Crossplay’s European Vacation Nears
The Klepek family is going international, but Crossplay won't be going offline! Plus, do you have any advice for traveling abroad with two young children?
In a few days, I’ll be boarding a flight to Europe as part of a lengthy vacation that’ll take me through London and Paris over nearly two weeks. It’s been a hot minute since I’ve traveled internationally before, and the biggest difference this time around will be traveling with family. Specifically, we’re headed overseas with both of our kids. Uh oh.
How will a five-year-old and eight-year-old handle crossing the ocean for eight hours?
Well, I’m about to find out. Do you have any advice?
Crossplay will, thankfully, keep trucking along while I’m gone.
I’ve lined up a series of guest pieces that will be published while I’m trying not to think about work. I’m proud of the guest pieces that have appeared on Crossplay, and I’m excited to share what people have been cooking. My ultimate goal with Crossplay was to, over time, more wholly represent the experience of parenting and guiding children with games and technology. I don’t represent the entire experience! At all!
My final piece ahead of vacation will be a guide to September’s family friendly games.
Back to the trip, though.
The basic arc of the vacation is a few days in London, two days at Disneyland Paris (shh, it’s a surprise!), and a week and change in Paris. Hanging out in Paris long enough to not feel rushed to do something every day is the point of the trip. Moving a few days into the London column and rewarding the kids for being brave and adventurous with Disneyland Paris is just a bonus. With any luck, we’ll celebrate our wedding anniversary by having the kids watched one evening and walk the catacombs.
I mean, in London we’re going on a Peppa Pig bus tour. Who’s got it better than us?
We’re flying out late on Thursday. The flight takes off around bedtime, and while it’ll take a minute for the adrenaline to wear off, our hope and dream is to, well, sleep. Eight hours isn’t so bad if you can spend most of it nodding off? I’m more worried about myself than the children, because I have trouble sleeping on flights. I’m hoping a few drinks will ease my anxiety and let me get, at the very least, a few hours of zZzZ.
Either way, we’re landing in the late morning in London. That transition should be fine. I’m more worried about heading back, when we leave Paris in the morning and arrive in Chicago in the morning, too. It feels like that’s going to be a very long day.
I have loaded up a Switch 2 and Steam Deck with games I’m, uh, unlikely to play?
If I’m able to put a decent number of hours into Donkey Kong Bananza and Ninja Gaiden: Ragebound, that’ll be enough. In theory, I should be using the trip to think about games as little as possible. But it’s impossible to fully turn that part of me off.
Your advice, in whatever form it takes, is appreciated in the comments.
A few things I am worried about:
Eating: Our children are not picky but their palette is, like many kids, a little limited. I’m assuming you cannot get mac and cheese at every restaurant.
Getting Lost: We’ve got armbands for the kids equipped with an AirTag? I know, it seems a little silly, but it feels like peace of mind while being somewhere else.
Sleeping: Holy hell, the sun goes down at nearly 10pm in Paris? Here’s hoping we can get a room dark enough to convince the children it’s eventually time to sleep.
Language: My wife, thankfully, is good at learning and parsing other languages. I am not. My children, obviously, are not! London is fine. Paris gives me anxiety. Having a phone that can translate everything in real-time is helpful, but still??
Travel Medical Insurance: Should we buy it?!
I’ll see you on Thursday!
Have a story idea? Want to share a tip? Got a funny parenting story? Drop Patrick an email.
Also:
We don’t have too many events planned for the trip. My wife’s goal was to, instead, let vibes guide us. We do have a few things prepped out, like the Louvre.
Some of my anxiety is not knowing how my kids will react. I understand how to handle a meltdown with my five-year-old here. The sheer mental exercise of wondering how to handle a similar situation in a Paris restaurant freaks me out.
Disneyland might guide our future trips. If this goes well, it seems like a decent excuse to find a way to visit, say, Tokyo or Hong Kong some years down the line.
We took our three kids (at the time 9, 8, and 6) to London and Paris last summer. We spent a week in London getting over jet-lag before taking the train to Paris for the Olympics. Here's my advice: Don't pin your own happiness on the kids' impressions of major tourist sites (they're probably going to find them kinda meh), and leave time/space for the kids to have their own memorable experiences.
My kids' favorite place in London was the Diana Memorial Playground (after several hours we had to finally pry them away with ice cream) and in Paris it was the Luxembourg Gardens. I doubt either of those parks cracks the top 10 of tourist sites, but they're both really fun for kids, and they're different enough from American playgrounds that my kids still remember and talk about the stuff they did there.
English has really taken hold in the Western European capitals, so while you can still expect to see and hear plenty of French in Paris (and the locals will appreciate a "Bonjour" and a "Merci,") you shouldn't have much difficulty communicating, and a lot of signage and menus will have English as well as French.
My experience travelling with a younger kid is that you can't overplan, you have to be open to occasionally stopping at a McDonald's or the equivalent, and if you happen to have accommodations with a fridge or kitchen, picking up a few things at the grocery store that you know will tide them over is a good idea.
I also recommend scoping out the parks and playgrounds near where you're going to be to give them a chance to let off some energy amid sightseeing.