traveling to Italy with an 8yr. old with a house exchange

I don't think there is any place on earth more kid-friendly than Italy (but I am biased), good to know about Ireland, though. Italian families generally take their children on vacation with them, but your time of year will not be in between school terms as far as I know - someone else may have better information on that.

I don't know if there will be anything right near the house, but you can ask the homeowner/manager about parks and playgrounds. There are kid-friendly museums and other amusements as well. What city are you going to be in? The Lonely Planet guidebooks have sections on traveling with children, check out some of their info. Also check online for "Italy with Kids" or something similar.

Oh, and gelato research would be a great project.

We haven't decided where to make our exchange. It seems to be easier to exchange to a small town. It is quite overwhelming trying to choose. We are just getting started. I was thinking something near Florence so we could do day trips to most major places. Do you think that is reasonable or just too much travel to get places?

It is unclear from your posting whether you have a live possibility of an exchange or are just thinking about it in the abstract. It sounds like the latter. In general, having a house or apartment is better for kids than hotels. Even better if an exchange can be arranged with a family that has similar age children. Then there will be toys around, and a generally child-friendly environment. However, if you are at the stage of just abstractly considering a trip, you should be aware that most Europeans with children seek exchanges during the summer school holiday period. In addition, we have found, after numerous attempts, that the Italians are very difficult to deal with on the issue of house exchanges. After many promising beginnings, it became clear that what they really wanted was to rent their vacation house to us, not do an exchange. (Maybe that would work for you, however.) We've succeeded in obtaining six house exchanges, but never one in Italy. In case you are not aware of it, you can look on the sites of various exchange organizations - -Intervac, Home Link, etc. - - to get a sense of what's available before joining. Don't be seduced by listings that say they're available "any time." They usually don't really mean that. I do agree with Zoe that Italians might just be the most child-friendly people in the world.

I think Florence would be great with a kid! They have Carousels, and the Accademia Museum is an old music school with interactive displays for kids. Pizza, Gelato! The piazzas are beautifuil. I guess it depends on the kid and how easily he's entertained. Maybe Fiosole? It will be too cool for a pool, but like Zoe said, I don't think there's a place on earth that is more child friendly.

We took our boys to Riccioni for a family wedding when they were 12 and 8, and a chef took them into the kitchen to see the pizza oven, and watch the cooking. It was October, and there little alcoves everywhere with 'kiddie rides." We also took them to San Marino and San Leo, and they loved both towns. This is the Emilie Romagna are on the Adriatic side. They had a blast.

Right now it is in the abstract and we are looking for an exchange. We have a large house in an excellent area outside of LA so after looking at sites it seemed like we could do an exchange. Our son loves to read and honestly doesn't play with toys much so I wasn't worried about toys.

Excellent information about the exchange process, thank you so much. Have you every used the exchange company Homeforexchange.com? It seemed more realistic than the others. THe places weren't picture perfect.

If staying near Florence means a Tuscan town that is not served by rail, you would plan to drive to other towns in the region, but would not want to drive into big cities. If your choice is on a rail line, preferably the main north-south central line, then trains could take you to bigger cities, plus some hill towns served by train, such as Orvieto or Assisi.

What town would you recommend as a base?

We have taken children and grandchildren to Italy and they all loved Rome. We took our son when he was your sons age and he was fascinated by all of the Roman historical sites. You can find hundreds of apartments on trip advisor in every price range and size. If you decide on a house exchange you would probably end up in a small town, which would mean having to find transportation to and from each site you wanted to visit. This can take up a lot of your time and don't forget that almost everything closes down for several hours in the afternoon. This would mean trying to find something to do until everything reopens.

Hi lisalafrance,
We have home exchanged many times starting when our son was 7 years old - he's 16 now. We have always tried to exchange with families who have children of a similar age so that he will have a room that is comfortable for him and plenty to do! If you keep this in mind then your son should be just as happy as he would be at home. Sometimes you will find neighbor kids for them to play with...it's amazing how they adapt to not knowing the language...kids just play with each other!
We have always used the website HomeExchange.com for our exchanges. They have tens of thousands of listings anywhere you would want to go in Italy and the world. The trick is to find someone who wants to come to your area who lives in an area where you want to go. Bigger cities are always easier because there are more listings to choose from. Smaller towns and out of the way places are much more difficult.
Once you join a home exchange site and build your listing page, you'll be surprised at how many offers you'll receive, especially being in the LA area as we are. We get four or five offers a week this time of year (fall) but once February hits, we literally get 3 or 4 offers every day as people start preparing for summer trips. We find that a majority of offers we get are from France, Spain, and Australia but get offers from many other places as well including Italy on occasion. You really can take your pick!
Let me know if you have any questions about home exchanging - we are very experienced and have learned lots over the years.
Good luck finding a home exchange!
Anita

Anita,

I would love to email you to ask questions. You can reach me at lisalafrancephotography.com all my info is listed there.

You are so local it would be neat to connect.

Have you always traveled during breaks, this is our spring break but we are adding time to it. Did you go to Italy in the summer? It seems hot, plus it seems cheaper in the spring.