Yesterday was judging day for the Just Go Travel Awards and an exciting day it was too!
Our mission is to find the best family travel products on the market, the products that have earnt their right to take up the space within your luggage; today we found our winners.
Our day began bright and early at Peterborough train station with 3 enormous blue Ikea bags stuffed with our shortlisted products. These products range from Merino wool sleeping bags which suit any climate to a bucket and spade set to an old family favourite, the Milton sterilising tablet.
Our destination? The amazing Barber Surgeons Hall in the City, where our judging panel had been asked to meet us.
We arrived early to set out our haul and look over the products. I felt amazingly proud to be a parent with such extraordinary choice. One by one, our lovely judges arrived; first Nicky Grant from Holiday Nanny, then Kathryn Blundell, Editor of Mother & Baby Magazine and lastly, Amanda Morrison, who contributes to the travel section of Angels & Urchins and writes the Angels & Urchins blog. I've also recruited Gavin McOwan, from the Guardian, to judge the apps and my husband Rob for the dad's perspective.
What followed was an intense quest to find the best products; the ones that combined quality, purpose and design and therefore represented good value for money. Without giving away too much, the judges debated hard, revealing different approaches to packing, parenting and purchasing!
With 11 children between us, Amanda's experience of having 4 boys, Kathryn's encyclopaedic knowledge of the parenting sector and almost every product under the sun, plus Nicky and I sending 100s of families away on family friendly holidays, the products really had to prove they had a valuable role to play.
The result is a list of winners that really have earnt a place in your packing. Here is a full list of the shortlisted Just Go Travel Awards products.
if you'd like to know who the winners are...I'm afraid that for now, you'll have to be patient!
The results will be announced in a Twitter ceremony on 30th June 2011; please join us there by following @Totstotravelmum or search #justgoawards.
My special thanks go to:
- The Barber Surgeons Hall, Monkwell Square who kept us well watered and extremely well looked after
- Judges, Kathryn, Amanda and Nicky - you have been amazing!
I have several friends travelling with their tots to visit me in Spain this summer, so we cant wait to hear about the winners!
Posted by: Lindsayinspain | June 23, 2011 at 12:05 PM