Caiman Pacifying the Offspring (3)
Created | Updated Nov 8, 2020
You know the feeling? Everything sorted out, soulmate found, genes mixed nicely and hatched, growing like hell... And now what?
Caiman Pacifying the Offspring (3)
Age dependent holiday strategies 1.5
Apart from the mountaineering camps I spoke to you about earlier (see part 1), we did a lot of other things during our holidays, each depending on the abilities of the children.
This time I will tell about when the twins were 1.5 years old:
We went on the GR5 trail, a long-distance path we have been walking since way before we had kids. Each time we continued where we had left off the last time. This time we walked in the French Vosges region, using consecutive base camps along the route every three to four days. The logistics for getting to and from start and end of the stretch of the day consisted of the car and one bicycle. Having one on either side, picking up the other afterwards. (preferably choosing the walking direction such that you mainly go downhill on the bike (unless you want to torture yourself (more))). The kids went in carriers on our back. That worked well up to the point where we reached a more remote stretch without car accessibility for several days. There were some mountain huts though. After first checking if the huts were open, we found ourselves at the bottom of the valley, fully packed with kids, diapers, food, water, both packs well over 25 kilogrammes, wondering 'Are we really going to do this?'. We did. Given that most huts in the Vosges region are skiing huts, we were the only living souls there, except for the landlords, usually students who needed peace and quiet, or retirees seeking the same. The advantage of being sole customer is that you are free to rearrange the furniture in the hut such that it is safe(ish) for your toddlers to roam and to learn to walk in the process (in our case). Possible downside is the amount of Ooohs and Aaaahhs you get upon arrival, especially with the retiree landlords. Safe sleeping is one thing to deal with on a day to day basis. Some huts had a travel cot, most didn't. This led to us zipping together two sleeping bags, holding one toddler foot each all night or cordoning off areas with high enough barriers.
Since you can't have your kids in the carriers all day (it's not good for their backs and for the emotional wellbeing of all participants), regular breaks are important. It also creates some more space between their mouths and your ears (very important). During one of these breaks we observed the blueberry event, which I will now recount. What do you think happens when toddlers find out they like blueberries and then get placed in the middle of a forest floor full of them? We saw two varieties. One toddler managed to pick the berries off the plant and put them in his mouth (most of the time). Number two still had to work out a way to not squash the berries between her fingers, finally reverting to gripping the whole plant between two hands and eating the berries right off the branch instead (victory!). Baby wipes are ideal after a blueberry-munching event.
One tip I would like to share for free: A heavy duty rain suit with waterproof footwear is ideal on toddlers. You can just wipe them dry / clean and let them loose in wet grass if they want to. Back then we made our own suits from synthetic tent fabric, but nowadays they are for sale in these small sizes.
What happens when you have added another kid in that age range will remain a secret for now. We will get to that later (spoiler alert: it is different).
