Abroad- ready made formula or powder?

[Rose138]

Hello,

My husband and I and our 6 month old son are travelling to turkey in 2 weeks.

I'm stressed about his bottle feeds. He's not having as many bottles now as we started weaning him at 5 months but he still has some.

I know that obviously we will not use the tap water but I've been reading that you have to be careful about the sodium content in bottled water.

I did think about taking ready made formula but was concerned about taking enough to last the week, luggage allowance ect. With making up his bottles, I'm going to need to find bottled water with a low sodium content anyway to boil and cool for him as just drinking water. So I'm thinking it's then best to take the powder formula and make as we normally do?

What are your experiences?

I've also heard that you can order your formula to the boots at gatwick when past the gate. Would I be allowed to take on two boxes with me? I know they're quite big! Maybe I'll just order one then have one in my suitcase-here's hoping my suitcase arrives back to us safely on the other side!

Thank you

You're right, you can collect formula at Gatwick. You'll need to order it ASAP though, as I tried ordering a week before we traveled, and it wasn't long enough!

We took our DS to Cyprus at 6 months (just over 6 weeks ago), and had to get 'baby water' from the chemist over there. We ran out on the last day, and used boiled tap water - he was fine!

Have a lovely holiday

You won't even need to order it, the shelves will be heaving with it (well always are when we go through)

Personally I think I'd be OK with boiled tap water but I'd take as many ready made cartons as I could physically carry, I hate the faf of powdered formula when abroad.

So we pack some in our luggage and then go through security with all our 'stuff' in one hand luggage and an empty hand luggage for DH.

DH buys a million ready made cartons and fills his rucksack, then we get on the plane.

Have a nice time!

When ds was a baby, our hv advised that Evian is OK for sodium content and is pretty widely available. I bought single serving packets of formula powder from the HiPP website - easy to pack. Ds wasn't on HIPP at the time, but I switched him a couple of weeks before we went for the convenience of the "cup a soup" sachets of powder.

I second what bike says evian is the best water to use sodium content is fine.

Meant to say that when I flew to Egypt with dd2 (three years ago) I took four ready made cartons of milk through security they made me open 50% of them and taste. When I told them I wouldn't be able to use them and wouldn't have enough for the flight they weren't bothered. Fortunately boots on the other side had some. That was at Manchester airport.

We were just away with our 7 mo and used ready made. I put 1l in suitcase and had 5l ordered at boots at Glasgow airport (only away for 1 week). No issues with carrying the big box on board and despite website saying the order wouldn't arrive until 2 days after our flight I phoned the store in airport and they said they get them the next day.

Oh and I had the small ready made bottles in hand luggage for the flight with no issues. Security just asked me to put them on a different tray and they were scanned but not opened.

We took both powder and ready made through Glasgow airport. The ready made was scanned but they didn't open any nor bothered by the amount.

In pathos they didn't even look at the ready made

I took 2 boxes if powder through security with me it was fine and used the boiled bottled water it was fine. I wouldn't rely on it being available to buy in boots once you get through security I flew from Manchester and it only had a few ready made bottles not the big tubs of powder