BootsnAll Travel Community

We are planning our RTW trip with our (will be) 2 year old. Does anyone know if a car seat is required in Europe, Australia or New Zealand? We will also be in Asia/Southeast Asia, but I'm assuming it's not required there...

New Zealand requires a car seat. We were there for two months with our family of four kids. Wonderful experience. By the way, I don't know if you are planning to rent or buy (and then resell) but we found a really good rental place for cheap and yet with nationwide service. It made a lot of sense to be able to simply drop off the car at the end.

Yep - you need one here in NZ.
Had you considered something like this?

http://www.stork-to-chalk.co.nz/thepod.html

http://www.flyingwithkids.com/sit_n_stroll_flight_car_seat_stroller.htm

Or just hire one with your car!

quote:

Originally posted by Kids-to-go:
... we found a really good rental place for cheap and yet with nationwide service. It made a lot of sense to be able to simply drop off the car at the end.

Would love to find out where you rented! Please let me know!

If you travel with one from the states, you are most likely safe. The one thing that you might look at is the different countries that require the seat to be turned facing the back. In several countries, it is an age thing, not by the size of the child.

I have a really skinny kid who still needed to be in a regular car seat when we left as she only weighed 30lbs at 5, but we found this:

http://www.showeryourbaby.com/risatrvebkid.html

And it was one of our best investments of multi year RTW trip. It is very light and you can bring it with you ( we took it all over Morocco).

It works really nice in a camper van as well as a car so gives you lots of flexibility and very easy to deal with.

YES you will need some kind of car seat in most of Europe. Good thing too I think, as even a sudden stop could send a little one flying into something hard.

Car seats are required, if not just wise, in most European countries. In fact, most taxis in Vienna will not drive with a small kid in the car unless s/he is in a car seat.

If you plan to rent a car, you can request a childs/baby's seat. We have always been able to rent a car with a seat. The quality of the seats have been mixed.

Anyone know about whether car seats are required in Mexico? Or California? Or of a website that lists all the car set laws in different countries? (Or is that asking too much??) I've got a friend who's asking, my cats (so far) aren't interested in traveling.

quote:

Originally posted by JessieS:
Anyone know about whether car seats are required in Mexico?

No.

We also went to Cabo last Spring, and they chucked my daughter's car seat into the back of the van with our luggage, apparently because they try to pile as many people in there as possible. My 1 1/2 year old (at the time) had to sit on my lap.

It would be great if there was some place where you could check for requirements, but I haven't found that yet. Of course, I'd love to use the car seat for safety purposes, but if I'm not going to be able to use it, I don't want to lug it there.

Gloria
riolatravels.blogspot.com

A couple of car seat requirement websites:

US, by State
UK

I've never seen much emphasis on them in Mexico through Central/South America, but I'm not sure what the laws are. We spent last winter in Paraguay "crossing our fingers" with our five year old - certainly not the ideal scenario, but it was the reality of life there.

As a pediatric trauma nurse, I cannot say strongly enough that the legal requirements of a country isn't the issue - it's about what is the safest for your baby. I spent 3 days last month with a mom trying to come to terms with her 16 month old being a parapalegic all her life because she chose not to put her in a car seat. I've also seen children disfigured and/or seriously brain injured from going through glass windshields. Of course, I only see the kiddos that survive. Going through this hellish experience at home is horrifying enough - imagine in, say, Thailand....

Sorry for the graphic post, but I've seen it way, way too many times.

Penny Lane
I've been thinking about your post on and off ever since you posted it.
What would you do.......we visited family in Malaysia and they picked us up in vans and took us everywhere - only seat belt in the van was devoted to our baby in the carseat, but the rest of us didn't use belts. There weren't any. WOuld you feel strongly enough about this to hire your own vehicle? And even if you did, could you be assured there would be seat belts?
This is bothering me with regards to our upcoming trip.

I think this says it well ( from the sixintheworld blog a family of 6 who did a one year RTW trip last year):

quote:

Safety Schmafety
By Anne
After you’ve been away from the developed world for a while, you forget the degree to which safety has become entrenched in our lives. Seat belts, handrails, crosswalks, disinfectants, and strict codes and regulations punctuate our experiences in every means of transport and almost all settings. Much of the world has neither the ability nor the inclination to enforce such conventions. Anything with wheels is loaded with as much cargo–human, animal, and otherwise–as it can carry and sometimes more. People ride on rooftops, hang from bumpers and siderails, and cram themselves with sweaty masses into putrid, filthy spaces in an effort to get from one place to another. Anything that can be eaten is eaten, even if spoiled or tainted, because when you’re desperately hungry, such distinctions are irrelevant. Any structure that provides protection from the elements is inhabited even if it’s in danger of toppling, collapsing, or exploding because short-term survival outweighs long-term safety.

We’ve learned to adapt to the local conditions as we’ve traveled, understanding that a certain level of risk is required to experience the world. So far we’ve stayed both safe and healthy even though we’ve gone months without seatbelts and days without clean clothes. We’ve ridden unpredictable creatures through treacherous landscapes, eaten more than a few cockroach-riddled entrees, and hurled down sand dunes on flimsy plastic mats. Somehow our combination of common sense and good fortune have carried us through everything we’ve encountered.

Even in Europe the safety standards are FAR BELOW what we expect in the US. ( I know you are not from there but I can not speak yet of the differences with your country as I have not been yet). They think nothing of lighting fire crackers right next to kids, many restaurants on cliffs have no barriers to stop kids or toddlers from falling off to their deaths, almost no stairs have railings etc etc etc.


I was scared to death for my daughter in Morocco because mostly we could not find any transportation without seat belts. We lugged our little travel vest all over the country, but only used it once as most of the seat belts are taken out of the cars!!

It is a risk, probably a big risk, but we have had no choice but to take this risk sometimes. We try to avoid it, but we have not always been able to do that. All you can do sometimes is pray.

If you are taking your children around the world, you will run into risks that you do not have at home. That is frightening for a mother at times. Each must make their own decision on how to handle this. Anne let her 14 year old bungie jump in Africa, which is not something I would do and this entry goes on to describe another very dangerous event when they decided to do some para sailing with the little ones in Tunisia.

The lack of safety measures around the world will amaze you, but you get used to it after a while. Do what you can, but know that there will be risks along the way.

Mama-to-many:
I don't know what I would do if I was in the situation of really really dreaming of going RTW somewhere where I couldn't be assured of car safety standards. I think that personally I would wait until my kid were big enough not to need a car seat if renting cars without belts or getting a car seat was impossible. But it is a really difficult decision. Because, it doesn't (thankfully) happen that often. But when it does...

I think I am so close to this personally on an almost daily basis, it makes the decision easier for me. It is so very devastating and heartbreaking when your child is irreperably harmed. If you haven't seen that horror or had to live through it, you simply cannot imagine it. I think taking risks is important if it means living a quality adventurous life. But if your kid gets a brain or spinal cord injury, the likely hood of their taking an amazing journey around the world as an independent adult becomes a moot point. Their quality of life is impacted enormously. Is it OK to take that kind of risk for another person who can't make that choice for themselves? And for me, that's what it fundamentally comes down to. I cannot make those decisions for my child. I cannot make a decision for him to risk being able to walk again for the rest of his life so that we can go do xyz, no matter how gorgeous and enriching xyz is.

I also think that there is a romanticized idea of how other cultures experience risk and the repercussions. I mean, look at them, look at their kids riding in the back of the pickup! Nothing happens to them, right? Unfortunately, their kids get injured and/or die a lot more then ours do. Kids fall off cliffs. Kids get their fingers blown off. We visit the beaches and the markets, but don't really ever see the local trauma hospitals.

But I think that if someone is resourceful enough to figure out how to do a RTW with their 2 year old, with all the other logistical issues at hand, getting to a car seat is probably small beans.

Thanks for your great reply. One of the reasons we have waited until our youngest is two is that a 2yo is big enough to use a standard seatbelt (if propped up on a booster seat - or bag).
My concern is those places that don't have seatbelts at all. A family member in Malaysia has offered us theuse of a van, but we know it only has belts in the front - on our last trip we used it - the seatbelt issue caught us by surprise and we just went ahead.....but this time, we know and are wondering waht to do about it.
Most of our trip will be on trains and a few busses - in more worrying moments I even wonder about them, but at the end of the day, you cannot eliminate every single risk.
I suspect we are minimising our risks by trying to stay out of cars.
Again, thanks for your thoughtful reply.

quote:

at the end of the day, you cannot eliminate every single risk.

That is the bottom line. Life is one big risk and as much as one would like to, you can not eliminate every risk.

Remember that most people who do a RTW trip do not have problems. Your odds are different than someone who lives in this environment their whole life. Remember too that whole generations grew up without seat belts and most survived it. I grew up in the 50's and my mom drove all over with her 4 babies and never thought a thing about having no seat belts for us as they had not been invented yet.

You are all going to encounter more risks as you travel. There is no way around it. You will worry and sometimes be scared to death for you and your child/ren. But it is also this pattern which will strengthen you and your children and is part of the reason to go.

You can not avoid all risks in travel or a life without travel. You can just do what you can do.

I do not want to make less of this danger, but I do think Penny Lane has a position that impacts her as she mentions. My husband had a friend whose child lost his eye, so he is always extremely focused and extra paranoid about anything that might damage our child's eyes.

I think one must think in terms of calculated risks. Don't look at the child who has died from this, but the percentages and odds. The greatest risk in travel ( by percentages) is getting travelers diarrhea and that is riskier in children than adults, but it can also be prevented by common sense precautions and good hygene ( at home and in riskier countries). Don't take unnecessary risks, but don't worry excessively either. Look at all who do not have a problem, instead of the small percentage that do. Think in terms of odds, instead of focusing on the sad victims.

At a certain point, when it is your time to go, it is your time to go. You can not prevent destiny for yourself or your children. Both my brother and my MIL were hit by cars and neither made any sense at all and should never have happened.

My brother wandered the world and took all kinds of risks like riding a bike illegally on hwy 17 in silicon valley which is one of the most dangerous roads in the world. He jumped freight cars and even stowed away on a Russia ship once. He lived a highly dangerous life and none of it killed him when it would have been logical. He rode his bike on highways crisscrossing the U.S. many times and traveled to 3rd world countries.

It would have been more logical for him to die from that high risk behavior, but it did not happen. When he died he was not doing anything dangerous at all. He was helping a friend and he was far from the road on a lonely 4 way highway that nobody usually uses, just taking off his shirt as the day was getting hot. A drugged out kid in a stolen car somehow managed to run him over. My MIL was crossing the street a block from her home to get some sugar when she died. There was no rhyme or reason for either death, it was just their time to go.

Death and disaster will come when it comes no matter how safe one lives. My brother was happy with his 40 years of life lived to the full and really lived more in his years than most do with more years.


We love our travel vest, that I have mentioned before, so I would look into that. It is light and easy to carry and works great.

Worrying about all the possible dangers and possible disasters is just part and parcel with planning a RTW trip...more so for a parent. I think for the most part, you will worry less once you start going and get some if it under your belt and find it is less dangerous than you imagined. Carpe diem! Do what you can and keep your focus on the positive.

Firstly, you need a car seat or booster seat in the UK until your child is about 11 years old. You can hire them with the car or maybe get hold of a second hand one via a website like freecycle or a charity shop.

Secondly, I agree with WT. Terrible things can happen when you take every precaution. A friend of ours lost her very sensible 9 year old daughter, who was hit by a car (not speeding) when she crossed the road. We live in a quiet residential neighbourhood and it was unlike her to cross without checking, but that day she did. These things can happen, however careful you are.

I think you have to decide what is an acceptable risk for yourself, and take sensible precautions, but also live your life without too much fear. To me, always being scared of stuff is no way to make the most of the time that we do have on earth.

Personally, I don't want to reach the end of my life and regret all the things I didn't do. I also want to share the stuff that's important to me with my children. Although I'm quite happy to live without bungee jumping!

Thanks for that Wallop - when we get to the UK we are hoping to buy a van and caravan for travelling round England/Scotland/Wales and then over to Europe.....at that point it's entirely in our hands and we'll be buying booster seats for sure. Ebay here we come!

"at the end of the day, you can't eliminate every single risk..."

Well,that's exactly it right there. You can't. And you should take risks to live an extraordinary life, for sure. But there are simple risks you can eliminate. If so very much of our destinies are out of our hands, why not embrace that which you can control? Like riding a motorcycle across the country....Of course you should do it. But why would you not wear a helmet? You could get completely squarshed by a tired truck driver, but why die from hitting an embankment going 30MPH? I think it's an interesting conversation, and I think that where people draw their own personal risk/benefit lines is interesting too. And I think that it's great this forum exists so we can get a heads up, as parents, as to what we need to expect and anticipate. Like travel vests, that's great.

As far as calculated risks go, the number one cause of death in young children in the US, per the CDC, isn't diarrhea, it's accidental trauma. If your kid gets diarrhea in a third world country, you probably have the money to get them to a hospital and get treatment, no problem, no big deal (well, probably fairly distressing and not very fun, but you know, things happen). The reason diarrhea is a primary cause of death in developing nations is a lack of basic hygeine and access to healthcare.

I've seen kids get serious head injuries falling off of playground equipment too. Do I let my kid play on playgrounds? Of course. Kids die in car accidents even if they are properly strapped into their car seats. It's not 100%, obviously.

Also, WT, there were whole generations of kids who grew up without seat belts and were just fine. When I was 10, I rode 30 miles holding on for dear life to a goat in the back of grandpa's pickup truck while he was going 50 MPH. Sure, it was part of growing up in the country. Nobody thought twice about it, and now it's a fun story. BECAUSE WE'RE NOT DEAD. Just saying. My Step-dad was a state trooper in the 70's, and he'll tell you lots of fun stories about people who don't have the same benefit of being alive to chuckle about it later. I'm sorry WT, but that rational is one I hear often, and it really truly makes no sense. The reason these laws were enacted is in large part because police officers and first responders got tired of the daily trauma of scraping people (literally) off the side of the road.

Also,if you're going to get a car seat second hand, try to ensure it hasn't been in an accident before, because that could compromise it.

Just for the record, I actually don't worry excessively about my kid despite my exposure to the 101 things that can go tragically wrong. It's honed my sense of do what you can and give the rest to God. I'm the parent who lets my kid eat dirt and get wet and drags them off at all hours and sometimes I think he may have had mild hypothermia from camping. But he can't run with pencils and he needs to be in a car seat. Simple. Oh, and he can't sit on the stove to watch water boil. Really, people do that.