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City break with a baby - stupid?
Former Member
Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
This year my MIL turns 60 and FIL 70, and as they have never left the country, our present to them is passports and a trip abroad. For the first trip we were planning to go on the Eurostar, cause they're used to trains and we thought it would be less fear-inducing (they're big time panickers) than a plane.
Anyhoo, somewhere along the line Paris was suggested, obvious choice on Eurostar, I guess. But Superbaby obviously will be coming along, and she'll be around 10/11 months when we're planning to go. Has anyone been somewhere like Paris with a baby, and is it a stupid idea?
She's happy enough in her carrier, so don't necessarily have to worry about getting a pushchair about, but my mind is being blown with the logistics of sleeping and eating arrangements, for a start. Half thinking we should just abandon the idea and look at child-friendly beach holidays instead. Opinions?
Anyhoo, somewhere along the line Paris was suggested, obvious choice on Eurostar, I guess. But Superbaby obviously will be coming along, and she'll be around 10/11 months when we're planning to go. Has anyone been somewhere like Paris with a baby, and is it a stupid idea?
She's happy enough in her carrier, so don't necessarily have to worry about getting a pushchair about, but my mind is being blown with the logistics of sleeping and eating arrangements, for a start. Half thinking we should just abandon the idea and look at child-friendly beach holidays instead. Opinions?
Post edited by JustV on
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But thing to bear in mind are also how she would be sleeping in a room with you my baby is awful so wherever we go we have to have a whole room for her, plus how your going to feed her but if your doing blw it shouldn't be tooooo hard.
Ohh though a random thing to bear in mind is that they don't do nappy bags in france so you'll need to bring some.
Another option might be to see if you can connect through lille or brussels to somewhere a bit smaller and more baby friendly but that would mean you getting 3 trains in total which might be a bit wearing.
If your looking for other baby friendly options i found this website really good for something chilled out yet baby friendly and which means you don't need to cart all of your baby pharephenalia about with you - the place we stayed did a thing where they cooked your meal for you so you could go out whilst staying in as it were and they also offered baby sitting.
But also if your going to paris i'd say definately go for an apartment vs a hotel as you can be more chilled out and sort out baby friendly food and drink more easily.
At 11 months she will largely be on proper food, and you breastfeed anyway, so feeding shouldn't be too much of an issue. She might have to sit on your knee or some restaurants might have high chairs when you eat out.
With regards to sleeping arrangements, it depends on baba. Little Rosie co-sleeps with us as often as not, so for us we'd just have her in bed with us for a weekend as it makes no difference. It does mean that either baby has to stay up or you have to go to bed early, but if superbaby is like Rosie she won't want to go to sleep anyway. Rosie quite often isn't asleep until after 10pm because she fights it for that long.
I can't see why you couldn't make a city break work, especially if you have a BabyBjorn or a backpack for baba. Or get a small pushchair like the Quinny Zapp, it folds up into nothing and will be perfect for city use.
We've done London with Rosie a couple of times, for the weekend. Granted we stayed with a friend and not in a hotel, but the general principle was the same. We still ate out and touristed with her.
The only thing I'd say is: don't go to Paris. Turn left on the train and go to Brussels or Brugge. Brussels is a lovely city, far more friendly than Paris and smaller, so you can walk most places without having to use the Metro. And the restaurants are generally staffed with the sort of mental waiters you see in cheap Italian places, so you'll get a warm reception with a gorgeous little baby in tow.
I think you're deffo right about the apartment. She goes to bed at 7pm, and there's no way she'd sleep with the lights on - I was having visions of us going to bed with her at 7, or sitting in silence in the dark just so she'll sleep! Mr K is getting overexcited looking at budget hotels but I don't think he's thought any of this through!
The sleeping is my main problem. My daughter is a lovely, adaptable, easy-going kind of baby, so long as she's in bed (any bed, anywhere, but in a bed) on time. She's normally fast on by 7, but can generally make it to about 7.30/8, whereupon she becomes Satan's child and screams blue murder until you put her to bed. Obv not ideal for your touristy purposes.
I'm not bothered about daytime naps, cause she'll sleep in her carrier, or in her buggy, and be fine with it, and by that age she should be sleeping less in the day anyway, but the nights do concern me!
It's not that we're slatternly about bedtime, it's just that Sod Child will fight it all the way. It's taken us three hours to get her to go to sleep before...
I tried co-sleeping back in the days when she was eating every 90 minutes at night (for my own sanity), and she was having none of it. I felt a bit put out! It would be very handy if she would sleep with us, purely for these eventualities! Maybe she'll be more open to the idea as she gets older. She's a very independent lady atm.
Sorry Kaff, I know nothing about babies, but just wanted to say that I think that is such a lovely idea for a present!
Um, I wouln't take a baby on a holiday, but then I am a wimp with parenting things like that.
I would strongly advise against going in July/August. The polution in Paris and the smog can be horrendous. If you've been to Sacre Coeur, you can look down and see Paris is in a 'crater' and all that shit that's pumped out just sits there and reacts with the sunlight making it truly awful
I wouldn't want to do it permanently, just have a snuggly snooze now and again when one of us is feeling crappy, and then the rest of the time have her in her own cot. I guess you can't have it both ways! She's not a very cuddly baby generally, though. She's better than she was, but she still likes her own space a lot of the time. I might end up being one of those awful needy mums and chase her for hugs!
I do insist that you go to Brussels instead though. The beer's much better and there's a statue of a little boy having a wee.
I'd love to go to Brussels (or Bruges), but cause the out laws have never ventured further than Newquay, they're all about the iconic tourist places. And it's their birthday trip, so we're kind of doing what they want. Although my birthday this year is a big one (:(), so maybe I should try and sway the voting?
Brugge will be just about OK in May, but it depends your tolerance to annoying retard Americans. We went to Brugge in an April and there were enough of them then, twatted on two bottles of Belgian beer.
However the bar we were in did get a visit from the Kwak man, and everyone got a free beer. The Kwak man's a bit like the Duff man in the Simpsons, except Belgian and with a horse drawn cart:
Brussels also has some nice parts, but like any city it has some horrid parts too, so not sure about there really (I got my phone stolen :grump:).
Will see what he comes up with!