emigrating to NZ with 17mo - ideas to keep him settled please!

[chiccadee]

We are moving back out to NZ mext month so we have a 30-odd hour flight (34 or 36, I think, depending on who we finally book with) with a very exuberant 18mo. He has been walking for 8 months so is very confident running, climbing etc and is not a big one for sitting still or watching TV. I've been reading the various threads re keeping toddlers occupied on the flight but my questions are:

• if anyone has done this flight with a toddler before, is it better just to get it over with, eg one long flight to Sydney, followed by a hop to Auckland, or should be break it up with a rest (hours or days) in Singapore/HK. I like the stopover idea based on the theory that DS could sleep on both legs but if that doesn't work, we will all just be exhausted and fed up for nothing so maybe it is just better to get there? The decision will affect the airline we book with.

• it's going to be unsettling for DS to move house, esp as many of his toys will be shipped so he won't see them for a while. He's also going to have to cope with the change from me being a SAHM mostly to me being at work and his dad being a SAHD (he'll be fantastic, incidentally). Could anyone give me tips on ways to keep DS as settled as possible?

• lastly, I've read a few posts re taking a travel seat for toddlers to sleep in which I'm a bit confused by. Do people mean an infant car seat (which my DS grew out of months ago) or something else? Presumably we couldn't take his full size car seat on the flight?!

Can't help much with the flight as DS is a good traveller and will watch movies and have little walks around.

You can take your big car seat on the plane, we used DSs on our last move, and is very handy for keeping them strapped in.

Re getting there, when we first moved, we brought some of of DSs familiar things with us, a blanket, some toys etc... only a few bits. Then of course just bought some things when we got there and the novelty of the new stuff satisfied him. He was 1yo when we moved, and didn't really notice, as far as he was concerned, he had his mummy and Papa, and that was all he needed.

Not as far as NZ, we line in the Philippines and travel regularly back to UK. We found doing a long and then short hop much better. Mainly because like you said there's no guarentee they are going to sleep on the stop over, especially as their body clock is haywire. We make sure the long part is a few hours before DD and DS normal bed time. This generally gives us the majority of the flight asleep.

Two tips that have saved us are 1) ordering a special meal even though we aren't veggie. This means meals come at seperate times so always a pair of hands free.
2) making sure the drugs aren't in the overhead locker on take off. Once we had turbulence for over an hour after take off and couldn't reach them and DD was going mental.

Good luck!

Sorry just realised our long part of the trip is from HK/Singapore and that's only half way for you. Don't envy you!

the stopover wouldbe good if more than one night. One night just doesn't help really, then I find it best to just plug on and get it over with.

You might be lucky if a lot of your flight time is in the night, that he'll drop off. I find it so hard to sleep on planes but dc seem to manage to do it.

even if you don't have an overnight stopover, I think you will have t o leave the plane at Singapore (not sure Hong Kong) and then you can (holo on to him and) let him run up and down a bit

Thanks for all the tips. Am thinking that we'll just plough on and get there, maybe with a couple of hours in Singapore on the way for a run round for DS. I don't think we'll try the A380 29hr flight to Sydney option!

JMS - that's great to hear about the big car seat. I hadn't thought of that so I'll check with the airlines when we book. Would save us forking out at the other end for another new seat too which is great (although it has to be offset against the cost of a seat for DS, I guess because at the moment we don't have to buy him one - how realistic it is to have him on my lap is a different question...).