Spain

Spain is a very child friendly country, and would be a great place to go on a family vacation. Everywhere we went people would give my daughter attention. They would say hola, que bonita, preciosia, etc... My daughter was given snacks, toys to play with, and picked up like one of the family. In restaurants the Spainards let their kids run around, part of this is high chairs are a few and far between. Many of the kids will pack together and play games while the adults sit and eat and enjoy their meals. In the US people would freak out by the children running free, but as a mother I wish kids could run free here at home.

At one hotel in Sevilla we started to check in and the clerk said "wait, first things first" and went and said hello to my daughter and tickeled her foot and made her laugh, then he helped us check in to the hotel.

In Southern Spain their are a lot of animals around. My daughter loved seeing the burros in Mijas, the horses in Monda and Terrifa, monkeys on Gibralter, and cats, dogs and goats everywhere we went. My daughter loved being able to pet the horses and burros. She would have loved to touch the monkeys on Gibralter but I wouldn't let her near them as I find them rather disgusting and scary.

The one problem I had in spain was with the car seat. We borrowed a car seat from a rental car company and we could never get the seat belt to lock and secure the car seat. I am not sure if there are different safety standards in Europe for car seats, but I found the car seat a little unstable and even if I had brought my car seat from home I would have had the same problem securing the seat to the car.

Baby changing tables and high chairs are not available in most public places but I think it is more acceptable to change your baby in ther stroller or on a park bench than it is in the US. Many roads in Spain are made of individual stones and this is hard on a stroller, so I would recommend a cheap stroller you plan to throw out or a good stroller that will hold up to the punnishment it will undergo.

I would also check out a department store to look at the baby goods. European design is amazing and a lot of that carries over to their infant goods some of which are very interesting. The clothes for children are amazing and sometimes very expensive, although we found some very cute dresses at an open market and at some small shops.