Formula milk: Melbourne to London flight

[Bonfire2010]

Hoping that someone can advise me on this...

We are going to Melbourne in March/April when my baby son will be 4/5 months old. He is formula fed (HIPP organic milk). I think I can order travel sized cartons to pick up from Boots once we clear baggage check in London, but I am a bit worried about what to do for the return leg. HIPP isn't available in Aus, but Apatiml is so I will probably use that. If you have travelled back from Melbourne (or Aus in general) and use formula, please can you let me know how you managed? I am assuming you can do the same order/collect process as London, but don't know who to order from in Aus (maybe Priceline?), or what to do if that's not an option.

Thanks in advance.

[Syppox2000]

Hi

We did london to Melbourne and back from Brisbane in January with our 7 month old. The only place we needed to test the milk/ food was at heathrow but we bought enough from boots airside - ordered online. We found it really difficult to find ready made cartons out in Australia and none of our Aussie friends knew about it. We used aptamil out there in big tins but after much research found only the brand s-26 gold step did mini ready made cartons. These were really quite hard to get hold of but could be got in a big Coles supermarket. No Aussies knew of a facility like boots does in the airport - sorry . I reccomend the tommy tippe disposable bottles from

Boots too as would be a real pain carrying loads of dirty bottles . I later discovered SMa make a ready to feed bottle where you just screw on a top . Sorry if this is confusing and rambling !

[Syppox2000]

Oh forgot to say my son had surgery out in Australia and the hospital gave him

Aptamil from a ready made small bottle but we couldn't find these in any chemist or supermarket .

[BellendenBear]

I flew London to Melbourne and back a few years ago. Same experience as above. Would recommend buying enough cartons for both journeys here. There were no problems at all taking full bottles of milk through security in Australia. No equivalent to Boots over there at airports and be warned that in general baby stuff like formula and nappies is really expensive.

[kittysailing]

Hi there - my mum is living in Oz at the moment - she's very au fait with all things baby - I can get her to check out some local places if you like.

[Convex]

We took enough formula to last the trip, including ready made for flights and powder for the rest of the time. Depends on luggage of course.

We had to open and taste a selection at heathrow. We took our own bottles but agree disposables might be more practical.

In NZ I worked out formula was 4x the cost so it was worth it for us.

[Bonfire2010]

Thanks everyone for the replies and PMs. Think I may order some ready-made cartons for the trip out, and take powder in dispensers for the trip back. Will also take enough in stow luggage to last the trip.

Kittysailing - if you wouldn't mind asking your mum for some tips/thoughts that would be great. I actually have quite a lot of family over there but none of them would know about this sort of thing so her advice would be great.

[Kelpie]

I flew back from Melbourne in January with my seven month old son. I wasn't using formula, but ... they didn't make me take any liquids for the baby out of my bag at security (i did have some formula with me in case something drastic happened to my milk supply). Also, you'll find all airlines carry some formula (and baby food) on board in case of emergency. I would recommend taking ready made from the UK for both trips, personally. Formula is nowhere near as easy to get hold of in Australia as it is here as breastfeeding is much more entrenched. Woolworths and Coles are the two main supermarket chains in Melbourne but neither of them have much of a range (I did have a look when I was there as I was struck but the massive difference in aisle space for formula in Oz vs the UK).

[CocoC]

Sorry to jump on your post Bonfire (I think it was you who kindly responded to mine the other day when I was also trying to find Hipp Organic cartons?) but we're going away at the end of the month too - I'd planned to take all the cartons/ powder I need with me - assume you can put whatever you need in the hold and whatever you need for the flight in your carry-on? Clueless! Good idea to order the powder for collection once you're through security as that's on the bulky side isn't it...

[Norfolkvillas]

Hola, could one of the companies that deliver UK baby stuff abroad be useful? Order all your Hipp stuff to arrive at your Oz destination to see you through your stay and return journey, and then you only need to worry about enough for your outbound trip?

http://www.traveltotsuk.com/destinations.php

http://www.kids-away.com/index.asp

There are a bunch of them - these are just a couple from my google search. I don't think it's a cheap option but if baby supplies in Oz are as expensive as some of the above posters are saying, then it might actually work out to be much of a muchness.

[gillianthomson]

Not exactly the same but we went to South Africa with a baby who only took made up SMA which they don't have. Took 70 bottles in luggage (35 litres weight) - each one wrapped in a nappy - and had lots of space to bring back things I'd bought. Lasted whole trip and beyond and I felt very relaxed as not trying anything new. Worth noting, like Oz that nappies, formula etc is about 4x price. I'd advise take with and shop the things you love back in the empty space.