The stars aligned – a good deal on airfare, ability to take an extended period of time off, dear friends at our destination, a strong travel itch… we decided to go for it. We pulled the trigger on plane tickets to Indonesia and secured a passport for our one-year old daughter. I haven’t found too much on traveling to such a destination with such a small kid, so I’ve decided to create a blog. Hopefully this is also a place for our daughter to look back and wonder how she survived.

Before we even begin our trip there are several topics that I want to cover, partly for my own reference, partly to share with others looking to do their own adventure, and partly for my daughter to have as a way of looking back on her childhood. We owe a lot of this trip to our family doctor, who not only signed off on such a trip, but when we sent her the list of islands we were planning on visiting, researched health and safety precautions and sat down with us for close to an hour and reviewed important precautions with us. We got shots, took pills, and went crazy on mosquito prevention.

As a first step for any adventure, finding a doctor who is willing and able to support travels is important. Prior to heading on a seven-day sail around the Galapagos while four months pregnant we checked in with our doctor who gives her blessing with a hefty dose of information and health maintenance tips. On that trip to Ecuador I found myself with medical questions that I’d wished I’d had answered ahead of time.

As a high-level takeaway from that trip to Ecuador I would not recommend being on a relatively small boat on the open ocean during that time in your pregnancy when your center of balance just begins to shift. If you do decide to go for such a trip talk to your medical professional ahead of time about how to handle motion sickness and nausea; specifically, how much can you throw up before you should really worry?

Both me and our doctor did two years in the Peace Corps in West Africa. Our definitions of the middle of nowhere align, and when we propose adventures to her, she doesn’t hesitate. I can not emphasize enough how important it is to both my husband and me that we have such a strong and understanding medical resource.