? Other places on my list are Nepal, Vietnam, Bali. All maybe not great with a baby. We have travelled a lot with her already. She’s been to Morocco, Spain twice and Greece twice so she is pretty good on an aeroplane. Longest flight she’s done is 4.5hrs.

I’m considering Hawaii with a stop in San Francisco. Is Hawaii worth it from the UK? Because it’s a lot of money… Is it Amercian Tenerife? We have been to the Galapagos and I was told that is Hawaii without the destroyed eco systems.

Other thoughts were Mauritius? Caribbean would be an option but we’ve missed the boat on using the reward flight for that because it would be hurricane season in August/September.

Would love any advice or suggestions thanks.

I’d love to go to Vietnam but I was thinking it could be a nightmare for the pram? At the moment she hates a carrier so I don’t think that will improve when she’s older.

@Beaufort89BA don’t fly to Vietnam. So what route? SA is totally safe for tourists. Never ever have we stayed in a resort. My DC went to school there for a term. Like many countries you take safety precautions. Women are raped in India. Do you avoid India as a tourist? I assume you mean a pushchair? Easy enough unless you hike.

Not sure why you think having a pram is a nightmare? I've seen plenty of small children in prams in Vietnam.

Japan reward flights are ultra competitive. Read up on how to book with the best chance (it involves 1am fast finger online bookings / calls to non-UK BA phone lines and this need to be done once for outbound and once for inbound as they are released on different dates).

San Fran / Los Angeles are much easier as there are so many more flights.

In April (Easter, paid in full rather than reward) we flew London to LA to Hawaii and then Hawaii to San Fran before returning to London. We did the to and from London in business and the Hawaii flights in front row economy. The Hawaii flights are 5 or 6 hours themselves. Our children are 8 and 10 though.

Hawaii is incredible. Oahu is very touristy, did it 11 years ago, wouldn’t again. Kauai and Big Island much less so. Maui (we’ve been pre and post fires) is my favourite. Yes, there are very touristy elements but it is so beautiful.

@Beaufort89 18 month olds are hard work on planes and also hard work dealing with jetlag. So my vote would be Mauritius.

@Flibbertyfloo where would you recommend for east coast Canada? I'm looking at Canada for next year but doubt DD4 and DS2 would enjoy the flight time to Vancouver.

@ingkir Halifax is 6 hours from Heathrow. Air Canada. There are various routes to see lovely beach towns and the Cabot Trail on Cape Breton. The distances are not particularly short and I’d suggest you don’t try and do too much driving. The big detour is New Brunswick so decide if this area can be left out. It’s not as dramatic as the Rockies of course but it’s very relaxing and we enjoyed it.

We used to do Mauritius in the summer when our DC were small. Night flight down and back. Off season so really good deals for 5 star hotels and high 20s so not too hot. Children welcome, great childcare if you want it and baby sitting in the hotel room at night if you want to go out to dinner. We really enjoyed it.

Hi OP. Sounds amazing. We did first class BA to Sydney when DD was one and just walking.

We had a brilliant three weeks and other than her being sick on the internal flight it went without a hitch.

No one else in first class was bothered by us, she didn't scream or cry and she charmed the pants off the cabin crew. Also you get a really big toilet and changing area at the front which was great!

The jetlag was hard though, she wanted to be up playing at 2am for a week.

@Notsurewheretostarthere “Didn’t scream or cry” is the key here. What would you have done if she had? How would you have felt?

We didn't book the holiday until she was 7 months old and we had a fair idea of what kind of child she would be.

I would probably have spent 23hrs in the kitchen area if she had been upset!

@Notsurewheretostarthere Not much fun! I agree though. Some dc are good travellers and others are very unhappy for hours. Mine never went as babies as I avoid stress!

Op worth considering whether your baby will fit in the bassinet bouncer seat at 18 months, could be a very tight fit and as good as business class is, I still wouldn’t want to spend a long flight with an 18 month old on my lap. You can sort of put them on the floor for short periods but I personally wouldn’t want my 18 month old on the floor on a plane. The club suites are even worse in this respect than the older seats.

@YaWeeFurryBastard Not a bassinet on BA. 6 months age limit. They have travel seats and certain seats where there’s fixing for these. It’s quite complex when looking at the web site but the seats would need booking in advance. Or bring own car seat. On a reward flight this can be a difficult booking.

What isn’t clear is if dc can sit on parent lap for take off and landing. Seat guru recommend PE. Mainly due to pod seats being individual spaces but some planes don’t have them yet.

Er yes there’s a bassinet on BA. We fly BA business relatively frequently with an infant, there’s both a cot type bassinet for babies under approx 6 months and a bouncer seat type bassinet for babies up to 12.5kg, although IMO an 18 month old would be a tight fit.

I’ve never seen anyone use a car seat in BA business class seats and all under 2s must be on the parents lap for takeoff and landing and during turbulence etc.

You can prebook the bassinet positions in advance for free and there’s usually 2-4 of them in business.

Own seat would be fine for an 18 month old on old style club with 2-4-2 layout but probably not on any other as they’re much more individual seats, whether they’re the new club suites or not.

Uneven terrain and/or lack of pavements. I’ve found this to be an issue in Europe never mind Vietnam, which I imagine is potentially less developed in regard to infrastructure.

My advice would be do take that issue about time zones seriously. Children don’t really understand the time zone concept and the need to adjust. Even at 4, my son struggled with it and getting up at 4am every day in America, then trying to keep a grumpy child awake who wanted meal times at all the wrong times was not was not fun. He was better by 7, though still struggled, we’ve recently done Mexico and he was fine with it (he’s now 11).

You Could think about the Caribbean but outside the hurricane belt - so Antigua, Barbados, curacao, Trinidad, Tobago etc. all a decently ‘short’ long haul flight and lovely destinations - you can be adventurous (we have just come back and did an entirely independent holiday, staying in a stunning isolated villa in the middle of a rainforest, exploring and not going anywhere near tourist places) or stay at a resort and have the ease of all the facilities etc. The weather is pretty good too for a 1.5 year old as it’s not wall to wall sunshine, but sunny and cloudy while still lovely and hot (33-34 degrees while we were there) and sea temps of 29/30 degrees. We flew with BA although not direct as our holiday was a bit off the beaten track and took us about 48 hours to get to in total.

I think the Caribbean is a good suggestion. I didn’t start long haul trips until my youngest was 5 and that’s where we first went and then we built up the flight duration and started making holidays multi centred.

We are hoping to take our baby to south America next year, likely Argentina. The time difference is significantly less than south East Asia (only 3 hours) and there's lots of BA business class reward flight availability to South America because of the partnership with Iberia (via Madrid). He will be nearly 2 by then.

My friend took her 2 year old to Japan and found the jet lag extremely challenging (9 hours time difference) and whilst it would have been a great place for a toddler they just couldn't enjoy it because of the sleep disruption. Child had barely adjusted to the change and they were coming home.

It’s about the clearest thing. Children under 2 have to sit on an adults lap for take off and landing. On all flights.

There are bassinets on BA for children over 6 months too. Seems strange to be giving out wrong advice here then admitting you didn’t bother travelling with yours until they were 6 to avoid “stress”.

OP - some people will tell you it’s definitely going to be a nightmare but that’s not my experience. My kids have flown long haul since being 5 months old without issue. Get the most out of your reward flights I say.

Thailand or Barbados/Antigua/St Lucia

I am not that well travelled in terms of distant destinations but I have been to Mauritius several times. It's quite a long flight - about 12 hours - but doable I think. It is a lovely island and the people are generally nice. I especially like Tamarin and Le Morne. Be careful when you go though. My recollection is that the best time to go is probably October/November, though one year we went with our grandchildren during the school summer holidays and the weather was very nice - not too hot and very little rain - but I think that may be unusual. But you probably need to check up on that properly. December and January can be very hot.

My son has been to Bali and loved it - but it is a long journey.

We did BA to Mauritius with 18 month old. Hotel was Long Beach (gorgeous we loved it) and a private nanny was very inexpensive. Our son loved her! We had a few hours in the mornings and also some evenings so we could go out to dinner, so yes we managed to snorkel!!

There’s a really easy answer to this: don’t. Leave the baby with the grandparents and go by yourselves. Everyone will have a much better time.