Flying from Melbourne

[minniemumma]

How did people go with the length of the flight with small children from Australia to Disney World?
I have a DD that will be turning 3 on our trip and don't want to have to deal with jet lag once we get there. Also how did you keep your children busy and not bored?

 

[losfp]

Every kid is different, as the antenatal classes always tried to tell us

We are lucky that we have a really good traveller in our first daughter, The Superseded Model. She regularly takes 12 hour drives down to Geelong with Wifey, and took maybe 3-4 return plane trips to Geelong per year for the first 4-5 years of her life. When she was 2.5, we flew to Christchurch and she didn't get out of her plane seat once, either there or back - not bad for a 2.5 year old to sit still for over 6 hours in total. She was great in our flights to LA as well.

The other kid, Baby 2.0, I think we'll have more problems. She is more adventurous and will get into anything. I look forward to our big trip to Orlando, LA and Hawaii next year... should be interesting.

We always pack lots of things for the kids to do and play with - books, colouring books, (quiet) toys. We also have ipads as backup, though they only get used sometimes. Meals are always a good distraction. If you can find them a good kids video loop on the onboard entertainment, they will stare at it for hours.

Jet lag is a whole other thing - the first day is always a writeoff, but the trick for me is to try and fight through and sleep at the normal time in the destination timezone.

 

[Aussiefamof5]

How did people go with the length of the flight with small children from Australia to Disney World?
I have a DD that will be turning 3 on our trip and don't want to have to deal with jet lag once we get there. Also how did you keep your children busy and not bored?

Hi we flew from Sydney to lax last year, our little one was 3. We deliberately chose a late afternoon flight as we knew our little one would be tired my tips

Nurofen before the flight to help with any ear pain
A set of comfy kids headsets for watching TV
I chose 4 little presents for the flight, things she had never seen before brought out at approx every 4 hours
Colouring pens,
Invisible ink pens were great
Activity books, ie stickers drawing etc
Her favourite teddy, in our case 5 of them lol
Her favourite blanket
iPad with kids apps, eg disney junior
A small pillow for sleeping, eg pillow pet
Pacifier
Her favourite drinking cup
Some warm slipper/socks
We let our little one choose her own carry on bag, and got her involved with everything, we even pretended our couch was the plane so she got used to the squishyness.
Your little one will sleep I'm sure they get a bit grumpy towards the end but the new activity is always a great distraction

 

[minniemumma]

Thanks guys that's a big help. I am getting her some of her very own Minnie mouse luggage! It has a carry on that I will put some snacks and activities in for her. We have an ipad locked and loaded so just need to get some stickers and other Disney related bits that are new to keep her occupied

 

[WearegoingtoAmerica]

We flew over last year with our 6 kids including a 3 year old. We had iPads ready to go, as well as drawing things. They didn't come out of the bag. With the inflight entertainment, the food (of which none was ours) kept them all amused. My older kids could play battleship against each other even though they were in different rows. My DS3 did enjoy looking at the flight safety books in the back pocket. They also spent a lot of time talking to each other. The other thing is they sleep for a good portion of it. We did have FAA approved car seats for 3 of them that we had purchased in the US previously. This helps immensely for the younger ones I find. They are used to being in the car seat at home, so it's easy to be in it in the plane. We find it makes sleeping time easier too. However, we were travelling for 6 weeks and staying offsite, so used them constantly over there. My DS3 only got out to have his nappy changed (he was only just 3), and do his teeth. The rest of the time was happy to be strapped in. I know taking a seat doesn't work for everyone but for us, it's great.
Should say, we didn't fly to Orlando straight away, but flew Melbourne to Sydney, to Dallas, to Houston, so still a long day of flying.

 

[edeneye]

Jet lag is a whole other thing - the first day is always a writeoff, but the trick for me is to try and fight through and sleep at the normal time in the destination timezone.

+1 on that, I've made the flight twice from MEL-LAX-MCO and both times I've just stayed awake until night time in Florida and jet lag has completely passed me by both times. It hit my fiancee hard last time, I woke up one morning at 3am to her unpacking our bags. I went straight back to sleep and apparently she went down to the laundry and washed all our clothes!

They also recommend on the flight that you get up every couple of hours to stretch your legs and just do other stretches and exercises in your seat. I do this religiously and feel absolutely fine on arrival.

 

[minniemumma]

Yeah we are flying straight through to LAX from MEL now so I am hoping my DD sleeps on that flight and has her nap from LAX to MCO.
I think im going to not let her nap on the Friday so she goes to sleep really early on the Friday night and will wake up about 3am and then she can stay up from then. Hopefully that puts her on the right track.

 

[Aust]

We have only gone as far as LA with the kids but have done that twice with a 3 year old. I was really worried but they were actually fine - each time the 3 year old slept a good portion of the flight, as did the older kid/s (wish I could say the same for myself). They have always been more than entertained by the inflight entertainment and the novelty of the meals etc. I took a whole bunch of stuff with me the first time and hardly used any of it. Also for my son the DS was a lifesaver, he got it the day before we left and spent the whole flight playing that, watching his tv and sleeping.

As for jetlag we are big believers of the 'stay awake until normal bedtime on day of arrival' method. We've usually arrived at DL by lunchtime, spend the afternoon in the parks, have an early dinner then crash out by 8pm. Wake up at normal time the next day and be ready to go. Coming home has always been the hardest adjustment.