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We recently spent 11 days in Spain with our 7 month old. Highly recommend traveling with the baby. While it’s hard, the memories will last forever. If you’re thinking about traveling with an infant overseas, here’s my breakdown of the trip and recommendations.
Special thanks to Connie for co-authoring this post!
The Scenario
- One of my best friends lives in Spain and is marrying a Spaniard (hola, Maria).
- Baby is 3 months old at time of invite. We immediately go get his passport started. Such a cute photo.
- He’s 7 months at the start of the trip. Solid age. Can’t walk but can hold himself up. Very alert. He’s a good sleeper too.
- ATL –> MAD direct flight. 8hrs redeye. 2.5 days in Madrid. Stay at the Westin Palace Madrid.
- Take train to Valencia. Drive 1hr north to Castellon/Benicassim (thanks JTS for driving the whole trip). Stay in amazing Airbnb on the coast ($200/night for 3bed 2bath).
- Wedding. Friends. Party. Spanish. Lots of food. Love siesta culture. Maybe we’ll summer in Spain?
- Train from Valencia to Madrid. Stay at the Hilton Madrid Airport Hotel. Fly home. Forget all your Spanish.
The Gear
- SlumberPod: LINK Basically a blackout tent that goes over the baby’s crib at night and during naps. I think it’s amazing. Folded up, fits inside a carry on. It has a slot for the baby camera/monitor and sound machine. How they describe themselves: ‘SlumberPod is a portable, affordable, US-patented solution for family room-sharing and getting a good night’s sleep.’
- Baby’s Brew: LINK This device is amazing. It’s a portable bottle warmer. How they describe themselves: ‘It’s the first-ever battery-powered bottle warmer that can heat your baby’s breast milk to a perfectly safe temperature of 98.6 degrees.’ Note: check the site to make sure your formula is compatible, if not, you can just use to heat water to the preferred temperation.
- Pockit Air All-Terrain: LINK It’s a cool little compact “umbrella” stroller that folds into a backpack. It handled Spain like a champ given its size. How they describe themselves: ‘The revolutionary ultra-compact folding mechanism of the Pockit Air All-Terrain reduces the stroller into a handbag-shaped package in seconds and is airplane hand luggage compliant.’
- Guava Lotus Travel Crib: LINK Another great travel essential. Glad we brought it because the hotel cribs were not great for our wiggly sleeper. The SlumberPod fits nicely over this as well. How they describe themselves: ‘Say ‘goodbye’ to the hassle of figuring out safe sleep at your destination with the Lotus Travel Crib. Whether you’re flying or driving, the compact, 3D fold and the airport-friendly backpack make every trip easier.’
- Rohm Travel Sound Machine: LINK Great little sound machine we use on all our trips with the baby. How they describe themselves: ‘Block out disruptive noises for better sleep or concentration wherever you are with the Rohm White Noise Machine.’
Our Recommendations
- Global Entry: If you are a seasoned traveler and know the glories of Global Entry, you certainly don’t want your baby to slow you down when returning to the country. Every traveler (even babies) need their own Global Entry card. So plan ahead and take your baby to their interview. All interviews booked? Try this website to snag earlier appointment. Not affiliated but it found us an appointment within the week for $7. LINK.
- Change your typical travel mindset: Don’t expect to see a new city every 3 days; instead, pick a home base to travel out of. Less packing. Less moving suitcases and shuffling the baby around. More happiness.
- Bring reinforcements (if you can): Not a hard requirement but if you can convince the grandparents to travel with you to lend an extra set of hands, I would recommend it. Now, only do this if you enjoy traveling with your parents/in-laws and trust them to watch your baby. My parents were incredibly gracious and helped look after the baby through out the trip. Thanks!
- Try for bulkhead (but it’s ok if not): If you’re in bulkhead you can request a bassinet during your flight. Probably works best for babies who can conk out on a flight but it was even useful for us to just put the baby stuff somewhere.
- Car seats: We elected not to travel with our car seat because it is bulky and we wanted to be able to handle all of our luggage with baby between two adults (although once we had grandparents in tow, it was much easier). We rented a car seat at the car rental for Castellon/Benicassim, but in Madrid where we did not have a car, we were able to call a taxi that had a car seat from the airport to the hotel.
- Leverage the baby: More often then not, if there was a line I would ask to skip because ‘we have a baby’ and it worked. We skipped an older couple at the phone store. We were fast tracked through Customs upon arrival in Spain. People like babies and feel bad for their parents. Use it! They’re only going to get bigger.
- Be forgiving: No lie, it was tough. Probably tougher on mom because baby when is a ‘mom-only’ phase.
- Enjoy this amazing opportunity: Uh, you’re in Europe with your baby. Congrats! Enjoy it!
Tidbits
- Baby’s first beach was the Mediterranean Sea. So bougie.
- Heading into the trip, we start moving the baby to over to formula to make the trip a little easier on Mom and to reduce the amount of frozen supply we needed to bring. Long story short, little man ate more than we expected and we ran out of formula the day before we flew out. We bought some formula at the store (most were closed on Sunday) and had him drink that. He was visibly and audibly uncomfortable all night, the next morning, and half of the flight. We decided mid-flight to nurse him instead of trying more formula. While it was uncomfortable, the poor guy made it through. Recommendation: pack more formula than you expect. They don’t sell the same formula in Europe.
- Abuelas throughout Spain kept gawking at the baby. A few pinched his cheeks in the train station. Very flattering but c’mon!
- We were fortunate to be able to fly Premium Select on Delta. It’s between First Class (full layflat) and Comfort+. Definitely recommend it. Nice value for the price. Enough lean in the chair to sleep and wide enough for a baby to crawl all over you.
Have any other tips or tricks? When’s your next trip? I want to hear!