Tips for Traveling With a Baby

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Traveling the World with Baby Leven

I’m feeling like a travel episode today and really recapping the past five months of travel with my baby. Leven has gone on four flights, two road trips, a six-hour train ride from London to Cornwall. We are looking at flights to Switzerland to visit our friends, and then we are also looking at business class flights back to Brazil, first stopping in Rio (where I gave birth!)

To visit more friends. And then finally going back to Florianópolis, baby Leven has visited three continents in five months. He has his British passport, his American passport, and he is entitled to his Brazilian one, but that is in the works and will be finalized when we go back to Brazil. He is an international baby and he is a testament to all you parents out there that you do not need to stop living your life when you have kids, you do not need to stop traveling when you have kids. 

Rip Off The Band-Aid!

And today’s episode is going to be sharing all of my tips for traveling and flying with a baby to help you do the same if you currently have a baby or you’re planning to have one in the future. First and foremost, I want to reiterate the concept of ripping off the band-aid.

And this can apply to so many things in life, but especially with traveling or doing anything new with a newborn, you need to rip off the band-aid and just do it, get it over with. For the first time, it’s going to be daunting. The more you think of it and the more that you delay actually moving forward with it, it becomes this huge monster of what are the logistics?

How do I do this? And it can be so overwhelming that you just stop doing it or stop planning it altogether. You just think that it’s impossible the more you dwell on it. So the sooner you can get on that first flight or get on that first train ride, or go on that first road trip, the easier it will be going forward.

The first time we had our road trip, it was a bunch of logistics that I completely over-plan for, but as a first time parent, you are just prone to over-planning. Now it’s so much easier because we know exactly what to do and we know how to handle a newborn. We are more experienced now that we are looking at more international flights. I know exactly what to look for, what times to travel during the day, what seats to book on the flight, and all of these things come with experience. So my first tip is to rip off the band-aid.

Air Travel with A Baby

Next, if you want to book flights, which is from what I’m told, so much easier to do with a baby than with a toddler. So the first year of traveling with a baby is a lot easier than year one or year two, and more specifically, the first six months with a baby in the first year is a lot easier than the second six months of the year. Capitalize on that. Learn from the experts and trust that if you want it to be easy, it’s going to be easy.

So if you are looking at your first flight, you have the option of flying with your baby on your lap as a lap infant and paying $0 if it’s a domestic flight or 10% of your ticket price if it’s an international flight, plus taxes and fees. You obviously also have the option of booking a separate seat for the baby themselves, and this will allow you to bring on a stroller or a car seat if it fits in the seat.

I have never personally done that, and through all of Leven’s flights, we’ve booked bassinet seats. Bassinet seats are amazing; they give you extra legroom if you are in economy or premium economy, and they attach a bassinet to the wall, that your baby can sleep in. This is especially helpful if you are on a long haul flight and if you have a heavy baby like me, you will definitely want their own space where they can sleep peacefully and not on you.

Depending on the airline, you may or may not be able to choose the bassinet seats. There are only a few per flight and you really have to check the seat map for them. You’re gonna have to book the bulkhead seats. Some airlines will allow you to just choose. Some airlines will only allow you to request a bassinet, and then they place you into those seats, and then other airlines, you have to pay extra in order to select those seats.

So you have to do your research if you want a bassinet. And it just takes a bit more planning. Again, I recommend these for long haul international flights or any flights over six hours. Next, the bassinets themselves, they can either be shallow, as in bigger toddlers can fit into them, or they’re kind of deep, they’re like an actual bassinet with high walls.

With the ones that have kind of like a wall, it’s more enclosed. There is a height limit, and if your baby is too tall, they might not fit into it. However, on the last flight we were on, the bassinet was kind of like almost flat. It was very shallow, so the toddlers sitting across the aisle from us, she was able to fit into the bassinet and she was well over one year.

This makes a big difference because if you have a bigger baby, you want them to fit into it, right? You don’t wanna go through all of this effort and learn that they’re over the weight limit or they’re over the height limit. So it is worth checking with the airline what type they have, because every airline will have a different format. So it just takes a few extra calls and a few more steps on your part. But again, nothing you can’t handle. You can also do what some of my friends do, which is leave seat selection to the last minute until you check in at the airport and see if they have extra seats in the back. That way you could get a row to yourselves if the flight isn’t fully booked. I know some people that have had a lot of success with this, so that is always an option if you’re not able to book a standalone seat. 

Choose Strategic Flight Times

Also, in terms of flights, try to book a nighttime flight or try to book flights that align with your baby’s sleep schedule. We started feeding and having Leven sleep on a schedule since he was one month old.

This makes traveling so much more predictable and we are able to plan what we can do around his naps, around his feeds. We know exactly what to expect. So if you are able to book a flight that’s around his nap or a red eye so that they can sleep overnight, it’s going to work to your favor.

Road Tripping With A Baby

Road trips are a little more manageable because you can be on your schedule. Personally, I love traveling in our car because we can stop when needed and it is very comfortable. I definitely recommend buying a doona if you are an international traveler. The Doona is a stroller that also converts to a car seat.

So everywhere we go in the world, we’ll bring it with us and we don’t have to purchase a standalone car seat, and we are always driving in other countries. So it’s worked really well for us. Everywhere we go, every continent we go, we buy a travel cut so that if we do go on road trips within the country.

We are able to pack the bed with us along with our Doona, and we have most of what we need. The baby has somewhere to sleep and the baby has a mode of transportation in the car or on the streets. When we are walking around, for road trips, we usually stop every one to two hours just so that we can feed and we can make sure Leven gets enough time outside of his car seat.

He can stretch, we can stretch and we reset. We can really take our time with road trips, and that’s why I love them so much. I also recently discovered this website called imoova.com that allows you to book really nice camper vans, RV vans. Around the world for a dollar a day, and the premise is you relocate the vans from point A to point B, and you’re allowed to drive it with as many people that fit.

You can stop wherever you want and a lot of them give you credit for fuel, but otherwise you just pay a dollar a day and you pay for fuel. Because we have a baby now, I definitely want to look into this, especially when we’re back in America in the next few years because I wanna do a road trip along the West Coast and just go to all of the national parks with Leven and with Rag.z

So I think that’ll be really special. If you want to look into it, it’s imoova.com. I am not affiliated with them, but I do know some friends who have gone on these trips and they say amazing things and it’s. Not a scam. It’s genuinely such a great experience. 

Train Travel With A Baby

Next, we have train rides, so long train rides. Honestly, anything regarding a train, I would say just have your grab bag, have the essentials, and make sure you have enough entertainment for the entire journey. Sometimes it can be super comfortable. Other times your baby will need to sleep on your lap, and so it really is a hit or miss depending on where you are in the world.

Personally, I hate traveling on trains, I think it’s just so much easier flying or driving. But know that if you do have to take a train somewhere, it is not the end of the world. With all of these modes of transportation, know that you are going to need what I call a grab bag of essentials.

How To Build A Travel ‘Grab Bag’

This bag goes with you wherever you go with the baby. It’s one bag. I have this tote bag. You can call it a diaper bag, but I call it a grab bag because I don’t think it necessarily needs to be. What you buy online as a quote unquote diaper bag. It can be just a backpack or a tote bag. You’re gonna have this on you at all times. When you go to the supermarket in another country, when you go to the beach in another country, you just have a bag of essentials that you don’t need to pack.

It’s just always there. This means you’re gonna need two of everything. You’re gonna need diapers, wipes, a change of clothes, hand sanitizer. Creams, a portable charger, a water bottle, a blanket, socks. I always also leave a carrier in his stroller so that we can push him around or we can wear him. We have all of the essentials always by the door ready to go.

I also have been combo feeding Leven from the beginning. So we will do breast milk, we will do pumped milk, and we will also do formula. So I always have formula in this bag because it doesn’t go bad and we can always make sure he is fed on the go. Which brings me to the last segment of traveling and flying with the baby.

Feeding Schedules & Traveling

The last thing you really have to think of is the feeding schedule. So depending on whether you pump, whether you exclusively breastfeed or you exclusively formula feed, you just wanna make sure you’re packing enough and making sure you are traveling with enough. To get you through to your destination. Personally, because I also breastfeed and I pump.

I always travel with two pumps with me no matter where I go. One of them is electronic, but in case that runs out of battery, which it has in the past, I have my battery pack, but I also have a manual pump in case I need it. So bring an extra pump if possible. Also know that if you are traveling with breast milk, you are able to bring it through TSA. You can also bring bottles over 100 ml if it is water used for formula for your baby. Most of the places you go to, you can find somewhere that will give you hot water to make a bottle like Starbucks or any coffee shop or any place that sells tea.

You can also purchase sanitizing wipes for pump parts. There are also these microwavable baggies that I have where you can sanitize parts just by popping them into the microwave. I also recommend traveling with a sanitizing kit. You can buy those on Amazon and it’s just like a little wash and dry station for all of your bottles.

You can add in some sanitizing tablets in there, and you just wanna make sure you have a way to clean and sanitize. For feeding. Depending on how you feed, you might need to bring a cooler, you might need to bring a tub of formula. And what really helps me is planning out the feeds from the beginning before our trip.

So I’ll have a note on my phone of what time exactly to feed, and this could be in our destination country with a different time zone. If you need to adapt to a new schedule, it helps planning it out from the beginning. And knowing exactly when you need to pump, where you need to pump, where you’ll be washing your pump parts, or where you will be bottle feeding. Planning out your journey in terms of feeds is going to help you stay on track. Sometimes if you’re crossing time zones, there is so much going on, and you don’t wanna be confused as to when you last pumped or when you last fed. Having a note planned out beforehand will help you so much. 

Again, rip off the band-aid, just do it because traveling with a baby is so much fun and you’re really not going to regret doing it. All of the memories are going to be core memories, and I will obviously update all of you as we continue to travel more. If you have any questions, do not hesitate to reach out to me at The Wanderlover on Instagram and I will see you guys in the next episode.

Have an amazing week my loves.

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