South America with a toddler.

[weenawoo]

Has anybody been? I will be living in the Falkland Isles for a year from Jan 2010, DD will be around 20 months by then.
We want to do some traveling while we are there but everybody I know has gone to these places on a student back packing type trip.
I want to find out where would be good to go with a young child - any information would be really helpful, thanks.

Anyone?

Hello, I've done quite a lot of traveling in that part of the world, as a backpacker and since, working and holidaying - so far without kids but we are already planning a trip to Colombia and I'm due to have our baby this week.

I can't think of any drawbacks at all. What are your fears? Food? Crime? What countries are you thinking of?

To me, the 'easiest' countries to travel in would be, from the cheapest first, Bolivia, Colombia and Venezuela. Brazil is a bit more expensive, mainly because of the internal flights.

Maybe someone will come along with direct experience of traveling there with kids - I'll be lurking...

depends on your budget. I wouldn't want to do backpacker type travelling with a small child. Its hard work. We've backpacked round S.America and everyone gets 'the Inca Quickstep'. Wouldn't be fun for a small child.
And also depends on your PFB status. Decrepid buses with no seatbelts....

Have heard that the under threes shouldn't be taken to high altitudes so am wondering about places like peru. We have to fly from the Falklands to Chilie so any info on stuff there and in Argentina would be useful.
Not too worried about food/ health and safety - will make those decisions as we go.
It's more that we want to use the chance we've been given to see a different part of the world, but as Dh's job only allows him three weeks off the Islands we want to fit a lot in. I'm trying to plan ahead so that we don't waste our time trying to do stuff that is going to be near impossible with dd in tow!

I used to live in Argentina and would highly recommend it. Buenos Aires is a great city. Lots to do that kids would love (if you've got the budget to travel) like whale watching in Patagonia or waterfalls at Iguazu. It's a relatively safe/easy country.

Chile too is fantastic.

I wouldn't recommend Venezuela at all. Why would you want to go there with a child (unless you're really rich and you're planning to go to an exclusive resort on Isla Margarita?

Definitely go to Patagonia, well worth it. But besides Ushuaia you'll be roughing it a bit (I did it in a 4x4 - most places were quite basic).

The Bariloche area in Argentina is also very beautiful (go in summer - winter is very $$$ because of skiing). The Atacama desert in Chile is supposed to be amazing - haven't been but know lots of people who have (DH's cousin lives in Santiago and just went with her toddler, so must be doable).

Lots of bits of Brazil are nice, but I agree on the price of internal flights - my brother lives in the northeast and I live in the southeast; he can fly to Miami for the same price as visit me. But there used to be an airpass that you could buy if you don't live in the country which was quite reasonable - don't know if it still exists though.

Think you can still get that air pass Geo. I think Journey Latin America do one. There was a Mercosur pass and a few other ones. In fact, would it be worth contacting a good travel operator like JLA and asking for advice on child friendly destinations?

We spent 2 wonderful weeks in Peru this year with 15-month old ds, and despite being pfb, had a wonderful time.

We did it independently, which is what I think made all the difference - you need to be able to just spend a lazy day somewhere if he's tired and not try and force him to fit in to a group's schedule.

It was the first time we went "proper" traveling with him, so was pleasantly surprised to see how much he enjoyed it. You need to keep in mind though that, should your dc feel bad / grumpy etc, you'd need to abandon plans to travel around and stay put for a bit. If you'd be able to have fun anywhere, then I'd highly recommend it. If you're not flexible, I'm not sure if it's not too risky.

South America (well, Peru, but apparently others are known for it too) is very child-friendly (the people). Everywhere we went - from Machu Picchu to the Amazon, people went out of their way to entertain him. If you do go to Peru, which I loved, keep an eye on altitudes. For example, whilst we would have loved going to Lake Titicaca pre-ds, it's too risky (well, in my opinion) with a young child. He loved the Amazon (but again, be careful where you pick - we went to a low-risk malaria zone), and he loved Machu Picchu, but we spent 3 days acclimatising at lower level (in our case Ollantaytambo) on arrival in Peru before doing the trip.

Have a look at the Lonely Planet Kids to go forums had some great advice from nutcases more adventurous parents.

We backpacked round Central America with our 3 children who were 5, 3 and 16 months a few years ago. It was amazing. They loved it, everyone loved them, we were never in any immediate danger (we all got dysentry once except dd2 who was still bf) and we loved it.

I would say that it really helped to be able to speak Spanish! Cos so many people wanted to chat about the kids, be friendly etc and it was great to be able to do the same in return.

Dh and I are off for a week in Venezuela next week (its part fo a long term plan to get involved in development work out there) and though we are not taking the children this time (too much to do in a very short time to make it feasible) we are hoping to go with them (by then age 6, 8, 10) at Easter for 3 weeks.

Latin America is very very child friendly. We love it!

Travelled to Argentina when my dd was 13 months. We stayed mainly with distant rellies in Buenos Aires and we also travelled up to Iguazu and popped over the border into Paraguay.

We didn't encounter any problems at all. We did take some formula milk, but I'm sure it was in the shops anyway.

Social life in BA with DD was wonderful. Everyone made a fuss of her they love children.

Hope you have a great trip.