We asked mummy Sophie to take the brand new Donkey² for a spin with her two little ones.
Quick Summary: The Bugaboo Donkey 2 has worked brilliantly for us as a family in both Duo and Mono modes. It has to be the simplest of pushchairs we have used but at the same time the prettiest and best quality too. As a mummy, I always feel a million dollars when I'm pushing it and my babies are always happy and comfortable in it too.
Whats good?
- So many seat configurations
- Adjustable handlebar
- Large extendable hoods
- Loads of storage
Whats not so good?
- The seat is slightly narrow for my 2.5 year old
First Impressions
I am so excited to have been sent the Bugaboo Donkey² to review and use. Prior to the Donkey² arriving I was using a tandem double pushchair for my newborn little girl and 2.5 year old boy. We’ve been using it now for a good many weeks and I have to say there will be no looking back!
When the Donkey² arrived I was so excited to get it set up. Having struggled with the ‘mummy guilt’ of putting one of my children on the bottom of my tandem double pushchair I couldn’t wait to try the Donkey² so both of my babies had an equal view of the big wide world. There were loads of pieces to put together but my partner found this bit fun, so I left the building to him!
My first impressions were that the Donkey² seemed huge compared to my tandem stroller, because of course the Donkey² is a side-by-side double. But actually, when we came to push it out of the door to go for our first walk, it fitted perfectly. Phew!
Pushing the Donkey² down the street for the first time made me feel like I was totally winning at life! We had set it up so that our baby girl was in the carrycot as she was only 11 weeks old and our toddler was world-facing in a seat unit. It was so easy to stroll down the street with our little boy chatting about everything that he could see ahead of him at the same time as me being able to reach into the carrycot to check on my sleeping newborn.
Our baby girl slept like a dream in the carrycot, the sides are deep and the fleecy mattress cover made her very cosy. The extendable hood came all the way down to the bumper bar and sheltered her completely from our glorious British weather.
Gus was so happy sat in his seat unit. He’s quite a big boy for 2.5 years old and the seat, although a little snug widthways, was deep enough for him to sit in comfortably and the harness had loads of play left in it if we ever needed to lengthen it further.
The more I look at our Donkey² and the more I use it, I seem to fall more in love with it. I’ve lost count of how many compliments we have got about how pretty it looks. We chose the grey melange base and ruby red hoods. It literally does make people stop and stare on the street and in the shops – my little ones sure loved all of the attention!
Three weeks into using the Donkey² and it was Daddy’s turn to take the little ones out on his own in the pushchair. I’ll be honest, I did panic! Not only has the Donkey² become my prize mummy possession (and I didn’t want it getting bumped about!) but I did wonder how John would cope with folding and working the brake, etc, if I wasn’t around to show him! I didn’t need to panic though as he sent me a text saying how ‘easy peasy’ the Donkey² was to use because he just had to fiddle with all the white levers!
Living in a rural village, we don’t have much choice but to pack our pushchairs into the car to get anywhere when we go for a family trip out. Although the Donkey² seemed large we were pleasantly surprised at how easily it folded. You can fold it with the seat on but we always removed the seat and carrycot so that we could make it slightly smaller and lie everything on the boot of our car. We have a VW Touran and a BMW 5 series. The Donkey² filled the boot of the BMW but there was loads of room left in the boot of the Touran.
During our time testing the Donkey², our toddler has decided that he prefers to walk everywhere and our newborn has developed reflux so we’ve really switched around the way in which we use it. Lucky for us the Donkey² can change from a double to a single so we simply unclipped the white clips around the frame and shrunk the pushchair chassis into Mono (single) mode. It really was THAT simple! We removed the carrycot, put our little girl in the parent-facing seat unit to help make her more comfortable with her reflux and popped the side luggage basket on too, which just turned out to be my saving grace!
School runs have been a breeze since testing out the Donkey². Even our 6-year-old son can push it up the steep hills in our village!
Since we were testing the Donkey² in the colder months we were very kindly sent a gorgeous Bugaboo footmuff too. We chose the wave pattern as we thought it looked beautiful with the ruby red hood. Our little girl was so happy and snug in the seat unit that she nearly always nodded off when we were out in the pushchair!
Conclusion
The Bugaboo Donkey² has worked brilliantly for us as a family in both Duo and Mono modes. It has to be the simplest of pushchairs we have used but at the same time the prettiest and best quality too. As a mummy, I always feel a million dollars when I’m pushing it and my babies are always happy and comfortable in it too.
