What age to start introducing children to international travel
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Anonymous
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Our kids are 3 and 1. DH and I like to travel and have done so extensively pre-kids. I'd like to introduce them to other countries and cultures early on but I wonder if it's worth saving money now and taking trips when they are school age that can be tied to what they're learning in school. I think that if they're learning about Egypt and we take a trip there it would be more meaningful than taking them at age 5 but DH contends that its just going to get more and more expensive so we should take the trips that we can while we can afford it (regardless of their age or what they're learning).
Anyone have advice or recommendations on the best way to go about doing this? |
Anonymous
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Would you enjoy Egypt with a toddler? I wouldn't.
We are sticking to easy trips where I won't be upset if our 1 year old has a melt down and needs to go back to the house to nap sooner than expected. The exciting trips are just dh and me, and we're having grandma come stay at our house for the week. |
Anonymous
No I probably wouldn't enjoy Egypt with a toddler as much as I would alone but I'm pretty easy going and these trips would be solely for pleasure so if we have to cancel an afternoon and decompress in a hotel room I'd be ok with that. I have a fairly stressful job so when I'm on vacation - nothing gets me down. I think it might be my hidden talent. But I should probably also mention that, while we have family who would watch the kids and happily travel with us to help out, I've realized that "help" from family actually leads to more stress and/or money. |
Anonymous
| I took my son to Egypt at 16 months and 4 years old. (Family there). There's nothing super fun there for toddlers that you can't find here. When my son was 4, he LOVED Egypt. And he still remembers it. So I'd say a minimum age of four. |
Anonymous
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I've been taking my kids since they were born, basically. I have to travel a lot for work, so I haul along the nanny and kids. Sure, my 2 yr old doesn't remember being in Ireland or Greece, but my 3.5 yr old asks to go back to South Africa routinely. Sure, some plane rides have been hell, but we get through them (and I offer to buy drinks for the ppl sitting near us).
I understand that they won't remember every trip. Being exposed to foreign languages at an early age will make learning them later much easier. I think it makes them better people to travel. |
Anonymous
| Once the youngest is 4, I'd go anywhere in the world. |
Anonymous
+1 We just took an international trip and our 4yo may have enjoyed it more than the rest of the family (we all has a blast). Already a travel junky - talks about the trip all of the time and wants to go somewhere every time we see a plane overhead. |
Anonymous
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We are waiting till the youngest is 6. The others will then be 8 and 9. This year we are doing a dude ranch in WY as at 5 the youngest can have his own horse/ride all week. Before this we have stuck to beach and ski vacations. We did Europe when we just had one baby and it was a blast!
We want them to remember Europe and have the endurance to walk all day….at this point my 5 YO (he just turned 5 this month) still needs naps some days. We figure another year will make it more enjoyable. Have fun on your adventures!!!! |
Anonymous
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It depends on your kids. I would take my (now 6 yo) teins anywhere and that has been true since about age 3. We also traveled a lot with them starting young. We were doing 4-hour roads trips with only 1 hour of screen time by age 1. This kind of thing was important for me to build up their endurance and prep them for long flights (longer than they could watch movies for) and for the many trains, etc. getting from one part of a country to another.
We also try to focus on not everything being a kid-tailored experience. They had been to pretty much every Smithsonian museum, the folklife fest, etc. by age 2, and we didn't do just the kid sections; we walked through all of it. This means that my kids know how to be interested in things that aren't specifically geared towards them and their age group, which is obviously pivotal. My point is that I agree they are a bit young, but if the choices in DH's mind are "Egypt or leave them with family," then I would revisit that. This might not be the best time to dontour dream trip, but it is the perfect time to acclimate them to travel and teach the skills of being interested in what's around them. So if I weren't going to do Egypt I would still travel somewhere with kids, even if it's via road trip. |
Anonymous
This is our plan, as well. We have a 2 week beach vacation planned for Italy next spring. Kids will be almost 4 and 5. We will be doing 30% touristy things, 70% relaxing at the beach. We are greatly lowering our expectations for how much we could otherwise see (normally we'd spend most of our times touring and going to museums, tours, historical sites, et, and very little time at a beach). The time difference, the amount of walking, and just all the exciting new things, we don't want over tired exhausted kids causing all hell at the forum. |
Anonymous
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Our kids are 7 and 5....
We've traveled with them abroad but so far the ease of being in the U.S. Has made for better domestic travel. The U.S. U.S. Is easier, cheaper and tends to have an excellent kid-activity infrastructure. I would also say that a huge inflection point is whether you have family or close friends abroad. |
Anonymous
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What a strange question for us international families, who visit parents and grandparents abroad every year. Let me recount my personal experience as a child visiting family in different countries, as well my children's. Your children, depending on their level of involvement and personality, will only have very limited memories of their visits abroad before the age of ten. It will be in the form of snapshots/visuals of certain events they really liked or for some reason stuck in their minds. So they may recall a certain distinctive hotel room (as I did at 5, the Parisian doorkey was in the shape of mic and I pretended to sing like a rock star, I chased pigeons all down the avenues, I loved the carousels), or a certain dinner with particular food and family (traditional tatami Japanese dinner at 7), or a highly unusual entertainment (camel rides in Lanzarote), but sometimes not the name of the place or the exact timeline. The first international trips I recall with a clear sense of continuity were as a preteen. So it's up to you to determine whether you want to spend the money or not. Sometimes a trip *you* really want to do will just be for the photo op: "Hey kiddo, you went there when you where 2!". I know it's hard to wait when you want to show your children the world! Trust my experience, OP. If you want them to truly benefit from an intellectual and cultural standpoint, wait at least 5 years. |
Anonymous
| Agree with PP, this is very strange for families who are spread across the globe. If you need to visit family, you go wherever as soon as babies have been vaccinated and you've saved enough to afford the tickets...though I do remember trips starting when I was about 6...before that not really. |
Anonymous
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08:33 again... also want to say if you are interested in a particular language or culture, you will need to visit several times for the experience to really "stick" with your children. I remember Greece and certain other countries very well, since my parents took me there several times, and we could then visit different parts of the country each time, tour places in detail, cover historical and archeological sites. I don't recall as well countries I only visited once. Young children will also remember things that are important to then. Animals, fun rides, and above all, food! They won't remember why this mummy was in this tomb, and won't care about the agricultural and societal significance of the Nile in the early history of man. |
Anonymous
| I've traveled overseas since the kids were 1. Frankly it's much more enjoyable for you and the kids get more out of it once the youngest is 4. |