My husband and I have been world travelers since long before we could utter the words "Are we there yet?" My mum tells stories of breast-feeding me on the backs of ponies in the foothills of the Himalayas; my husband's family moved to Nigeria when he was just 10 months old. Travel at such an early age gave us both an intrepid mindset about globe-trotting that we've carried throughout our lives, and especially, throughout our relationship. (Our most memorable travel experience so far was a kayaking trip to the Tufi Coast of Papua New Guinea—we were only the second or third group of foreigners to visit the area since the '70s.)
Before we had our children (Austin, 4; Alexandra, 3; and Gavin, 2), we thought that by adjusting our lives just slightly we would be able to continue just as before. We wouldn't let the kids slow us down, nor would we leave them behind. Turns out, not so easy. That set of beliefs flew out the window the moment Austin arrived.
Obviously children are time-consuming and require a ton more work than we predict, yada yada.... But what surprised us the most was how our much our
desire to travel had diminished. The travel magazines that used to inspire us had become irrelevant exhibits of folly and unnecessary risk. Our instinct to protect our kids from hazards trumped our itch for by-the-seat-of-our-pants exploration. As we began planning our first family expedition, it became apparent that if we were going to maintain any bit of our prekid wanderlust selves, we would have to negotiate the mental and physical blocks parenthood has imposed on us. But if we wanted the kind of travel that had enriched our childhoods to also enrich the lives of our children, then Disneyland and all-inclusives would also have to bite the dust.
As we tried to settle on a destination, it quickly became clear that
health--malaria, in particular--was going to be a significant factor in the planning. Malaria
occurs mostly in poor, tropical, or subtropical areas close to the
equator, where about 40% of the world’s population live (and where my
husband and I have done most of our traveling). The prospect of exposing our kids to a disease that could kill them or stay with them the rest of their lives seemed, at the very least, extreme neglect of our parental duties. Giving them anti-malarial drugs with
all sorts of side effects and covering them in DEET didn’t seem much better.
Amidst our vacillation, we kept coming back to the issue of identity and the strong sense of self we both gained from seeing places at young ages that most kids don't know even exist. Equally important was our family lore. For my husband and me, some of our most
cherished and potent childhood memories occurred while we were far from
home. Moments of wonder, excitement, frustration--even
homesickness--forged powerful bonds
between us, our siblings, and our parents. It was stuff that a 100 birthdays or family dinners
couldn’t replicate. So through that lens, we became committed to making it work.
We settled on a country with the mildest strain of malaria and, therefore, required only the softest
anti-malarial drugs: Honduras, on the Island of Roatan. We also made sure that there were decent medical
facilities available and fast, easy flights home. My husband and I started to relax when it occurred to us that things could go wrong anywhere--even in our backyard!
Was planning a trip to a malaria-stricken country more stressful than say, booking a week at blissful beach resort? You betcha. (Just getting our kids to
swallow the anti-malaria pills caused a few more grays to sprout.) But we had so many magical
moments on this trip that were well worth every midnight worry: Gliding through the jungle canopy past giant iguanas with my 3 and 4
year olds on a zip trek; watching my kids and some local children
play all afternoon without a television or toy in sight; and our 4-year-old lamenting, “I am sad to go, Mum. I am going to miss
the hammock, the crabs, and our dock.”
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