How far can you ride with a baby?

[Kiwi Stoker]

I am pregnant with my first child and I want some realistic advice here.

DH and I love cycling and we really love riding our tandem. However we now live in a different country to both of our parents (been here for a little over a year) so we don't have instant babysitters.

I was wondering how far can you realistically cycle with a 9 month+ baby in a baby seat on the rear.

Here's the conditions we would cycle-

Baby would have to be well and not sick
Weather would have to be suitable
We mainly ride off-road concrete bike paths at the moment anyway so we don't go very fast anymore, plus also don't do steep decscents
We currently are coffee shop breakers. We normally ride 20-30km and stop for coffee and snacks.
We normally do a total distance of 60-80km in one ride (so possibly stop twice or more).
I currently wear a Camelbak so am OK to wear a larger Camelbak to stash baby stuff.

So am I mad to think about riding with a baby so young? I realise we might have to slowly build up distance and time so the baby can get used to it. Or are we simply best to find a babysitter and leave baby off the bike until much older?

We have vetoed a trailer for the tandem as it makes it just too long and some of the bike paths have nasty chichane things to get through.

[lph]

Sorry, we only used a trailer (with great success, I should add, he slept like... well, a baby). But as I recollect the general advice was: don't put your baby in a seat until she can sit by herself, and don't have her there longer than she could sit by herself otherwise. Suspension is also an issue. Babies have big huge heavy heads and weak necks to hold it all up with. So I think realistically you're looking at less than an hour at a time, at gentle speed on non-bumpy roads. Trailers are better for babies, at least the ones that are large enough to put a reclining seat in.

They do get bigger and stronger very fast, though, so I wouldn't despair if this sounds like very little. A small child, 1-3 years old, can handle bike rides a lot better.

How about hiking instead? You can get baby carriers than can be used for very small babies that support their heads well. Worth considering for those first months?

[shootingstar]

Nothing to add here, except congrats.! May it all go well.

[velo]

First of all, congratulations!!

I couldn't ride at all for years. I had to take a break from cycling. It's less up to us as parents and more up to the child's temperament. They don't often conform to what we want, especially as babes in arms. The funny thing was that I had planned all this stuff and it just went out the window the moment I became a mother. She had other plans. All for the better... being a mom is eleventy times better than any bicycle. I wouldn't ride with a small child, anyway, as mentioned above. Their necks are so, so weak for the first few years. Even a mild jolt could cause problems.

I will say that we ascribe to the rearing philosophy of Attachment Parenting, which has proven to be very successful for our now 11 year old. Without a doubt, that had an influence on my activities, including riding.

Best of luck!

[Irulan]

Trailers are much safer and more comfortable for the baby. They can nap with more support to their neck and whole body. You can also bring more toys snacks diapers whatever along.

[Melalvai]

Unfortunately I didn't start biking a lot until my daughter was a preteen. And I don't know a lot of parents who bike with babies. I wish I could offer more advice. My understanding is it can be done safely and conveniently, and that you have to be flexible, as with everything with babies. Whether you wait a year until the baby is old enough for the bike seat, or get a trailer, I think it would be a lot of fun. The other advantage of a trailer is you can put the baby bag in there. I have heard that in the US trailers aren't rated for babies less than a year old but in other countries the same trailer is rated for <1 yr old.

[Catrin]

No advice but many, many CONGRATULATIONS!!!!!

[Crankin]

Congrats!
But please re-think the trailer. It is just safer.
And don't let anyone tell you life stops when you have a baby. It only does if you let it. I sincerely wish I had done all of the outdoor stuff I do now, with my kids, from an early age.

[pll]

Trailers are much safer and more comfortable for the baby. They can nap with more support to their neck and whole body. You can also bring more toys snacks diapers whatever along.

Let me just add something from watching some friends of mine: kids fall asleep easily, making neck support a bigger issue. My friends took their oldest kid in a bike seat as toddlers. Within less than 2 hours, the kid was asleep.

[Irulan]

more on the backseat safety issue... I missed at first that you want to put a baby seat on the back of the tandem... Let me ask you this, have you ever ridden the tandem with 15-30 pounds of dead weight on the way back? It's hard enough for single person to hold the bike up when putting a foot down with that on the back, let alone the captain of the tandem dealing with it. Yikes!
If the tandem is non negotiable, what about a wee ride Kangaroo? http://www.weeride.com/
These things are awesome. We used similar with our kids before trailers were out. The kid is out front, not looking at your butt all day. The center of gravity is much more stable, and they are closer to a parents voice and face.

[tealtreak]

Congrats!
But please re-think the trailer. It is just safer.
And don't let anyone tell you life stops when you have a baby. It only does if you let it. I sincerely wish I had done all of the outdoor stuff I do now, with my kids, from an early age.

Ditto on this thought- though I (luckily or crazily) did lots of hiking, camping and paddling with my kids as they were growing up- as well as being gym rats in bad weather. It was often kid oriented -toned down versions (especially backpacking and biking) but SO worth it! My kids and I now do fun outdoor stuff together for our entertainment/holidays/vacations! They are all old enough that they now push me (never let them know it haha)

[Crankin]

Well, I was a gym rat when my kids were really little, so at least they saw me exercising . However, we did do a lot of nature walks, etc, and I taught them to x country ski when they were 6 and 8. However, when I look at the family activities AMC has, I think, wow, my kids would have loved that hiking, riding, etc.
Fortunately, they went to a Mass. Audubon overnight camp for years,from ages 10-14 and there they learned all of the outdoor skills I didn't teach them! They slept in a tent for 4-6 weeks, one became great kayaker and the other learned how to sail. It was such a down to earth camp. They are both super active adults, so I guess I did my job.

[Kiwi Stoker]

Thanks for all the support and advice. We do have single road bikes so I get DH back to looking at a trailer then. Our tandem will just have to take a bit of a holiday for a while. Cycling is such a big part of our lives- the places we ahve been and friends we have made, I really don't want to put it to one side if possible. On of the reasons we have delayed having children is because we were so heavily involved in cycling but over the last year we have gradually become less race orientated and just about enjoying ourselves so I knew it was possible. Plus living in a city with heaps of cycle paths and seeing other families out and about on them has made us more happy.

All the info on trailers and bike seats say that the child has to be 9 months or older, so I am not looking to start riding with bubs any earlier than that.

I guess I am looking for reassurance that I can still enjoy a cycle ride regularly and have a child at the same time. Because other ladies I have meet either stop riding entirely when the baby comes or have taken up riding after their children are older/left home.

[Irulan]

All the info on trailers and bike seats say that the child has to be 9 months or older, so I am not looking to start riding with bubs any earlier than that.

I guess I am looking for reassurance that I can still enjoy a cycle ride regularly and have a child at the same time. Because other ladies I have meet either stop riding entirely when the baby comes or have taken up riding after their children are older/left home.

Pfft on them. Sure taking kids out is more work, logarithmically so at times, but it's so worth it. We did the following with our kids: bike, hike, ski, backpack (yes I backpacked with babies, you want to talk a ton of work) camping, and multi day river trips.

A few years ago a family of five rode across the US. I think their "parade" lol included a tandem with a trailabike but I'm not sure. I bet one of our google wizards can find the link.

[lph]

Pfft on them. Sure taking kids out is more work, logarithmically so at times, but it's so worth it.

Oh, absolutely.

You will probably need to be flexible about what you do and how far you go, and all kids are different, of course, but there is no end to the outdoor activities you can do with kids. Some things we found were just not worth the hassle taking kids to, like rock climbing. Parents we knew did take their kids, and enjoyed it, but we were fairly focussed on climbing for exercise and training, and found it hard to enjoy an outing when we always had to be ready to go feed someone, or throw pine cones into a stream instead ;-) Hiking with kids was great fun, though.