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I touched on this lightly (and fairly hysterically) before when in the midst of travel hell. Low blood sugar, a cranky baby, and a challenging environment do not lead to good blogging.
We have traveled extensively with Elanor. Several long road trips and two trips to the western states from the East Coast here in the US. The UK was our first time abroad, and our longest trip to date at 19 days.
We were in Edinburgh for 12 of those days, and I found in incredibly difficult. The Scots are a lovely people and I want to say that people went out of their way to talk to Elanor, and (by extension) me. But as a destination, it is not a great option for families with small kids.
Things I wish I had known before we went
—Kids under 4 are not allowed on highland tour expeditions. Period. Even if you offer to bring a car seat. Even if you offer to bring a car seat and pay for a full adult fare. Even if you offer to do both of those AND sign a waiver releasing the company of all liability. I should know…I tried. FAIL.
–Conversely, most tour busses (the big red ones specifically) have a space for a wheelchair bound person OR one unfolded stroller on the ground floor of each bus. The issues with these is that it’s often hard to find one with a real live tour guide, so often you need to use the headphones, which presents multiple issues when with a small child.
–The licensing laws. Now if you’re one of those families where everyone eats before 5 (like my family was growing up) you won’t run into the sort of problems we did. However, should you want to eat after 5 with small kids (up to age 17), good luck. We found that there were two options…very expensive restaurants had paid for the expensive license OR McDonalds or a fast-food equivalent (most of which also close early). This was a HUGE pain in our asses. Scotland has a huge problem with alcoholism and so as a measure to not expose kids to the drinking culture, they’ve made licenses VERY expensive. Only one of our 5 star hotel’s restaurants had coughed up for it, and most restaurants didn’t. There was no comprehensive guide, and there were no signage laws (although the GM of the hotel told me this was changing) so the only way to find out if we could eat somewhere was to go and try to walk through the front door and get yelled at. This was not pleasant.
-Eating, other issues before 5. When traveling alone with an infant who isn’t walking, most eateries on the lower level or upper levels are unattainable. I desperately wanted Indian food. I couldn’t find one at street level, and folding the buggy up and carrying baby, buggy, diaper bag and all was not an option, especially once I tried that in a castle and broke the damn stroller so that it WOULDN’T fold up. Also, most restaurants did not have high chairs that in any way contained the kids…they were older, beat up and often missing straps. The high end places were the exception, as you would expect. But then we were paying the equivalent of over 100 for a two person meal, so there’s that…
-There’s just not much to do in Edinburgh with kids. There aren’t any kids museums or much of anything for them. Towards the end I found Molly’s…a soft-play indoor playground at a shopping Mall (Ocean Terminal, I think it was called…the royal yacht is there) and Elanor thought it was the coolest thing ever. I also heard of a children’s petting zoo that we didn’t make it to, but that’s about it. It’s just not a city with a lot of playgrounds or thought given to kids. This doesn’t make it a bad place, it just makes it a difficult place to bring a young child.
Would I say NEVER EVER go there? No…it would have been more fun with a 5 year old, particularly when we were there-Fringe Fest. There were lots of kids events, but it was made clear to us when we tried to show up at a few of them that the under 2 set was NOT welcome.
There are also some cheats we found to get around the challenges…
–We did a lot of room service, and it wasn’t bad. We also did a lot of stocking up at a local grocery store and making food that didn’t need to be cooked.
–I rented a car and a car seat and drove up to Loch Ness myself. In the end, this was far more fun than a tour group as I got to choose the route, stop whenever I felt the scenery merited a photo and Elanor was a peach, sleeping most of the time as she usually does on long car rides.
–We found a book meant for people who live in Edinburgh called Edinburgh with Under 5’s which does list some family friendly restaurants…it’s a bit heavy on the chains, but it was still a useful tool to find things to do.
Overall, I don’t find Edinburgh to be a great place to take your kids, but with some ingenuity it can still be a fun place. Easier to manage with a second adult or a walking child.
We have been in Edinburgh for 48 hours, and have been refused entry at multiple eateries, EVEN OUR OWN HOTEL’S restaurants because we’re with a child. Apparently there are all sorts of rules about licensure here, and most places that serve food (because they also serve alcohol) will not serve anyone under 17.
Unless you want to live at McDonald’s when you’re away…which I hate doing…avoid Edinburgh or don’t bother bringing the kids.
Dear Caledonian Hilton–you could have at least put a note in the guest rooms. Thanks so much for the humiliation.
While there are all sorts of ethical arguments for and against zoos, I’ve always been a big fan. I like seeing exotic creatures in person…while I do gobble up specials about them on television, nothing compares with seeing the real thing. I was happy to discover that my (then boyfriend) husband Ravi is also a fan. So it with no small bit of excitement that we have dragged Elanor to several zoos.
Ironically, she has only been to our local zoo (where we’re members) with me.
The FPZ is a fairly small (one might even say dinky) zoo. If you’re visiting from out of town, I wouldn’t bother. But as a resident, it’s a great place to meet up for play dates. There’s a small farm as well as the more exotic animals like the lion and the gorillas. It’s right in Boston, and has free parking (an exceptionally rare thing here in the city). While it’s not on the subway, it is bus accessible.
Elanor and I recently met up with a friend and his son, who’s just over a year. While my fellow parent and I were enjoying ourselves, but not overly impressed, the two little ones were fascinated by everything from the donkey to the baboon who sat and stared at them for a good several minutes. There were plenty of places where I felt safe letting my crawling wonder out to get a closer look through the glass or to explore a kid friendly area with the other toddler.
Right now we’re in the midst of the worst of the summer heat, so I don’t see us going back until fall (plus we’re away for 3 weeks in the UK) but it’s open year round and is always good for several hours of entertainment. So while it’s not a world class place like the Please Touch, it’s on my list of favorite places to take your kids.
We are currently back on vacation. Yes, again. Although really, it’s only vacation for Elanor and I, as Ravi is working.
Elanor and I went to the Please Touch Museum in Philadelphia on Saturday. It is quite possibly the best kids museum I’ve ever seen, especially for those of us with very young children. I have to admit to feeling torn as I drove past the Franklin Institute, which advertised its huge Star Trek exhibit…but I came to realize I’d made the best possible choice.
There are 8 or 10 rooms of exhibits. In each of the rooms there is a gated off section aimed at the under 3 crowd. Even our kids museum in Boston, which is a great kids museum doesn’t offer that kind of support to the under 3 set. There’s also a carousel, which Elanor rode by herself (well, she sat on the horse by herself with the strap around her and me standing next to her, holding her).
I think MY favorite part of the museum is the Alice in Wonderland exhibit. Kids can sit at a table and have a tea party with the Mad Hatter and March Hare. They can experience the hallway of doors where the doors got smaler and smaller and they get bigger and bigger. They can play croquet with a flamingo that really moves. They can crawl (if they’re as little as Elanor) through a croquet hoop (?) made of a playing card. They can paint the white roses red in the Queen of Hearts’ garden. They can be huge inside the White Rabbits’ House. There are mirrors and a maze. There’s a rock to stage your very own caucus race around. On and on…and the under 3 area there is nursery rhyme themed. Elanor was particularly enchanted by the cow (from jack and the beanstalk) that mooed when she touched it, and the spinning wheel (from sleeping beauty). There was also a line to hang mittens on with the 3 little kittens who had lost theirs, a ship like the one that the owl and pussycat rode on, and other things.
We spent an hour there, and would have stayed longer, but they were closing. I had thought an hour would be more than enough, but really I should have budgeted at least two, even with only an almost 9 month old.
I really have to say that I wish I had taken Elanor back on Sunday instead of taking her to the Adventure Aquarium which was okay, but nothing spectacular. The next time we’re in Philly, it’s my #1 destination with kids.
