Air travel with an infant

[Patrickz]

Has anybody flown accross the country with an infant? If so I need some do's and don't s for this trip. Thanks :???:

[SideShowCecil]

Phone your airline’s customer service number and drill them with every question you can think of;

What if any ID will I need for my child?
How much checked luggage is an infant entitled too?
Will they check the stroller at the plane?
Is the aircraft equipped with a changing table in the washroom?
If there are empty seats on the plane will they block an adjacent seat to provide a little extra space?

We always check in at least three hours before the flight. We get a better selection of seats that way and it’ll take twice as long to clear security with a stroller and a diaper bag. If the flight isn’t fully booked we usually get one isle, one window and they’ll block the center seat so it remains empty.

Most important; you’ll need a months worth of patience and energy for a six hr flight.

[tt3]

There is more advice here (http://dadstayshome.com/dadforum/viewtopic.php?t=626) and a link to another thread as well.
Good stuff!

good luck!

[Patrickz]

Thanks tt3
I just finnally got around to reading the posts. We have a stop over after 5.5hrs then an 1.5hr flight into San Diago. Also a thanks to sideshowcecil, this trip is going to be crazy. 8)

[Weston]

We are taking a long plane trip the first of March, unexpectedly because of a death in my wife's family. Raleigh, NC to Butte MT. One ticket we looked at had us flying/layover for a total of 19 hours :shock:

We found a better one, but still not looking forward to flying with the little man. I will be perusing all of the posts on flying. :)

[SideShowCecil]

We’ll be flying to the East Coast in May; we’re bringing William to see his 93 year old Great Grandmother.

We managed to get a direct flight from Calgary, over six hrs. It’s a seat sale Sunday too, so I don’t think we’ll get that extra empty seat WestJet usually manages to provide for us. There’s also a two hour drive after we land.

Patience, patience, patience!!

Later that week we’re traveling from Moncton to Montreal and then Ottawa by train. It’s an overnight trip and we have a deluxe triple bedroom booked. I’m looking forward to that leg of the journey, it should much more civilized. Dad might even get to have a cocktail or two.

Earlier this week I was trying to work out how to get us all to the airport. We have to leave the house around 4:30 in the morning so none of our friends were quick to volunteer to drive us. The park n’ jet is $120 for two weeks, the airport shuttle doesn’t run that early on a Sunday and taxi would be over $60.

The cheapest and most convenient solution was a rental car. I pick up the car in our end of the city at 4:00 pm Saturday afternoon and drop it off at the airport 5:30 am Sunday morning. It’s only $40.00 and I don’t have to wait for anybody.

[Muz]

If you can afford it, I would go ahead and buy a seat for your child. Especially if your child sleeps well in the car seat. Most airlines will sell you an infant ticket for half price. While lugging the car seat through the airport is more of a pain than simply checking it, at least you know that it will be there for you at your destination and still in one piece. It also gives you a needed break once your child does fall asleep. We now ALWAYS buy the seat for any flight longer than an hour or so.

If you can get your child to act up, I've seen the security people allow families to jump the line. I'VE never done this, but I've seen it done. :twisted:

Check with the gate agent, some airlines ask you to get your stroller tagged for gate check prior to boarding, others will tag it as they take your boarding pass.

Have the flight attendant check if the plane has a changing table in the bathroom before you need it. If there isn't one, you will probably find it easier to change a wet diaper at your seat. We've ALWAYS changed poopy diapers in the bathroom. You might get some looks, but that's their problem.

Good luck. Even the worst flights eventually come to an end. I'm sure you'll do fine.

Chad

[Lobster]

Hi,

We go next week to Florida with our two guys. We managed to secure bulkhead seating on all the flights and I would receommend you try for this as there is more legroom.

I will give you all a full report on how it goes.

We have purchased lots of new toys (dollar store is great for this). We're even bringing a small portable DVD player in hoping that this will help too. We are packing lots of extra diapers, wipes and spare clothes just in case. Apparently according to my brother Air Canada has a fold down changing table in most lavs. I figure this will be quite cramped with a skirmy 2 year old. All of the flights are "buy your own meals" so we are packing lots of snacks, food too. Good luck.

[Weston]

Our trip to Butte Montana went amazingly well. Mom in law was with us so it was a whole lot easier having a third person to help take care of Alex.

He did very well on the flights - half of the time sleeping and the other half playing around and charming the other passengers.

We did not purchase a seat for Alex so we ended up taking turns holding him through the flight. Interestingly enough, I started to put him in our snuggli during take-off thinking that it would be safer for him to be attached to me in case something went wrong. The flight attendant said that he could not be in it during the take-off and landing...that the chances of him being pinned by me in an accident were too great.

We had two lay-overs going and two going back and security was really no extra problem because of having him with us.

I had been worried about what the change in air pressure would do to him, but it didn't seem to bother him a bit. The only inconvenience we had was changing diapers. One diaper we changed in the bathroom on the sink (no changing table and not much room on the sink so it was quite a job changing his diaper with his head in the sink and him grabbing at the soap dispenser) We both were there to change that diaper and having the two of us do it seemed to help a lot in that situation. Other diapers we changed on the seat next to us (that happened to be empty) but they were all just wet diapers.

The only really bad incident came for me when we had just got into Butte's little airport. Alex had a full diaper and it smelled like it was going to be a bad one. So I took him in the men's room while the wife and MIL were talking to family, and sure enough, a blow-out. At that point everything went wrong. Baby poop all over his outfit, and in the process of me trying to find another outfit in the diaper bag (there wasn't one) he peed ALL OVER EVERYTHING. After finally getting a relatively fresh diaper on him and his pants back on, pee, poop, dirty outfit, diaper bag and half of its contents strewn throughout the bathroom floor, I walk out of the men's room to go to where our luggage was and hopefully an easy to get clean outfit. The wife and MIL were still enjoying there conversation with the family when I walked up with a naked from the waist up baby (his shoes still on him mind you) and sweat just pouring down my face. At that point I got a little bit of help and Alex got cleaned up and dressed.

That was the low point of the trip and I can honestly say that my son took the trip a lot better than we did :wink:

[Jackson's Dad]

with a naked from the waist up baby (his shoes still on him mind you)

Sounds like John Wayne - he may be in a compromising situation, but he still has his boots on. :-)

Glad it all went well. And at least know that from your experience, we add learned -- I will now never forget to put some sort of back up clothing in the diaper bag. Thank you for that tip!

We are planning on going down to the outer banks this summer, but since we'll have the dog as well, I think we'll drive the 10 hour trips. Yowza. Should be interesting.

[Weston]

The outer banks are beautiful...We usually go to the beach several times during the summer as day trips.

10 hour drive with the little man doesn't sound like much fun. On this trip to Montana, we also made a detour to Seattle where my wife had a job interview. Drove a rental car there and it took 9 hours each way. Alex definitely did worse on the drive than he did the flight because he was always confined to the car seat during the drive. :(

[Jackson's Dad]

Makes me remember the old days when we were kids, and we'd just climb into the back of the station wagon with some board games and some pillows...


(Woo hoo! And with this post, #500, I have made it to the level of "Good Daddy"! Yeee HAW!)

[Weston]

We took trips in a rusty old suburban...laid down in the back during the trip. If you pulled the rubber mat up you'd find rust holes and could look through the hole and watch the road go by....good times :lol:

[jeffus]

Oh man I was just flooded with memories of driving from New Jersey to Florida (Disney) in the rear seat of a Datsun B210 with my younger sister - in the summer - without air conditioning. Man, 24 hours of hell that I just can't seem to forget.

"Will you stop touching me!" , "Cross this line - you die!", "Don't make me pull over". And the ever-popular: "Are we there yet?"

Disney was fun though, I think..... :D

[jeffus]

We did another 'road-trip' a few years later in the Reliant-K Station wagon - ouch! Again - no a/c...

A little more room - but "we couldn't wrinkle mom's clothes". Like the sweat, food, and road bumps were going to spare my mom's wardrobe? WTF, we're going to FLA in the summer?! I guess we needed to keep them clean so she could sweat, wrinkle, spill food on them herself.

Good news - we upgraded a few more years in the future to AVIATION! And the trip was much more fun! Remember coloring for 2 hours, getting a set of wings, actually getting a peek at a cockpit, a brief introduction to stewardesses (not today's non-attendent flight attendent), sitting on a pilot's lap asking me if I liked Gladiator movies (the rest is for another post), getting a set of mouse ears, and then de-planing to the Magic Kingdom. Guess planes really caught on in the early 70's. And so did "Marketing"......

[Weston]

Don't remember that when flying...but do remember having the infamous "pee jar" during road trips. Dad didn't want to stop everytime we needed to go so they kept a jar under the seat :roll:

[Jackson's Dad]

Let's see on the one hand, you'd have stop the car occasionally. On the other hand, you'd transport human waste in your car. Hmmm... which do you choose? :???:

[Don-Dad]

Dan,

Remember the Father Bakers bridge? I remember when I was small lad, traveling over that in an old beat up pick up truck, with no cap. Being afraid of heights and all the pot holes on that bridge, scared the crap out of me. I could not do long road trips as a kids, I used to get terribly car sick.

[Jackson's Dad]

Father Bakers - man, that was all pot hole! Or the Sky Way. I remember once going over that during a freezing rain when our windshield wipers broke. Our Dad had to roll the window down to see, as the wind blew the rain in. Ah, fun.

[Patrickz]

I must be the luckest dad of all as Alex was no problem on the long flights. The older kids seemed to be the ones with the most discomfort. He slept and nursed the whole way but the two hour car ride to the desert was another story. All in all a great trip and anybody thinking of buying a seat for their toddeler you might as well save your money as the ones we saw did not stay in the seat but in their parents laps instead. Just my limited observation however. 8)

[SmokinZBT]

We made it to Florida and back with no major problems. We went for a week, and Zoe had her own seat on the plane. We went Southwest, which was great, we got ot board the plane first and didn't have to worry about not having enough space. Zoe was great the whole flight down, got a little fidgety, but stayed in her seat almost the entire time (we bought a seat for her). We also borrowed this crazy contraption from some friends that is a combination car seat and stroller. It was awesome in the airport! Didn't have to lug around another car seat while holding a diaper bag, golf clubs, and suitcases, not so great at the destination, a little hard to get in and out of the car. In the future, I would use that, and check another stroller to use during the vacation.
As far as the flights, we had to change her once on each flight. I only had to deal with a wet one, wife got the poop. The person that was on the aisle just stood up, put Zoe on the seat and we changed her, no biggie. Bottle on take off and landing, and it was pretty smooth. Her nap schedule got all screwed up going down, she wouldn't sleep on the plane, and didn't like the smell of the crib and the grandparents, but we persevered. All in all, the flying was not the nightmare that I anticipated.

The pee-cup story reminded me of some days back in college.. about seven of us drinking beer while driving to Santa Cruz, the guy driving wouldn't pull over to let us pee, so we used empty beer bottles. Only problem came when we started filling them up. Then we threw them out the sun roof. Good times.

[Weston]

I know the pee jar sounds gross, but in my dad's defense, it did get emptied everytime we stopped. I don't think that's such a big deal compared to the fact that we were allowed to roam around in the back freely (seems kind of dangerous to me) but that was a long time ago and from what I hear pretty common at the time.