1st holiday with baby

RoxieW

Unless you're in the middle of nowhere, there should be a supermarket where you can buy nappies and babymilk. Of course, they're unlikely to be your usual brand so perhaps take babymilk with you - however, nappies should be fine to use. And nappies do take up alot of room and are heavy in your case.
We took the sterilized bottles and cartons of ready made milk. TBH the steralised bottled (when you work out how many you need to take) took up more room then a steriliser would. Just depends how confident you are of the water. Am not sure on this one but would imagine that once boiled the water would be perfectly safe as any nasties are killed off.

amandada

I'd agree about the made up milk in cartons, that way there should be NO worries about it.
When we took my ds to Tenerife when he was about 6 months, I just took nappies for a couple of days, then bought some when I was there.
We used the supplied cot, but all the baby equipment was supplied by Mothercare in the UK so we didn't have nightmares about trapped fingers-it might be worth asking your travel agent if there is an arrangement like this at your accommodation?
The thing we used loads in conjunction with the pram parasol was a couple of muslin nappies! There's always a bit of the baby that the sun gets to, so you can do "creative draping" with the muslins!

When I was having panics about taking a young baby away, and all the "stuff" we'd have to take, my health visitor said to me "remember babies are born in Tenerife too" so anything you don't have that you need, you'll be able to get your hands on easily over there.

Oh, and from experience, pack the Calpol in the hand luggage, NOT the suitcase:rolleyes:

I'm sure you'll have a great holiday, I was at Paraiso a few years back and it's a lovely place

LittleTinker

Check with the car hire people about baby chairs.....what makes you think they wont do them?

Taking a travel cot is going to take up all your baggage allowance and you dont need it. The hotel cot will be fine.

Buy nappies while you are there.

You can take a baby bag onto the flight (handluggage) and this wont count towards your allowance so you might want to put baby milk in there.

You can keep your baby in the pushchair until you get to the boarding gate. They will then take it to the plane for you and it will virtually be the last thing on/first thing off. Nothing to worry about.

Dont know what you do with babys bottles because we dont steralise here. I guess you would look for a travel steriliser.

And dont forget the Suncream

bloomin_freezing

we took steriliser tablets (from asda) away with us, combined with bottled water for dummies and, teats and bottles. just took 2 or 3 bottles with us from home. had several cartons of sma we took with us, the i think we used full dat milk from the supermarket, although our dd was getting on for 2 so more acceptable for her age. do they still make sma in sachets so you can just add bottled water? what about taking a travel kettle (small and lightweight) and using cool boiled water for bottles.

also found mozzie pads on ebay, i pack was enough for a week for us, small pads soaked in citronella that we stuck around the buggy and outside of the travel cot (supplied by hotel). we took usual toys/teddies dd had in her cot at home and also out own bed sheets, just for comfort.
sadly for us, a lot of this was pointless as she had 4 'big teeth' come through the week we were away, hadn't had any for 3 months beforehand!!! Lucky me noticed them coming through just after we boarded the plane outward bound!!
Thank god for calpol!!!

morganb

Dont' forget with baby milk, etc., then each container shouldn't really contain more than 100ml of fluid; I can't remember the exact ruling (as my DS2 is nearly 4!!) but you will need to think about this if you are carrying cartons of milk in hand luggage

onlyroz

Baby should get a full luggage allowance. We took our boy to Florida at 5 months. Our Quinny Zapp was taken right up to the departure gate. Also, we used the hotel cots and bedding, which were always fine. Breastfed so didn't have to faff around with bottles and sterilising fluid - and we bought the nappies once we were over there.

We hired a car + car seat, but we didn't anticipate the difference in quality between the US child seats and ours. It was rubbish and didn't fit properly, and the car hire staff refused to help us fit it, incase they did it wrong and we sued them. We later looked in Walmart at their car seats, but they were just as bad as the one we'd hired.

daveyjp

A baby actually needs very little.

Why take loads of sterilised bottles? Steriliser tablets and a big pan of water did the job for all babies not that many years agos and it still works today - we did this on our first holiday to Tenerife when DD was 7 months old.

Small tent cot - little life do some good ones, check e-bay. Light (less than 2kg) and very compact.

Quinny Zapp, maxi cosi car seat for use in taxi and hire car (both went in the hold).

Changing bag with nappies and some formula to last a few days.

Savvy_Sue

Calpol in your hand luggage? Just make sure you've checked the current restrictions on liquids, and that you've got your re-sealable plastic bag to hand.

My memory of DS1's first holiday is of feeling thoroughly depressed and thinking "Is this what it's like?" Because for me - breastfeeding - it was just doing the same things, only in a different place. NO more sleep - which I would have killed for. I don't think warmer weather would have cheered me up either because I don't like the heat.

So, sorry if that's a bit depressing, but just remember baby won't know or care that she's somewhere different, she'll want feeding, changing and winding just the same as she would at home ...

jasmin10

I think all your questions have been answered however I remember how nervous I was going away with my 14month old to Thailand.

The best thing I did was buy off ebay for £2 a back pack thing to carry the baby in. The footpaths were terrible and I know that Tenerife has the same problems. I did take a cheapy buggy that I bought from Argos for £30 which also laid down. I bought this as my proper one was too bulky and I didn't want to getting trashed whilst being chucked about on the planes, (for had for plane trips).

The other thing I'm glad I did was take enought baby food (jars and milk) to last a week incase I had any problems getting it and so I could make enquiries as to where I could get it. I am so glad I did as most of the locals tend to feed them homemade things and to come across baby food was few and far between. I had just started weaning so she did it some foods but my jars were a god send.

The things are as well is that you get to go on the place first and you get your dinner given to you first too. We did pay extra for a seat for her although she did sit on our laps for take off and landing but when she fell asleep I was able to lay her across the seat and the blanket over her (she slept all the way there thank goodness. The only nightmare I had on the plane was nappy changing ad she was head to toe on the changing thing in the toilets so just take a nappy, cream and wipes in with you as there would be no where to put a changing bag.

Hope there is a bit of usefull stuff here. Have a great time.

x

neverdespairgirl

Hope you have a great time!

OH and I have been abroad with our son by 'plane a few times - each time to Israel, which is a 5 hour flight. We went when he was 6 months, 18 month, 2 and 4 months, and 2 and 7 months.

The first trip, when he was 6 months, was by far the easiest! A 5 hour flight with a baby who can crawl / walk is much less fun, because they get bored so quickly and want to move around all the time.

DS was breastfed, so at 6 months we didn't worry about bottles. He now has a bottle during the day, and whenever we've been away, we've just dishwashered it (asked the hotel or relatives with whom we were staying).

We've not had any trouble, either in Israel or the UK, getting a car seat with a hire car.

As far as nappies go, taking enough would be seriously bulky, and you can buy them anywhere, so don't take a whole holiday's supply of them, I suggest.