Infant and securing stairs

embraer170

We are spending 4 months in Spain with our 2.5-year-old daughter. We are looking for a short-term apartment rental and some places we have visited have stairs inside the apartment (entrance & kitchen, bedrooms one floor up, terrace one floor above that).

Our daughter is used to having complete freedom at home and while she has got some experience with stairs (mostly at the grandparents) and she is generally very careful, we would not trust her alone.

Here are a few photos of a place that could be suitable if we could find a way to secure the stairs. The stairs are a difficult at the top/bottom and the handrail is bit high for a child.

A traditional stair gate won’t work since there is no place to install it (the metal bars on the left are also a bit loose). Since it’s a short-term rental, drilling wall is not an option.

Any ideas on how the stairs could be secure or are we reckless to consider such a place? If we had another suitable place lined up after 10 days of searching, I wouldn't even post this... but it just feels wrong.

Moonbeam

I just taught mine how to use the stairs.
My youngest is 21 months and she is well able for the stairs and goes up and down them on her own.

I can't view those pics.

John Mason

Can you just teach her to use the stairs? at 2.5 years she should be well able for it.

We never had stair gates, just thought him to use the stairs. he is 21 months now and I have no problem with him scooting up and down.

olaola

Put your suitcases in front of the stairs, secured with some chairs?

IvyTheTerrible

There's a stair gate from IKEA you can get for 30 euro that you don't have to drill the wall for, I'll have a look for the link.

We don't have stairs but we do have kitchen with no door and it was a godsend.

olaola

We visited friends last year, their place is a death trap! Marble, glass stairs, no risers, no proper balustrades, adults have broken limbs here! I was freaking out about a bit it before we left. We put suitcases in front of the basement stairs and just kept an eye on him around the stairs going up & plugged the holes (which were big enough for him to fall through straight onto the marble basement floor) with cushions.
He was about 16 months at the time. Shouldn't have been so worried - he was grand! Just made sure there was an adult with eyes on him at all times. If I left the room, I made sure I said out loud to the other person 'keep an eye on yer man for a min', I didn't assume they would be paying attention to the fact that I had left. The pool was more of a worry, but he was quite cautious about it.

Moonbeam

olaola wrote: »

We visited friends last year, their place is a death trap! Marble, glass stairs, no risers, no proper balustrades, adults have broken limbs here! I was freaking out about a bit it before we left. We put suitcases in front of the basement stairs and just kept an eye on him around the stairs going up & plugged the holes (which were big enough for him to fall through straight onto the marble basement floor) with cushions.
He was about 16 months at the time. Shouldn't have been so worried - he was grand! Just made sure there was an adult with eyes on him at all times. If I left the room, I made sure I said out loud to the other person 'keep an eye on yer man for a min', I didn't assume they would be paying attention to the fact that I had left. The pool was more of a worry, but he was quite cautious about it.

stairs like that freak me out never mind a child!! I am really clumsy.

olaola

Moonbeam wrote: »

stairs like that freak me out never mind a child!! I am really clumsy.

They're as slippy as hell too, esp coming in from the pool - and there's no return on them, so if you take a tumble - you're straight down onto the marble! God... I'm freaking myself out about them again!

markj2009

You can also get a stair gates from Argos. Some gates use a pressure fitting so you can avoid drilling into the wall. But it sounded like from what you said the part the gate would attach to is unstable ? If it cant be fitted and you have doubts, better to find somewhere else, IMO.