Jennifer from the Jetsetter’s Homestead sent me a link to a Yahoo article referencing an 11 year old English girl who had traveled to France by herself. At first the article made it out to seem that she was really going all around the world by herself, but after reading the article (and the original article from the Daily Mail UK), it turned out that her parents had just sent her alone on a British Airways flight from London to Paris, where she was met by a friend of hers and the friend’s family.
Photo credit: Rosalie Atkins
Traveling as an unaccompanied minor
Now while I think 11 is quite a BIT too young to be traveling around the world by herself, just going on a single flight (that’s less than an hour and a half long) doesn’t seem like a big deal to me. But to read some of the comments, it’s the end of the world!
My sister and I flew unaccompanied when we were 7 and 5 and it was fine. Nobody even called us “unaccompanied monsters” (at least as far as I can remember!!!). Almost all airlines offer something like this, though the prices have gone up for most airlines. Personally I’m not sure I’d be willing to pay $100-$150 (on top of the ticket price) but I wouldn’t be worried about it from a safety perspective, at least with my older kids.
Trips with Tykes has a pretty comprehensive guide about the rules for unaccompanied minors on different airlines.
What about you? Have you ever sent one of your kids to travel unaccompanied?
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Dan Miller travels with his wife and 6 (SIX!) children. He loves to help families travel for free / cheap, especially larger families. If you are looking for help, drop him an email at 
Personally I think it depends on the environment one grows up in.
I grew up in Hong Kong back in the 90s and used the buses and subway on my ownby age 9. By that time I have flown quite a bit with my parents (dad was an expat) and if my parents let me travel alone to go back to usa, I would have been ok.
I moved back to the USA for high school and was shocked how some parents accompanied their teenagers everywhere!
Seems totally fine to me.
I also consider it my personal mission to share with my fellow Americans the fact that the uk daily mail is kinda like the national Enquirer. There is very little of what most people would consider real “news” in it and they love stories like this one that can really get people frothed up about how much better they are than everyone else.
LOL. Thanks for the clarification 🙂
I grew up in New Zealand with a father who was a pilot, so my sister and I were around planes a lot growing up, and did more than our fair share of international travel. The earliest international trip solo was 12 for me NZ-LAX, and my sister did it at 11. We both had to make a connection, transfer terminals and clear immigration in Auckland. We were fine!!