Planning road trip with 14 mos old

[Marisa's Mom]

I could use some advice for planning our very first road trip with our 14 month old. We have decided to go for a destination that is about 2 1/2 hours drive away.

Q1: How do you plan out stops along the way?

I wonder whether there is some way (a website?) to look for chain restaurants, gas stations, and public restroom locations along the route of a highway. That would make it easier to plan out stops along the way. I'm worried about not being able to find a restaurant or rest room along the way since sometimes it's not so obvious from the freeway when you can't see a sign for those places, you know? Sometimes it helps to know that something is there so you know where to exit the freeway. We need to plan a lunch stop along the way, which will also serve as diaper change stop.

Anyone familiar with the route from San Francisco to Monterey, CA? .... we're planning on taking hwy 17 over the hills, and then getting on hwy 1 going south to Monterey. Does anyone know if there are any good restaurant or public restroom stops along that stretch of hwy 1L I'm talking about the part after you get off hwy 17, but before you drive through that "middle of nowhere" section.  I never noticed any signs for eateries from the highway along that more populated section, but there's gotta be some place around there, right?


Q2: How do you find baby/toddler friendly accomodations that are spacious enough to set up a small playpen?

What is the best way to seek out a place to stay? I really have no idea how to determine whether a place is baby friendly or not. I tried looking for travel guide books at the bookstore but didn't really find anything. Do they just not make "family" travel books?

[amheusser]

Could you just leave after lunch & let her nap the whole way?  That avoids any of the planned stops, and makes the drive go much faster for everyone!  We do this regularly when driving to visit my parents (3 hrs) and it works great.  For such a short trip, it's not really worth mapping out restaurants & everything....

The parent-type magazines all have websites that have assorted travel information, and I've heard hotels.com has thorough reviews, though I haven't really used it.  Pretty much all hotels have playpens now (don't try to get a real crib, though - that's a waste of time  ), just ask for it when you make your reservation and again when you check in.  We often ask for a wheelchair accessible room, because they have wider spaces so it's easier to find a place to put the playpen.  There are some hotels that are all "suites" - not actually 2 rooms, but a bigger room with a small kitchen area & sitting area - and those can also be a better fit for the playpen.  I know we've stayed at Springhill Suites, and I think maybe Candlewood Suites?

The city you're staying in probably has a website too - I usually google the city name plus "tourism" or "visitors" and get some official-looking results.  That can be helpful to find stuff to do that's kid-friendly (zoos, museums, whatever).

You're not going to be able to do half the stuff you've planned anyway, just relax & enjoy the change of scenery!

[Marisa's Mom]

Could you just leave after lunch & let her nap the whole way?  That avoids any of the planned stops, and makes the drive go much faster for everyone!  We do this regularly when driving to visit my parents (3 hrs) and it works great.  For such a short trip, it's not really worth mapping out restaurants & everything....

When we did the trip before baby was born, we used to make a trip around San Jose about an hour into the trip so *I* could have my "comfort" stop. I have that small body, small bladder problem.    I think the trip with baby along will definitely take a lot longer with the stops we'll have to make for her. DD can't sit in the car seat for a long time before she'll get fussy. She never did like being strapped in, doesn't matter if it is the car seat or stroller. She tolerates the high chair only because she knows there'll be food.    DD wouldn't be able to nap/sit through a 3 hr trip with no stops. We sometimes barely make it to/from the inlaws who are 1 hr away.

Depending in when DD wakes up in the morning, she usually falls asleep for her morning nap around 10am, so we were thinking of having the car packed, and putting her in the car seat when she's zoning out for a nap, and just drive ~1.5 hrs before we stop to stretch our legs, grab a bite to eat (because it will also be DD's lunchtime when she wakes), change diaper if she has a poopy (she's almost like clockwork with a poopy after nap), and let her stand/walk a bit before we stuff her back into the car again.

Pretty much all hotels have playpens now (don't try to get a real crib, though - that's a waste of time  ), just ask for it when you make your reservation and again when you check in.

Didn't know this. Will have to look into it. We were thinking of taking along our own playpen.

We often ask for a wheelchair accessible room, because they have wider spaces so it's easier to find a place to put the playpen.  There are some hotels that are all "suites" - not actually 2 rooms, but a bigger room with a small kitchen area & sitting area - and those can also be a better fit for the playpen.

I had never thought of asking for a wheelchair accessible room. That's a nifty idea! But I'd feel bad about possibly taking away a room that a disabled person needed. I mean, what if someone was turned away because I took the room they would have had?

One of my other concerns in how soundproof the rooms are. I would not want the adjacent guests to hear my screaming baby, if she happens to be fussy in the middle of the night during our trip. She's usually a good sleeper, but we really have no idea how she will behave during the trip and while trying to sleep in a foreign place. Her schedule will also be off for a few days due to the trip.

I do love places with suites, for exactly the same reason, the extra room. I already have a place in mind for our Lake Tahoe trip. I just need to find one in the Monterey area. Unfortunately, real estate is more expensive there, so lodgings tend to me more "cramped".

When we travel, we try to look for places with at least a fridge so we could store food and stuff. A small separate sink and microwave is even better. The only time we've done a full blown kitchen was when we rented a condo for our Hawaii vacations. But I can see how a kitchen can be handy with a toddler around. For this trip, I'm thinking a microwave would be handy so we can bring some Gerber meals just in case there is nothing else we can feed DD.

You're not going to be able to do half the stuff you've planned anyway, just relax & enjoy the change of scenery!

LOL, you're probably right. We move much slower paced now with DD around. Part of the trip is the change of scenery, we haven't taken a trip since Jan 2005, just before DD was born when friend advised, "take vacation NOW!!!" This will be our first trip with DD. It  will mostly be a learning experience to see how she behaves on trips, and to learn what we can and cannot do. Our only goal during the trip is to get some rest (hopefully), and to visit the Monterey Bay Aquarium  which we think DD will like. The aquarium is rather famous in this area, it's much better than the aquarium at the California Academy of Sciences in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park (although that one isn't bad to take kids to if you're in SF, there's also a natural history museum, planetarium, and other stuff to look at in the same building; btw the place is currently under renovation until 2008, so it is now temporarily located downtown).  I've gone to the Monterey Bay Aquarium a couple times and it is just amazing! Great for kids. DD is a little young to remember what she sees, but I think the exposure will be good for her.

Monterey Bay Aquarium: http://www.mbayaq.org/

It'll be interesting to see what we can do in the hotel room after DD goes to bed around 8pm. Guess TV will be out. Maybe DH & I will do something quiet like reading.   

[amheusser]

I've considered that about the wheelchair-accessible room too, but those are usually the most unwanted rooms, and they have to have a certain percentage of the hotel accessible so there are more than they would normally use (unless the special olympics are being held that weekend or something).  You can ask at check-in, too, because by then they would know if those rooms are going to be used or not, and we've never had a price difference so it shouldn't matter to change at that point.

The room won't be soundproof, and I worry about that too, but there's just not much you can do about it.  There have been times we've brought one of the girls into our bed to keep them from disturbing others, and as long as it's not a long-term thing that shouldn't throw off their sleep when you get home.

We usually bring the baby monitor, and some hotels you can actually use it from the lobby, I guess it depends what the walls are made of or something.  Mostly, though, that doesn't work, so we put pillows on the bathroom floor and read or chat quietly.  Sometimes we can get on the computer, depending how the room is set up, and on our last trip we did turn on the TV for 1/2 hour and neither of the girls woke up.

HTH!

[Marisa's Mom]

Well, it's a done deal. We made reservations for 2 nights, so we're definitely going. Now I'm panicking over packing all our stuff, and whether it'll fit in the car!    And I'm worried about what to feed DD since she's eating solids now, but not eating everything, so we have to make sure there is something appropriate for her to eat. Somehow I have the feeling she'll have a carb-heavy diet for 3 days. 

I had second thoughts this morning when DD woke up a 4:30 AM screaming and wouldn't go back to sleep, so I had to hold her until 6:30 AM when DH woke up and took over so I could go snooze some more. DD moves around so much, I don't think we could bring her into bed with us. Perhaps that's something we can do once she's a few years older. She's 14 mos now.  Makes me wonder what I'll do during our trip if she can't sleep.   And I won't have a glider to rest in when she's calm in my arms; she's pretty heavy after a while of holding her! Oh the other thing is that it will be quite interesting to see how it will go with all of us sleeping in the same room. Hopefully DH's snoring will help keep DD asleep...   

Do you worry about the babyproofness of hotel rooms?

I had never thought of that use for the baby monitor. That's clever! The baby monitor you have must have a pretty good range. The one we have works ok when in adjacent rooms, but not so well when they are at opposite ends of our house. We just never used it cuz our DD had such a good set of lungs that she let us know when she wanted us. 

[amheusser]

Do you worry about the babyproofness of hotel rooms?

Not really, because you're in there with her all the time so one of you will notice if she's getting into trouble. I don't bring outlet plugs & things like that because it's just not worth the trouble.  I let my 2 play with the remote control and the pen & paper that are always there (usually buys enough time to settle in & arrange stuff).

Trying to remember what we did for food with new eaters....  I know some trips I brought a small cooler and a 6-pack of those small yogurt cups - you can refill the cooler every day from the hotel ice machine.  We usually bought milk a pint at a time from a gas station store, that way there wasn't enough that it would be wasted, and we'd drink whatever didn't fit in the sippy cup right away.  Juice boxes are cool, you can still mix them with water in a sippy; there are also milk boxes that don't have to be refrigerated, but around here they're expensive & hard to find.  I brought applesauce in those little lunchbox-size cups, and some jars of baby food.  Gerber makes some of its cereals in single-serve packets so you can mix it with a jar, or their toddler dinners are not bad but expensive and she probably won't eat more than half at a time.  First Years makes disposable everything - spoons, cups, bowls, etc.

I hope you have a great time!!!

[Erin M]

We've brought small bottles of dish soap in the past to wash bottles, bowls, etc in the sink in the bathroom, which has worked fine for us. 

The pack and play that DD sleeps in at home has sheets that I'll bring when we're at a hotel and using their pack and play to make it more "homey" for her.  And on most of our trips, DD has ended up in bed with us for at least part of the night.  We have a queen sized bed at home at most hotel rooms seem to have a king so we all have a good amount of room anyway.  Every time we've done that we've just made sure that we go right back to our regular routine when we get home and things have been fine. 

Katie generally seems to eat terribly when we're away on vacation (WAY too many french fries) so I hear you about the carb heavy diet -- seems like you end up at places where that's your best option.  We usually bring along some cereal, crackers, etc for snacks if she needs them.

Sleeping...as long as you can put the pack and play somewhere out of line with the TV you should be ok to at least watch it without the sound (closed captioning anyone?) or with the sound turned really low.  I've left it on as I'm putting her to bed so she's at least a little bit used to the noise as she goes to sleep.  Does your DD ever sleep with a white noise machine?  I always bring ours when we're away since I think it helps her to feel like she's at home and also drowns out any outside noise. 

Basically just enjoy yourself, solve any problems that come up best you can, and all will be great!
Have fun!

[Marisa's Mom]

I let my 2 play with the remote control and the pen & paper that are always there (usually buys enough time to settle in & arrange stuff).

Hey, that's a great idea. I think I'm too much of a control freak and try not to let her touch too much stuff. It was only yesterday that I let her hold onto a rollerball pen and a ball point pen. I'm always afraid that she'll pull the cap off those pens, you know the type that just pull off? Cuz that would be a choking hazard, right?  Fortunately she was only interested in chewing on (and slobbering on!) the butt end and not the cap end. The ball point pen I gave her yesterday just happened to run out of ink, so I wasn't too worried if she pushed the button on the top that gets the pen tip to come out. She just sucked on that pen too. Good thing there was no ink, otherwise her tongue would be blue!   

As for the food... I haven't yet decided  whether I want to bring a cooler, that just means one more thing to put in the car, and boy do we have plenty already. It's all her stuff. Really! I guess we should just bring it anyways so we can bring yogurt, milk, fruit and juice.

There's something disturbing about milk that doesn't need refrigeration... 

DD has moved beyond baby cereal, but she will do cheerios. So I'm packing a generous supply of cheerios in case there's not much she can eat. We haven't done baby food jars in a months, I think she's also moved beyond that. I was thinking about those Gerber toddler meals until we booked at a place with no microwave. We have a fridge though, that was the minimum requirement.

Now the next challenge... figuring out where to stop on the way. And figuring out which restaurants are baby friendly...

It'll be interesting... at home,  we put DD to bed at 8pm, while DH & I have dinner and spend some time together before bedtime. I have the feeling that we'll be going to bed a lot earlier during our trip because we're all sleeping in the same room, so I'm not sure how it will go with DD going to bed and us staying up.

[Marisa's Mom]

We've brought small bottles of dish soap in the past to wash bottles, bowls, etc in the sink in the bathroom, which has worked fine for us.

 

Great idea, I'll pack that and a sponge. I'll pack her small plastic bowls, and of course bring her utensils. I'm wondering whether I should even pack a small cutting board and a paring knife so I can do avocado and mango. Kinda messy, I know.

And on most of our trips, DD has ended up in bed with us for at least part of the night.  We have a queen sized bed at home at most hotel rooms seem to have a king so we all have a good amount of room anyway.

How does that work out with her? Does she sleep without rolling all over the place?  I just can't imagine letting DD sleep with us in the bed, even though we're staying in a room with a king size bed, cuz she rolls around all over the place, who knows where she'll squirm to. She'll probably think we're in her way, LOL.

We used to play white noise (a CD of water/ocean/rain/etc sounds) a long time ago to mask out the "house" noises since she went to bed before us, but then stopped one night just to see what would happen. She was ok with the silence so we haven't used it in months. However, she has since figured out how to push the button on her Fisher Price Flutterbye Soother, so we're going to try to pry that off the crib and bring it along with us. Not sure how we will attach it to the pack n play though.   Lately, she sometimes turns on the soother herself when she's trying to fall asleep. And sometimes she'll even turn it on in the mornings after she wakes up. So we're not sure what will happen if she suddenly doesn't have it anymore.

[amheusser]

I was thinking about those Gerber toddler meals until we booked at a place with no microwave. We have a fridge though, that was the minimum requirement.

I always fed mine the meals at room temp anyway - makes life easier and they never knew any different!    Since you have a fridge, you could just buy a couple of single-serving milk or yogurt when you get there, and not worry about the cooler in the car.  I wouldn't bother to bring stuff for cutting up fresh fruit, but we use those lunchbox-size fruit cups for some non-carb finger food.  Dried fruit is great for travel too, you just have to supervise better because it's a little more chokeable.

We used to use the FP crib aquarium music-thing, and just set it in the corner of the playpen when we traveled, so that might work with yours too.  I was always worried they might roll into it in the night, but it was at their level so not really able to fall on them, and didn't seem to be a problem.

[Marisa's Mom]

I haven't yet tried dried fruit with DD, afraid she might choke. I sometimes think she swallows everything whole. I mean we're getting poopies with carrot chunks in them!

We still have some leftover #3 jars of baby food from months ago when we stopped feeding them to her. I'll bring a couple and see if she'll take those at room temp. DD usually likes her food warm so I don't know how it will go with the cooler temp, plus I think she's moved beyond that bland watery slop. We still have lots of Gerber Veggie Puffs. She still loves those though.... I'm just so glad that she also loves Cheeries!

Hadn't thought about just putting the soother in the corner of the playpen. That's another idea, and it would work as long as DD doesn't roll into & bash her head into it otherwise she'll wake up. That girl wakes so easily, and it's so hard to get her to fall back asleep. She's like the baby who doesn't want to nap or sleep.  I found some linkadoo rings, and was thinking of using that to hold the soother up cuz I can hook the ring over the top edge of the playpen. But of course there is the danger of the soother falling, you just never know...

[amheusser]

I found some linkadoo rings, and was thinking of using that to hold the soother up cuz I can hook the ring over the top edge of the playpen. But of course there is the danger of the soother falling, you just never know...

I don't know if those will fit thru the mesh of the playpen anyway, but it doesn't hurt to bring them.  They make good car toys too!  I was always more worried about it falling, so just set it in there and somehow it didn't bother them too much.  Maybe you could cover it with a small fleece blanket once she's asleep, just for some padding in case she rolls that way, or even take it out after she's asleep if she doesn't use it at night.

[Marisa's Mom]

The linkadoo rings actually fit (with some encouragement  ) along the top edge of the Pack N Play. So I just hung 2 rings along the top edge, plus an extra ring attached to these, before attaching the Flutterbye soother to it. It actually worked out well, she was able to turn it on herself and self-soothe during the night.

However, I can't say that the entire nighttime sleeping routine was copacetic. At home, we normally put her down while she is still awake, and she will work her way towards falling asleep on her own. This didn't happen during our trip. She just couldn't do it while we were in the same room with her.    So she'd cry up fuss about being put down for the night. And on both nights, she would wake up crying/screaming for a bit before she fell back asleep again.    Of course, it could have been anything ... sleeping in the playpen instead of her crib, sleeping in a strange room, having us in the room with her, different air, temp, smell, etc. It could have been a combination of all these things.  I just hope we didn't wake up any of the other guests. Fortunately, we had a room in one corner of the building, so we only had one neighbor adjacent to us.

The trip was not quite as relaxing for us as we would like, but DD had a good time. She got to see lots of new things. She had a great time at the Monterey Bay Aquarium, mostly looking at other people & "chatting" with them. She saw some of the exhibits too, but she was much more interested in watching all the people around her. We were hoping she'd take her afternoon nap while we were there, then wake up to see a little bit more, but she would have none of that. She was clearly tired, but just couldn't fall asleep for a nap even when we went to a quiet corner. So we left early. We'll return in the next year or two so she can see it again.

DD got to try lots of new foods while we were eating out. We'd make sure to order something that she can nibble off our plates.  So that worked out well. We've discovered that she likes Marie Callender's corn bread. She tried hamburger and pizza for the first time. We made sure to cut them up into very tiny pieces for her, and she did ok. So now we know, we can go out to eat with her and not worry as much about her having something to eat. It wasn't like before in that "in between" stage where we definitely had to bring food for her because she wasn't quite ready to eat off our plates.

[amheusser]

It sounds like it went really well.  I'm so glad you all had a good time! 

[Erin M]

Glad you had fun!  The only way that we ever get DD to nap when we're somewhere is if we keep laying her back and handing her her bunny over and over....and she has to be nearly ready to drop when we're doing it  and then she'll only nap for about 20 minutes tops.  Hey, as long as you had fun, that's all that matters