Bubbles!

Time has flown by so fast, I never reported back on our SECOND holiday abroad with Drew AND my parents. Check out the photos HERE.

It was in Madeira and it was lovely!

However, we have a few learnings which I can share with you...

Airport Parking (Bristol) - silver zone parking - Although the service is very good, you have to first drive around and find a space, argue about which direction you should be going then park. Once parked, you have to walk to the central point and hand over your keys and car details to someone called Sharon. You then wait OUTSIDE for a bus to pick you up to take you over the road to the Airport Terminal (I hate that word for an Airport). On your return, you have to again wait for a bus. If you're one of the lucky ones and there is already a bus waiting for you, you may be too late. There will be a sudden push to get on that bus and whether you have a baby or not and whether its midnight or not, you'll probably have to wait to the next one as you can't run with suitcase and a buggy and shove everything on at the same time. When another bus DOES arrive 10minutes later, you are glad that the bus is heated as you've been waiting out in the midnight air. With your baby. The bus drops you at the central point where you find the previous bus passengers all lined up, waiting to see Sharon or one of her mates to get their keys back. You join the long queue...probably right at the back because, of course, you have your buggy as well and people don't like to help as they have their own suitcase to worry about and run with. You wait OUTSIDE for about 30minutes. Once your keys have been returned, you have to find your car which has been moved nearer for you, but you have to wait whilst your other half goes to collect it and warms it up ready for you and your baby.
My advice: PARK AT THE AIRPORT


Sun Protection for your baby - tried and tested must have - You've got to buy a Beach Cabana! Its THE best thing. With SPF50, its a pop-up tent which Drew played in everyday. Check out my previous post HERE (Mar 08 'Holiday Success') to get more details. Drew didn't sleep in it this time around as I think she was a bit bigger and because she'd just started crawling, so she was curious to see what was OUTSIDE the tent. However, Drew DID play in there with a selection of her toys (rotated regularly to prevent baby boredom!). We made the inside quite luxurious with a couple of thin soft mattresses 'borrowed' from the apartment. The tent folds back up to a flat disc shape which is good, but doesn't tend to do it as quickly as you would like when the sun disappears and the rain chucks down. You've never seen anything like it...Jerry in his shorts and my Dad in his speedos (which are just a tad too big) carrying the tent with all the toys and stuff in it, still popped up. Classic. No baby was harmed in the removal of the tent during the rainstorms.
My advice: INVEST IN A BEACH CABANA TENT

Jacuzzi / Hot Tub - aren't they lush?? - Yep. We all love a good HOT hot tub don't we? The hot shallow water, the comfortable underwater seating, the stimulating bubbles, basking in the sun. Hmmm...do you realise how many chemicals go into something like this to keep it this hot? The safety signs always say 'children to be supervised at all time'...so that's what we did. We didn't see the OTHER safety sign which stated 'children under 2 should not use hot tub as they may have an allergic reaction'. It might have helped if this sign was NEAR the hot tub!!!

And then what followed was...the rash, head to toe red spots, emergency clinic visit, medication and lastly, shame!! You can picture it can't you. We sort of panicked, but didn't want to show the other how panicky we were inside, so we did a good job of keeping calm until the Doc confirmed it wasn't meningitis, legionnaires or chicken pox, but an embarrassing case of bad parenting. The Doctor was very understanding and put us completely at ease and reassured us the spots would go with some medicine. He was right. We won't be doing THAT again anytime soon!

My advice: DON'T EVEN BOTHER TAKING YOUR L.O. INTO A HOT TUB