Travel plans with toddler and stork
By
on
January 18th, 2006
Print This Post
Email This Post
NYC early evening
Since the stork is coming this year it will make travel a bit more challenging. During the last ten years we have traveled A LOT. I rarely travel for work because I don’t have to unless I want to and I rather spend time with the family. But I’m blessed with lots of vacation each year and we enjoy visiting fun places. Before Daniel came around travel was very easy but now we have to plan more and go to slightly different places. Less mountain bike trips to Utah and Spain, no more jetting down to South Beach for the weekend, less jungle trips to Borneo, or rock climbing in El Chorro. So we have traveled a little less but of course we bring the little one on all our trips. Last year we did Italy twice, France, New York City, Hampton’s, Mexico City, Baja California, Gothenburg, Norway, and Boden (north of Sweden). Those were the trips that required a bit more travel time. It was a pretty decent year for vacations and we felt like we had plenty of time to relax at home and still do some fun trips.
If all goes well the stork will arrive in the beginning of August which will make flying a couple of months before and after less desirable. It’s still possible but we prefer not to unless it’s an emergency. To get some vacations out of the way we are starting off this year with a little adventure to NYC and Mexico. Next week we are heading to New York City for a week. I look forward to see some of our friends and also hook up with MetroDad and hopefully some other bloggers. Nothing special planned. Good food, friends, and some shopping. And of course blogging:-) NYC is not the most kid friendly place on earth but we lived there for many years and simply love the city. So far Daniel have been to NYC five times in 22 months. Not bad! Then we are going down to Mexico for a month. Spending a week in Mexico City with family and friends then we travel down to our favorite state, Oaxaca. Spending a week in the sun in Ixtapa (southern part of Mexico). Then we head over to the other coast and spend ten days in Baja California. Looking forward to see our God-daughter Ximena, hang out at the beach and do some mountain biking. Sandra’s sister Patricia and her husband have an adventure company, Naturadventure, so we’ll do some fun activities with them. So for the next five weeks we’ll see less of cold and dark Sweden and have some fun in the sun.
I just found out I will be going to the Annecy in the French Alps in the end of March for a global kickoff. That may sound like work but the program is usually something like this. Arrive Thursday, Friday, Sunday and Monday free time to do whatever you want. Saturday 0900-1100, Motivational speaker and the rest of the day free time. Sounds like I can manage this tough schedule….
I’ve been asked to play tennis in the German professional tennis league this summer so we’ll most likely spend two weeks down there playing tennis, drinking German beer, and seeing old friends from our professional tennis days. On the way down or back we look forward to a visit to Legoland in Denmark which should be a great adventure for Daniel. We’ll mostly likely drive down since Sandra hopefully will be far along in her pregnancy.
We might do a short trip up to the north of Sweden as well depending on how Sandra is feeling. Or perhaps I bring Daniel with me alone to give her some rest.
I somehow managed to have 40 vacation days this year and I plan to use many of them. When the stork comes another wonderful thing happens. We get 480 paid working days for parental leave to split in the family. That’s not a misprint. Since Sandra doesn’t work I could take a year and a half off with almost full pay!:-)) Of course I won’t use it all but just like with Daniel I plan on spending lots of time with our new addition to the family without screwing up work.
Towards the end of this year we want to go back to Mexico and New York City again. Probably a longer stay of two months or so like we did the previous year with Daniel. That’s the basic plan for this year. Much can still happen. Vacations can be missed or changed without problems. Our main concern this year is of course our new child and as long as he/she makes it here safely everything will be great.
Popularity: 5% [?]
Oh, I am green with envy! I do miss the European company my husband used to work for (Sanofi-Aventis) and their liberal time off here in the US. Now he works for an American company with two weeks’ vacation and he had to PURCHASE a third week.
Have a wonderful time!