Norway Packing List With Kids: What to Wear in Summer

Norway is one of the world’s most beautiful destinations, but it’s variable weather makes it a tough place to pack for. Even in the peak summer tourist season, Norway will throw the entire range of weather possibilities at you, from sunny & hot to rainy & cold and everywhere in-between.

This wide range of weather possibilities makes it really hard to know what to pack for Norway. That is exactly why I put together this Norway packing list with kids, because packing for Norway with kids adds a whole extra layer of complication.

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Our Family Trip to Norway – Packing List Context

To help you with your packing decisions, here is our family’s Norway packing list, along with some commentary on what worked for us and what didn’t.

Our family trip to Norway was between between July 24th and August 16th. We visited a wide variety of locations in Norway, with a variety of different climates.

Our Norway family itinerary included 5 days in Oslo with kids, 7 days in Bergen with kids, 3 days in Ålesund with kids, a road trip with kids along the Atlantic Road, finishing with a couple of days in Geiranger with kids.

We spent most of our time in Norway outside enjoying family walks, hikes, boat rides, etc.

We encountered a wide range of weather in Norway, but most days were cloudy with some rain. Most of the time the rain wasn’t too bad, but there were a few instances where the rain was so heavy we had to go back inside.

We stayed in vacation rentals with laundry facilities. Having laundry facilities is very important when traveling with kids as it enables you to pack much less clothing than otherwise. Also, cooking your own meals is a great way to travel to Norway on a budget.

We’re from Canada, so we’re used to somewhat colder weather; if you are from a warmer climate you may wish to bring slightly warmer clothes.

Note that for each Norway packing list below, we’ve tried to give you a variety of pictures which show the range of weather we encountered during our trip – hope you find this helpful!

Clothes for Mom – Norway Packing List

We had planned to be active for most of our family trip to Norway, so most of my clothes were activewear that just happened to be Lululemon.

• 2 tank tops 
• 4 short sleeve t-shirts
• 1 long sleeve t-shirt (only wore once on an especially cold day)
• 1 pair of jeans
• 1 pair of lightweight pants for hiking (I love my unlined Dance Studio Pants by Lululemon. They are lightweight and dry remarkably fast for those rainy days!)
• 1 pair of Gap Girlfriend Chinos (these pants are great for touring the city, a fjord tour or even hiking!)
• 1 pair of shorts (I have a pair of jean shorts with some stretch, making them the perfect all around shorts.)
• 2 pairs of cropped yoga pants (perfect for hiking)
• 5 pairs of socks
• 1 long sleeve jacket (I brought my Lululemon Define jacket. It’s not too warm to hike in and I especially love the thumbholes and fold-over cuffs. It’s the little things!)
• 1 lightweight rain shell jacket (this was a perfect jacket to layer over a t-shirt for hiking. I was warm enough in the wind/rain.)
• Baseball hat 
• Sunglasses (with the amount of time we spent outside, this was a must)
• Light hiking shoes and Converse sneakers (I almost brought my proper hiking boots but chose my Merrell hiking shoes because they felt more versatile. In hindsight, since I also had my Converse for city walking, I wish I had brought my hiking boots. My Merrell’s were too slippery for hiking in the rain, especially with a kid on my back.)
• Silicone wedding ring (we don’t like bringing expensive jewelry on trips)

Things We Packed for Norway and Didn’t Use – Mom

• Swimsuit – The water in Oslo is quite warm in summer. We never made it swimming in Oslo, although it would have been a cool experience to swim in the North Sea. Unless you are staying in a hotel with a pool, I’d leave your swimsuits at home.

Norway Clothes for Mom – Photo Gallery

Clothes for Dad – Norway Packing List

• 4 short sleeve t-shirts
• 1 long sleeve t-shirt (only wore once on an especially cold day)
• 1 pair of jeans
• 1 pair of cargo pants (I know that cargo pants scream ‘I’m a tourist’, but the long pants/shorts option and quick-dry fabric are ideal for visiting Norway in summer).
• 1 pair of hiking shorts
• 3 pairs of socks & 2 hiking socks
• 1 lightweight, fully waterproof jacket“(I only brought a rain resistant jacket to Norway and it was a very bad choice as it got soaked through a few times during heavy rain.)
• Baseball hat (great for rainy days when you don’t feel like bringing an umbrella)
• Sunglasses (used these lots, even on the cloudy days as the sky was still quite bright)
• Light hiking shoes (multi-purpose items like these work well for the city and moderate hiking)
• Silicone wedding ring 

Things We Packed for Norway and Didn’t Use – Dad

• 1 fleece shell jacket – this fleece-lined, wind resistant jacket was too warm for Norway in summer. I didn’t wear it much, but it took up a lot of suitcase space. I wouldn’t bring it next time.
• Swimsuit   

Norway Clothes for Dad – Photo Gallery

Clothes for 2-Year Old – Norway Packing List

• 3 t-shirts
• 2 long sleeve t-shirts
• 1 polo shirt
• 1 sweater 
• 2 pants 
• 2 pairs of shorts 
• 4 pairs of socks 
• 2 pairs of pajamas
• Baseball hat (great to protect young skin on sunny days)
• One-piece rain suit (kept him completely dry the whole trip)
• Keen sport sandals
• Toddler rain boots – expect your little one to be jumping in rain puddles every day. Rain boots can be a bit big, so try to balance size with effectiveness. We used MyMayu collpasible rain boots, which were perfect, but sadly are no longer manufactured.
• Fall jacket (not waterproof, but slightly insulated for colder days)

Things We Packed for Norway and Didn’t Use – Toddler

• Bathing suit & swim diapers (we didn’t end up using these)

Norway Clothes for Toddlers – Photo Gallery

Clothes for 4-Year Old – Norway Packing List

• 3 dresses 
• 1 tutu skirt (not practical for travel at all, but she loves it, so what the heck?)
• 5 pairs of leggings 
• 1 romper 
• 2 long sleeve shirts  
• 3 short sleeve shirts 
• 1 pair of shorts 
• 5 pairs of socks
• Baseball hat (great for rainy or sunny days)
• Rain jacket and pants (we love the bright pink jacket for traveling – it helps to instantly find her in a crowd)
• Warm hoodie (we used this instead of a jacket for cooler, dry days)
• Sport sandals
• Kids rain boots 
• 2 pairs of pajamas 
• 1 bathing suit (went unused)

Norway Clothes for 4-Year Old – Photo Gallery

Travel Gear for Norway With Kids

• Flyaway Kids Airplane Bed – help your kids sleep on the long-haul flight to Norway with a toddler airplane bed. You can read our full Flyaway Kids Airplane Bed review on our Baby Can Travel website (which we started when our kids were babies).
• Diapers & wipes (we brought a decent amount of our own supply, but Pampers were easy to find everywhere we went)
• Peapod Plus Travel Tent (our little guy loves sleeping in his Peapod. See our full Peapod Plus review)
• LÍLLÉbaby toddler carrier (our kids outgrew our Ergo carrier; we find this larger LÍLLÉbaby toddler carrier is very comfortable for both parent and child)
• A compact fabric travel highchair (versatile and packs up nice and small)
• HALO Sleepsack
• Diaper Bag
• Ollie the Owl bluetooth speaker (the kids liked listening to the Moana soundtrack on our hikes. This cute little owl speaker does double-duty as a white noise machine as well).
•  Aden & Anais blanket (a very useful multi-purpose item to bring. It’s primary purpose was as a blanket for our son)
• Cheerio snack holder (great for finger food snacks on-the-go)
• Hard spout spill-proof water bottles (for bedtime and on-the-go)

Travel Gear for Norway With Kids – Photo Gallery

Outdoor Active Gear for Norway With Kids

• Deuter Kid Comfort child carrier (we brought two of these comfortable backpack carriers and we used them almost every day for city sightseeing and hiking)
• Deuter rain cover (this rain covers for our backpack carriers saved us on more than one occasion when we got caught outside in the rain. We only brought one of these to Norway, which was a mistake – we should have had one for each carrier)
• Water bladder hydration pack (ensures the whole family has enough water for the day)
• Sunscreen (we only needed to use sunscreen once during our trip)
• Camelbak water bottles – the perfect water bottle for kids for day outings in Norway.
• Day bag with rain cover

Outdoor Active Gear for Norway – Photo Gallery

Norway Packing List: Electronics, Etc.

• DSLR camera (a country as beautiful as Norway demands a good camera. Only problem was that we kept needing to put it away when it rained).
• Shockproof & Weatherproof camera (We brought along one of these sports cameras to Norway. It allowed us to take pictures in the rain, and we also let our 4-year old use it as her camera. Being shockproof, it didn’t matter if she dropped it!)
• Waterproof phone case (An easy alternative to a weatherproof camera for taking pictures of your family trip to Norway on very rainy days)
• Swiss Army knife (came in handy for some unplanned Deuter repairs)
• Travel size first aid kit (hopefully you won’t need it, but it’s best to be prepared…)
• Universal Travel USB Charger (We use these universal chargers extensively on our family trips around the world).
• Sandwich bags and storage containers (great for packing your own lunch and snacks)

Travel Day and Apartment Entertainment for Kids

• Reusable sticker book (both kids liked playing with this one. We liked the reusable nature of this activity).
• iPad (our kids favorite travel activity, of course)
• Volume limiting headphones suitable for airplane travel.
• Crayola Color Wonder Mess Free coloring book (great for little ones who can’t keep their markers on the page)
• A digital library for kids allows you to bring tons of online children’s books without packing any.
• Small cars and trucks
• Dry erase activity books (any reusable activity is great for travel)
• Washable markers (for our 2 year old in case he draws on the walls of our Airbnb)
• Melissa and Doug On The Go Water Wow (reusable painting pages using only water)
• Favorite stuffy or doll

Travel Entertainment for Kids – Photo Gallery

Norway Packing List with Kids – Final Thoughts

This may seem like a lot of stuff to pack, but we were able to pack all this in a small & medium suitcase, the small storage compartments in our two backpack carriers, a day bag and a diaper bag.

Overall, we were happy with what we packed for our family trip to Norway. The biggest waste of space in our luggage turned out to be our bathing suits. In hindsight, we should have used this space for umbrellas instead.

Have a great family trip to Norway!

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