Making Seeking out Farmers’ Markets an Essential Part of Travelling With Children

Fresh fruits and vegetables are easy to come by at
local markets wherever you go around the world.

With spring break on the horizon, I thought writing about travelling with children would be a helpful idea and a timely topic. We have travelled a lot over the years with our family, and we inevitably wind up at a market wherever we go.

At first, we saw them as safe and relatively inexpensive (compared to restaurant fare) places to find healthy and nutritious food on the go. When travelling with young children (who were, coincidentally, picky eaters), finding a farmers’ market was a godsend. We always knew we could find wonderful fruits and veggies, breads and cheeses and treats… and things to distract and inspire us too.

To make the most of our market experience, we always travelled with an inexpensive and simple kit. Here are our family’s travel essentials when vacationing with children:

Markets always have something to
distract, something to intrigue
and something to amuse children.

Our Kitchen Travel Kit

• - Ziplock bags for packing up market treats, dividing them into portions & keeping them food-safe (I take sandwich-sized and snack-sized bags, held together in a bundle by an elastic)
• - A small portable plastic cutting board for preparing sandwiches, slicing carrot sticks and preparing other food on the go (I use an old Ikea plastic half board for this)
• - A sharp paring knife and protective sleeve (I love my Pampered Chef knife for its thick, light protective sleeve but a pocket knife works well too)
• - A small travel-shampoo-sized bottle of dish soap
• - A sharpie for labeling bags with family members’ names (using goofy names and stick drawings makes it all the more fun)… so you know who hasn’t finished their veggies!
• - Portable, reusable shopping bags (Eagle Creek makes awesome ones that fold into themselves, packing away in a very neat, very portable way with a clip that attaches brilliantly to my camera bag, belt loop or purse strap)
• - A cork screw and rubberized expanding bottle top for those adult-beverage market finds (to enjoy once the kids are asleep!)
• - A large-sized ziplock bag to store these food-related travel items in (yup, they'll all fit inside!)

Portland's Sunday Market had a whimsical booth filled with
hilarious head pieces... bolts, knives, pencils, saws, hammers,
tennis rackets... all made to look like you'd been
bludgeoned through the head! 

Now that our kids are in high school, we still seek farmers’ markets out, for their food, for their beauty, for their entertainment, for their treats and for that sense of connecting with the community in which we are travelling. And for me, it never gets “old.” 

• There are new people to meet. 
• Scrumptious foods to try.
• New stories to hear. 
• And there is always that creative thing that startles and surprises me… sometimes with its beauty, sometimes with its creativity, sometimes with its mouthwatering delectability and sometimes with is sheer, creative audacity.--->