Travel Summaries: 10 hour Road Trip Alone with a Newborn

Solo travel is huge phobia for most parents. This new mom in her late 20s took to the road with her 4 month old son for a 10 hour road trip from Pennsylvania to Michigan.

Here is a quick summary of her trip:





My husband and I decided that at 4 months old it was time to take our son to Michigan to meet my extended family for the first time. We wanted to make the most of our vacation time even though the dates for our two jobs didn't quite line up. So we decided I would drive to Michigan ahead of time with the baby and my husband would fly in a few days later to meet us. Then of course we would all drive back to Pennsylvania together.

It is about a 10 hour drive if I went non-stop. But with a little baby, there was no way a non-stop trip would be possible. My plan was to stop every two hours or so to nurse and give the baby a break from his car seat. I also called ahead to a relative in Ohio at the halfway point to let them know I would be stopping in for a visit and a nap.

My plan more or less worked. The only things I would have done differently is to get a mirror of some sort so that I could have seen him and he could see me. I think he got a bit bored at times when he was awake just staring at the back of the back seat.



The other thing I wish I had thought through was the whole idea of breast feeding at rest stops. Really just feeding him in general. Since the idea was to get out of the car and into the sun and fresh air for a bit, I would take him over to a quiet park bench for a bottle. In the car it was a bit uncomfortable to breastfeed with so many people walking by. I had myself covered with a burp cloth but something a little larger would have been better.



But even bottle feeding outdoors was not as easy as I would have thought. People are nosy. VERY NOSY!!! Especially when you have a round little baby in your lap. Everyone wanted to come over and take a peek at him which was very distracting to us both and slowed us down a lot. I quickly learned that it was better to feed him in the car so he would get his food down calmly and quickly, and then take a walk about the rest stop so he could get air and people-watch a bit.

All in all it was a great trip and I would do it again if I had to. Having another driver of course would have been great, but being able to spend those extra days with my family back in Michigan made the whole endeavor well worth the added effort.