Dorothy

Most of the long haul flights are overnight, so your toddler will probably sleep. If not the airlines will almost definitely have in flight entertainment. We came Air New Zealand and they had a massive choice of kids movies and cartoons.

You can get a cheap DVD player over here for peanuts. I think ours was about $79 @ K-Mart.

comet555

We've never needed a DVD player on the plane. We've always flown with Qantas and my daughter spent many hours watching playhouse disney, among other things. There were about 4-5 childrens channels to choose from. The on demand video doesn't always work perfectly, although even when there is glitches you can watch things as they are being broadcast. So basically you can always watch the kids channels live even if there are issues with the system.

If you really wanted a dvd player I would suggest one that is either region free, or one that can be unlocked with a code on the internet. I have no idea which ones would work.

The other option is just download a bunch of DIVX or other video files and use a handheld mp3 video player to let your child watch. When we made the trip I had a pile of kids videos on my mp3 player but I never ended up needing them. Or you could use a laptop to accomplish the same thing.

However, as Dorothy said the kids will likely sleep the whole way anyhow. When we got on the plane in LA the kids fell asleep as soon as we got in the air (boarded at about midnight). The woke up a couple hours before we landed, so that worked well.

gday_eh

Thanks, Comet555 and Dorothy. We did travel over last fall (no layovers, just a couple hrs in each of TO, Vancouver & Hawaii!!) when our son was a year, but thankfully he was easy to entertain with books and his trucks, plus he did sleep a lot. We're thinking that we may not be so lucky this time around, and he loves his Treehouse TV shows, so we'll be coming with full back-up gear. We'll have our laptop as part of our carry-on, but the battery dies out after an hour or so. MP3 video player might be a good option, tho....Tks!

comet555

With my mp3 player we could get aout 4-5 hours of video I think. I prefer that over a full sized travel dvd player because the mp3 is so small & lasts a lot longer. The kids don't care how big the screen is. We've flown back and forth twice now and I've never had to use it yet. There were always enough kids shows and movies to entertain the kids.

We have a creative mp3 player, not sure how long the video iPods work.

On another note, I don't think you get Treehouse here. Not on Foxtel anyway. My daughter used to love Treehouse but now it's Playhouse Disney or Nickelodeon. So some of the shows you won't get here.

ShawnMcCrea

AGREED!! I brought my electronic head shaver from Canada when I was in Australia and the thing overheated and blew up. Same exact thing happened to me in South Africa believe it or not. Think I would have learned? It all seems good when you have a convertor but unfortunately its not that simple.

Leave most behind I would suggest.