Extreme Dad

Long haul flights are fun when...

1.  There are no kids with you. 
2.  Work is paying for business class.
3.  There are no kids with you. 

And that, my friends, is going to be me tomorrow, because I'm flying back to London on my own to catch up with old friends, drink gallons of real beer and paint the town red for a conference.  I'm trying my level best to contain my excitement because I should be feeling sorry to leave the boys for a week.  Oh, and to a much, much lesser extent, guilty for leaving Zoe to cope with the little tykes on her own (she forgot my birthday last year). 

But the thought of being waited on hand and foot for 10 solid hours while not having to worry about Max running screaming up and down the aisles, or Tom throwing up over some lovely stewardess, is just too damn wonderful.  There will be no fight with Max in the airport when it's time to go through immigration and he wants to stay on the Postman Pat ride.  There will be no delaying the flight because Tom, seconds before boarding has mysteriously disappeared, only to reappear from behind the vending machine shortly after missing our takeoff slot.  And there will be no cringing from the hostile stares of other passengers, all praying "Please God, don't let it be me".

Oh yes,I fully intend to make the most of this and I won't pretend that I wish I didn't have to go.  I just hope there aren't any noisy kids on the flight.   People are so inconsiderate, travelling with babies and toddlers.  Little monsters should be put in the hold...

Pick of the holiday pics

Rare moment of contentment

Max's chum

Why you little....get back in that bath!

Match made in heaven

Oh, the shame (unExtreme Dad)

I was going to pretend that this didn't happen, but while, through years of practice, I can lie to my wife with the greatest of skill and ease, I just can't lie to you lot.

The truth is, we abandoned our holiday after 10 days.  While fun for the first week, it was, well, just too much effort.  It had turned from a holiday into just temporary change of scenery, and the house we were staying in quickly changed from rustic to basic to unbearably hot and dirty.  We realised that while we could easily cope without the creature comforts we've come to rely on to make raising two toddlers that little bit easier, we just didn't want to.  So we changed our flight and came home a week early.  Pathetic.

The shame of it is that we love adventure travel and we, well I, believed we could take the little monsters almost anywhere.  I had grand visions of climbing K2 with Max before his 3rd birthday.  And of trekking across Alaska with Tom before he turns two.  Now I know that's just not going to happen.  Until at least their 5th birthdays...         

Defeat of The Beach

Eat my dust, Beach!

What's that? You want some more?!

The power of the Cornetto

It looks like my cunning plan has worked and we may have conquered Tom's fear of the beach.  I say 'may' because I'm not counting any chickens - I'm reserving final judgement until tomorrow's trip.  But today, by the end of the afternoon I had him running up and down the beach squealing with delight.  And get this, he even ventured, albeit cautiously, to the water's edge.

OK, so it had nothing to do with my cunning plan.  I was tempted to take the credit, but much as I'd like to, I'm afraid I have to cede it to icecream, and Mr Cornetto in particular.  When we arrived on the beach it looked like we had gone back to square one, with Tom squealing like a stuck pig as soon as he caught sight of, shock, horror - sand.  We tried the same technique as yesterday, eventually putting him in a little 'sand pool' Max and I had created through an hour sweat and toil ("You will like it, Tom...").  But Tom was wise to that trick and clung for dear life to Zoe.

That is, until an icecream vendor came along and one Cornetto was all it took for him to forget primal terror.  Within seconds, the beach was suddenly OK. That one Cornetto may have cost the equivalent of a 15 course dinner at the Ritz,  but it's the best 8 squillion Bolivars I've ever spent.

Tom Vs The Beach

Ok, so Tom is making a tiny bit of progress on the beach.  He's still not happy with it, but I devised a cunning plan yesterday to help him on his way.  I bought him one of those little plastic blow-up swimming pools (only just big enough for him to squeeze into) and we plonked him that at the top of the beach.  After 10 minutes or so, he was happily splashing around, and leaving him with Zoe, Max and I went down towards the sea, dug a hole in the sand and filled it with water.  We then got Tom and plonked him gently into it.  Cue much screaming.  But after 5 minutes of gentle coaxing we managed to get him to sit in it.  I wouldn't say he was actually having fun, but every now and then he forgot he hated it so much.  We'll try again today.

Not very extreme Tom

Tom hates the beach.  No, is terrified of the beach...We just can´t understand why because he has enioyed it in the past.  But now, when I try to put him down on the sand he screams.  A bit like the way he screamed when he had to have yellow fever and typhiod vaccinations in the same sitting. 

Forget the long term ramifications of Tom hating the beach (I live for it), a two week beach holiday just isn´t going to be a great deal of fun if he does (there´s not much else to do here) .  It´s now my mission in life to get him over this sudden and unexplained terror.      

Margarita, Venezuela

The flight to Margarita on a Venzuelan airline was, er, interesting.  A little 19 seater job that probably took its maiden flight in 1928.  I wasn't even 49% certain it was going to get us here, but Margarita is only 40 minutes away, so I gambled that as long as the pilot could get us to 22 thousand feet, we could glide the rest of the way if (or when) the engine gave up the ghost.

Amazingly, we arrived without too much terror, but the taxi ride from the airport soon made up for that.  We're in a nice little house, basic, but adequate for our needs, a couple of hundred metres from the beach.  What's really nice is that we're right next door to a Venezuelan family who have two little boys and little girl around the same age as Max and Tom.  They're all best of friends already,  so I expect Max to speak far more than my meagre 5 words of Spanish by the time we leave in two weeks.

My one complaint so far is about the beach vendors.  Hey, I know they're trying to make a living, but these ones are persistent and don't take no for an answer.  I swear to god, I counted how many there were this morning, and I had AT LEAST one every 30 seconds come up to me and offer, no demand I buy, everything from knock off shades to sharks' teeth. Ahhhhhhhhhh!!  In the end, even Max was saying 'NO!' before I could!

Blowing this joint, manyana!

Phew!  Hectic few days at work (I didn't see the boys at all yesterday)...But it's all over now and we're going to Margarita,Venezuela, tomorrow for two blissful weeks (although I made the fatal mistake of giving my boss my cell number).  And guess what?  I didn't even get upset when Zoe said I couldn't take my kitesurfing gear.  All I want to do at this stage is lie on the beach and read my book, build sand castles with the boys and have the occasional dip.  Yeah, I know all that will change as soon as we get to the beach and there are 20 guys ripping it up on the water, but at the moment I'm just looking forward to spending some quality time with my little fellahs.

From adventure to all-inclusive (well, not quite that bad)

Has anyone done any real adventure travel with toddlers?  I spent a month trying to decide where to go for our annual holiday this year.  I wanted to do something thrilling.  Something we haven't been able to do since the birth of Max two and a half years ago.  I started off with a trip up the Amazon, something we've always wanted to do.  But the thought of trying to control two unruly toddlers on a small boat for days on end soon put paid to that idea.  Then there was Peru and Machu Picchu.  Somewhere else on the top 10 list of places to go.  But I would have ended up carrying both boys and Zoe all the way to the top.  And I'm NOT taking a train to Machu Piccu...

After Zoe batted another idea or two into touch, we came to an agreement to consider a Llama trek in the Sierra Nevada.  Lamas only spit at people they don't like.  Or so claimed the Llama Trek website.  Much to my shame, this idea was eventually dropped too for various reasons, practical in nature, and all centring around being stuck out in the wilderness with a 1 and a 2 year old.

So where are we going on holiday next week?  Margarita Island, off the coast of Venezuela.  I musn't be blase about Margarita.  After all it's a beautiful Caribbean island with Latin flavour.  But it's just not adventurous.  Its saving grace, however, is its trade winds, so the kitesurfing should be good.  I haven't broke the news to Zoe yet that we're leaving Tom behind to make space for my 17m Carbrinha kite...