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I did a 6 hour road trip with LO right after she was two. I never had any reason to drive alone with her instead of fly before then. I think I could have done it much earlier though. At 13 months, LO was still taking two naps, so we would have left at nap 1, stopped when she woke and got fussy to eat and play, then keep going for nap two. It wouldn't be ideal, but definitely doable.

I took DD on a 6 hr plane ride at 10 weeks. I have taken her on two other plane trips since and a few car rides (about 4 hours). It wasn't too big of a deal. She was younger than your LO, so I don't know if it was easier.

I did a 4-5 hour drive with LO when she was 9 months and again around 11 months. She was (is) on 2 naps, so we left before morning nap, stopped when she woke up and BF, got back in the car, stopped for solids lunch (for both of us) when she got fussy again. It went OK, definitely worked best to wait as long as possible for the first stop, then let her out of the car seat for a while to stretch, play, and generally not be in the car seat. For us, it would be harder on one nap, but I am sure we will do it then too. We also did not stay in a hotel, we stayed with family. You can do it! Just be prepared for a 7 hour drive to take 9 hours with stops, and time it so she will nap at least part of it.

At 22 months, I've never done over an hour road trip by myself, it scares me! she needs to be entertained, easier with 2 people in the car, one can sit in the back with her.

@illumina: I've taken DS to see my family (5 hours each away, multiple times. Its fine, plan to stop a lot and have the drive take forever. DS has a melting down point around 4 hours that makes the last couple suck but what cha' gonna do.

I leave tomorrow to see other family 7-8 hours away so I can report back on that next week. We're leaving at 5 so that hopefully he'll be asleep for most of the drive.

If you are driving, I wouldn't hesitate to do this. I would, however, consider renting a house rather than staying in a hotel. With that many babes, a hotel might be really difficult and we have always preferred renting a house when we travel with DD.

Flying is a whole different monster.. I would have been fine traveling with DD alone before she was mobile... now it takes both of us to wrangle her on flights.

I did a solo cross-country trip with DD to see my parents just before she turned 6 months. I wouldn't say I was "confident" but it worked out just fine. The hardest part was figuring out how to eat/drink something while holding her on my lap in those tiny airplane seats -- if I was doing it again, I'd definitely pack lots of energy bars! But really, packing light (for the carry-in at least), having things well-organized, and staying calm so LO didn't sense my anxiety were key.

I took two solo trips w/LO - once when she was 9 months, and then again when she was 14 months. 9 months was relatively easy - she was crawling but not super mobile so I didn't have to chase after her or anything. I wore her most of the time to keep my hands free. We flew internationally, and it was really a piece of cake.

14 months was muuuuch harder. She was running around everywhere so it was really hard chasing her around. She wasn't content to just sit on my lap anymore. I didn't enjoy that trip as much, just b/c it was so stressful trying to keep her under control.