Traveling with Children!

As time passes, travel is going to become more and more 2nd nature. My niece and nephew live in California with my sister while my folks live in Texas. The thing is, they already not comprehend what it is to fly or to travel. My niece will call my Mother and ask, “Grandma I want to visit you, can I come on Thursday?”, and if it is possible, it will happen. These days taking a flight across the country is no different then taking a long car journey.

That was not the case for me, far from it. I can remember the first time I flew. It was between Minnesota and Illinois. The idea that I was flying was exciting- and I was older then they are. Maybe it is just showing my age, probably.

M and I are parents now. We know that we have responsibilities as parents, but we do not have any interest in stopping traveling. That has been a major part of our childhood/adult life. So N will be traveling with us, and in fact she has already started to travel with us. Just to give a rough idea of what type of traveling she has experienced. N turned 8 months last month. She has already seen a decent amount of Sweden. In my humble opinion, that is impressive, but that is not all. She has already traveled to 9 different countries (future blog will be how we count countries, but one actually has to sleep in the country, not just travel through it). She has two different passports (a Swedish one and an American one). I did not leave the US until I was 16 years old- going into Mexico across the border does not count. Plus she has traveled a decent amount in the US while we were there. By the time her first birthday comes around, she will have traveled to 12 countries. I know, it is hard to believe!

The point of saying this is not for you to go “Wow, that is freaking amazing!” Though, lets be honest it is pretty freaking amazing. The point of it is to address the question, “What does a parent have to do to unsure that travel does not just become a second thought for the child?”

I really do not have the answer to the question. M and I have already planned on several large and several small trips which will absolutely include N. We will be going to Mexico and Cuba, Australia and New Zealand, trips through out Sweden, and I am sure other trips within the next two to three years.

With that in mind, there are two different sides to look at. The first is that as a traveler from my generation, if they will encourage travel in their children, will not succeed in assisting the child in understanding the actual act of travel. For the child, traveling throughout the world will become what traveling across the US is for my niece and nephew- nothing more then getting in the plane rather then getting into a car.

The other option is to make each trip special. Now this is a whole lot harder then the other option. This option requires the parent to plan things for the child. On a travel forum that I am a member of, it has been recommended that the parent find children books about the country that the family will be traveling too.

Another recommendation was to have a map in the child’s room of the world so the child can mark what countries they have traveled through. This gives the child a perspective on where they have traveled to and how far they have traveled.

If you have any other ideas, make a comment. I will make another post later on with all the different ideas that people have given!