Car Journey with young baby

[WITW7]

Currently pregnant with my first child and live near London. I’m my family all live in Edinburgh and whilst I’ve been in England a long time and have a partner and close support network here I realistically want to visit my family with the baby quite a bit during my maternity leave.

When is too soon for a long car journey with a baby? Thinking more from a safety perspective of them in a car seat a long period rather than the impractical side of just travelling with a child. Has anyone done something similar when your kids were young? I can’t fly up as navigating the airport with a pram, luggage etc alone might be too much at the start.

Please no judging. If it’s not do-able I won’t do it but if anyone has experience I’d be grateful for your thoughts

Hi OP. When I was in your situation I was just really strict with the amount of ‘stuff’. No pram, just a baby carrier and a rucksack with three or four changes of clothes and toiletries that would last for a day. Got toiletries at the other end sorted on arrival and kept them there at the back of a cupboard for future trips; hand washed outfit each night so wouldn’t run out; had the Brittax lie down car carrycot too and factored in driving overnight / in early hours to arrive at breakfast time after going to bed same time as baby. For flights, I followed the same process minus the carry cot car seat. Every couple of months I did this without any problems and now DD is 6 yo well versed in travelling and packing minimally! It is do-able so long as you’re not fussed about taking all the baby paraphernalia!

I don't think little babies are supposed to be in a ca seat for longer than 30 mins at a time fo quite a while, due to the risk of SIDS. I've got 2 kids and I don't think I'd have wanted to do a big trip like that until they were at least 4mo, an I don't drive so that would be a train journey for me

Young babies should not be in a car seat for more than 2 hours in a 24 hour period, and definitely no longer than 30 minutes at a stretch. It's dangerous for their spine and for their breathing. I would fly with a baby before I would attempt a long car journey. It's just not safe.

OP ignore the hysterical s. Go for it, time in plenty of stops and ensure you get bsby out for stretches etc. Can baby sit on your passenger seat? Can you turn your passenger air bag off? Plenty people do it for holidays, seeing family etc. The important thing is regular stops. The advice is guidance bot the law.

We drove London to Scotland when DD1 was 4 weeks old. We did two hours driving, stopped for a long break, did another two hours driving, then an overnight at a premier inn / travel lodge before resuming journey the next day. It wasn't loads of fun, but we managed. We did similar to pp and packed minimally, and had some things delivered (online shopping) to relatives before we arrived.

@supersonicginandtonic

OP ignore the hysterical s. Go for it, time in plenty of stops and ensure you get bsby out for stretches etc. Can baby sit on your passenger seat? Can you turn your passenger air bag off? Plenty people do it for holidays, seeing family etc. The important thing is regular stops. The advice is guidance bot the law.

Right. We're all hysterical.

Don’t put the baby in the passenger seat, the back passenger side is the safest. You can get headrest mirrors to keep an eye on him. You won’t be able to tend to him whilst driving anyway so it will be less of a distraction too. Just have regular stops. Hopefully yours will fall asleep, I think I’ve got the only child that hates car journeys!!

We e done it a few times. You'll have to have a good stop every 2 hours and we have always split the journey in a hotel but it is v doable. Good luck

Get the train instead. Then you can feed and change the baby and rock it to sleep all without interrupting your journey. Long car journeys with very young babies are horrendous, I did loads of them and can't believe now that I didn't just insist my family came to me for the first year or so.

It’s not ‘hysterics’, it’s the official guidance which is there for a reason. Spending too long in a car seat is not good for a baby… the positioning means that their airways are compressed and oxygen intake is reduced. Not sure why pointing out that (proven) fact is hysterical?
How about the train OP?

When my daughter was 8 weeks old we drove from Colchester to Llanelli with her, pram, travel bed, two bags of reusable nappies, bag of her clothes, four bottles, and our stuff. She slept for most of the first two hours,, then pooed every hour, followed by screaming so we kept stopping. Took us eight hours to do 280 miles

We just did the 200 mile drive to see family with our 7 week old. We stopped every two hours and it was fine, he had a good feed and went back to sleep, we just make sure that he had lots of time to wiggle and kick about on his back once we got there/in the morning.

Have a good look at different car seats though if you can, the newborn insert to ours hold baby really flat, even though it isn’t a special lye flay car seat.

Sorry to throw a spanner in the works, but when our DS was young he wouldn't tolerate the carseat fir longer than a few minutes. He'd just scream the entire time. We didn't leave our home city for months because it was too much trauma for us, never mind him!

Like a PP said, flying with a baby is easier than you think, take a sling or wrap and a rucksack with your essentials, and buy most in the other end.

However, if your baby tolerates the carseat, go for it (within the safety guidelines for their age!)

But if you're looking for actual guidelines, a newborn shouldn't be in a car seat for longer than 30 minutes for the first 4-6 weeks due to the risk of positional asphyxia. After that, the recommendation is no more than 2 hours in a 24 hour period.

carry cot car seat

It is lie flat so should be fine.

Catch the train.

You don't actually need that much stuff for a baby. You are just told you do by companies wanting to sell you stuff.

I'd get the train. Get your partner/a friend to take you to the appropriate London station and shepherd you on, so you don't have to do much with your stuff at that end; get family to pick you up at the other. (I'd consider not taking a pram and just slinging baby; or using a borrowed or cheaply obtained for the purpose pram at the other end, just to cut down on stuff you'd need to move). The whole train journey looks to be 4-5 hours which is quicker than driving would be even if you didn't have to make stops (which you would), and there isn't all the additional airport rigmarole you'd have if flying. You'd be able to get up and walk around the train as needed, and tend to baby any time they needed it. It just sounds way less stressful to me than driving.

Or maybe the OP wouldn't want to have to sit next to someone and breast feed (if she bfs) or change the baby on a seat and wants the comfort of being able to be in her own space in her own car and drive door to door with lots of rest stops.

Sit next to someone on a train that is

I live in the south, currently pregnant but parents live in Newcastle.
I’m weighing up driving vs. Train.
I know on the train I’ll be limited with what I can take but as someone else said travel light and by toiletries on arrival, even supply of nappies. My parents neighbours all have grandkids that visit so we have been told we can borrow a travel cut. I’m thinking the train would be less stressful for me as I can have baby on my lap and tend to it’s needs easier then driving. Once he or she is older than I’d go by car.

As others have said, driving isn't a good idea in the first few months due to the car seat SIDs risk. But you could get the train. They sleep a lot at the beginning and you can walk up and down to settle them if they're upset. Much easier.

Would you be travelling alone or with your partner? If there's two of you it's easy. Just take a bag each, but nappies and toiletries when you get there, take a sling and stick the pram at the end of the carriage. On your own is a little trickier but still do-able

Its at least 5-6 hour drive for me to get to Edinburgh so you've got to be at least 7 hours before you factor in stopping every 2 hours. No way I would drive that with a young baby OP sorry.

Get a light foldable travel buggy/pram and fly instead. You can get buggy's which are suitable for under 6 months in the lie flat position. Silver cross even do a flight bag which attaches to their prams

Please don't fly for that little journey on a regular basis, it's so awful for the environment. My family live a similar distance away and I always took DS by train fight from a tiny baby.

RIGHT

I second the suggestion of taking the train if you can when baby is very young. We did this with ours from 8 weeks - the first few times we had no pram, just a baby sling, a rucksack and (godsend!) a very light babyseat on a metal frame that fit on the train table - not a car seat, but the kind of seat that allows the baby to lie practically flat. (Later on, when our baby got too heavy to heave around in a sling, we took a fold-up buggy.)

Provided you have a family member who is happy to let you stay at theirs and host everybody else, the rest can then come to see you. My mother kept a travel cot at her house for us, and a car seat so she could ferry us about when we were there.

All the best to you and your new baby when s/he arrives.