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Original poster

Kirstie Allsop's 15 Year Old Son

415 replies

ImAFemaleVersionOfRoyKeane · 20/08/2024 05:23

Kirstie Allsop has just posted on X (Twitter) that her 15 year old son has just returned from inter-railing around Europe.

He was accompanied by his 16 year old friend.

AIBU to think this is too young?

These situations may seem OK but at that age they think they are invincible, so they can be impulsive and not make the best decisions, especially when something goes wrong!

OP posts:
CrispsAndWines · 20/08/2024 07:19

This reply has been deleted

This has been deleted by MNHQ for breaking our Talk Guidelines - previously banned poster.

AgentProvocateur · 20/08/2024 07:19

Mine entertaining at 6the with a friend (both v sensible). They stayed in youth hostel type places and had a ball. They still keep in touch with friends they made 16 years later.

soupfiend · 20/08/2024 07:19

Im not keen on Kirsty Allsop but I completely agree with kids doing things like this

We really do wrap kids in cotton wool and its not good for them or society.

Having said that Im amazed they managed to get accommodation but perhaps they met up with various friends and relations along the way and stayed there

CosyFanTucci · 20/08/2024 07:17

I did this a month after turning 16 with my best friend (post GCSEs). We went down to Provence for a festival. Our first mistake was misunderstanding the 24hr clock and thinking a train departed at 7pm rather than 7am the next morning and having to spend a night in Gare de Lyon. That was a useful lesson to learn.
We’d both been to boarding school so were very independent anyway.

5lessmins · 20/08/2024 07:15

Some parents are a little bit suffocating. And some kids just aren’t mature enough even in their 20s. Good on Kirsty for havin faith in her ds.

Lilyhatesjaz · 20/08/2024 07:12

I think it makes a difference whether the 15 year old can speak any other languages. If he has been to private schools he may well have been learning European languages from a young age which would make travelling much less difficult.

Pawsfourbyfourbyfour · 20/08/2024 07:10

FinalInstructionstotheAudience · 20/08/2024 06:27

And this is your business how?
So, she's bought up a confident, articulate and adventrous young man.
That's fabulous
She obviously risk-assessed his capability, and that of his friends
We need more parents like her. Many kids her age are either surgically welded to their phones or scared of the8r own shadow, won't take a phone call from a friend unless they have texted them to tell them they want to talk, and think the world owes them.

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I agree that youngsters are too cossetted nowadays but if you don’t want people commenting about your dc, then don’t talk about them on X.

The poor lad. I can imagine that he is not overly thrilled that his holiday is being discussed on sm. I do wish celebrities, and everyone for that matter, would be more circumspect and not post about their offspring. It’s unnecessary.

DinnaeFashYersel · 20/08/2024 07:09

@FinalInstructionstotheAudience

Gently, it's fazed in this context!

Gently, that's the most arsey and unnecessary comment on the thread.

renomeno · 20/08/2024 07:04

Inter-railing has changed a lot, you now have to book much of it in advance. My son did it this summer and booked everything in January! Definitely doable by confident & responsible 16 year olds, especially if staying with a network of friends and family plus the occasional hostel.

DinnaeFashYersel · 20/08/2024 07:04

I went on my first parentless holiday at 16. It was great.

Good for him.

Doggymummar · 20/08/2024 07:02

Vic6 · 20/08/2024 06:22

You can’t even stay in a Premier Inn by yourself unless you’re over 18 in this country, so how the hell does this inter-railing work abroad for a 15/16 year old?

DS (17) has only just flown by himself, staying with a friend and his family, but we made sure (after doing research) that he had all the relevant forms, address of where he was staying, our consent for him to fly etc, as he’s still classed as a child (put you still pay adult fares - another thread) and there might have been issues at passport control.

Youth hostels?

DowngradedToATropicalStorm · 20/08/2024 07:01

😂

cryinglaughing · 20/08/2024 07:01

All my dsis's kids did this after they'd finished their GCSE'S.
They didn't go to private school but it was in an affluent area. It seemed to be the de rigueur thing to do for many years.

hildabaker · 20/08/2024 06:57

pollyglot · 20/08/2024 06:09

4x gt grandfather went to sea, all alone, as a powder monkey at the age of 8!! Just a baby! He survived Trafalgar on the Temeraire which had 18% of the crew killed or wounded. i don't recommend it, of course....

This is amazing! I'd love to know more about this, did he document his experiences anywhere?

NoKnit · 20/08/2024 06:57

Pawsfourbyfourbyfour · 20/08/2024 06:26

I wouldn’t allow it this young but I did allow my dds to go to Italy and Greece with groups of close friends when they were eighteen, between school and university. But I knew the friends and many of their parents and there were sensible girls in both groups.

You allowed it at 18?

Didn't you realise you actually had no choice?

Temushopper · 20/08/2024 06:57

FinalInstructionstotheAudience · 20/08/2024 06:43

Again, another post by the terminally envious of other people's money. You make nasty assumptions are are not ashamed to share them.
From your post, I could make many assumptions about you and your family, none of which may be true, but once they are in the public forum, someone will believe them
No need to be so bloody nasty about a stranger

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I don’t think it was nasty. It’s probably true you could stay with friends and family all over the place if you knew people. I spent weeks at 16 after GCSE backpacking round Germany and stayed with people who organised school exchanges with my mums school & my grandparents friend who moved there in the 60s as well as a few youth hostels. If my mum hadn’t had her network I maybe couldn’t have done it and I was lucky she knew so many families in Germany willing to host me. I’m sure someone in media & with a partner in property development (& an interest in it themselves) will have a decent network of friends and that it likely includes people who will either have homes abroad or know people who do and would be happy to have the kids stay for a night or two.

PigglyWigglyOhYeah · 20/08/2024 06:56

FinalInstructionstotheAudience · 20/08/2024 06:43

Again, another post by the terminally envious of other people's money. You make nasty assumptions are are not ashamed to share them.
From your post, I could make many assumptions about you and your family, none of which may be true, but once they are in the public forum, someone will believe them
No need to be so bloody nasty about a stranger

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Why do you think I'm being nasty?! I'm just saying how it could be done with a network of friends. Calm yourself. You're making yourself look foolish.

Bobbybobbins · 20/08/2024 06:54

He must be one of the youngest in his class, some of his friends would be coming up to 17 so I think it's ok. As others have said, clearly he would have loads of cash!!

AgnesX · 20/08/2024 06:54

Edingril · 20/08/2024 05:26

I wouldn't do it but if she is OK with it not sure why I would have an issue?

This. Maybe he's very mature? I would have seen it as a huge adventure at that age.

MapleTreeValley · 20/08/2024 06:52

Assuming he's young for the year and about to be 16, I did this when I was a year older than him. It was amazing!

CormorantStrikesBack · 20/08/2024 06:51

FinalInstructionstotheAudience · 20/08/2024 06:45

Will you be my mum?!!🙂🙂😀😀😃

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I can’t afford another one after bankrolling this one so much 😁.

She does pay for her own trips now but the summer after she finished uni cost me dear as she convinced me she needed to go on some architecture course in Florence for a month. The course was expensive and accommodation in Florence in August was horrendous 🙈

But she got one of a very limited number of part one Architect jobs when she got back and she reckoned the course helped. Her now employers said it was the confidence in her job interview which made them give her the job. They wanted someone who could stand up to clients if needed.

shes on about doing a similar course in Sri Lanka next year but will be paying for that herself!

Edenspirits73 · 20/08/2024 06:48

JudgeJ · 20/08/2024 06:42

Poor lad, still being babied. A lot of students will be starting Uni in the next few weeks and I hear some horror stories about their inability to cope with living away from Mummy, some parents do their offspring no favours.

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WTF? You know literally nothing about me or my kids.

Boopbeepbeepboop · 20/08/2024 06:46

PointsSouth · 20/08/2024 06:24

Surely anything that puts distance between oneself and Kirstie Allsop is a good idea?

That's an unnecessarily spiteful sounding comment.

FinalInstructionstotheAudience · 20/08/2024 06:45

CormorantStrikesBack · 20/08/2024 06:42

She’s having the most amazing life and I’m pleased for her. Slightly sad as the guy she met in Vienna is Canadian and they’ve been to a year now and she’s looking at moving to Canada. I was a bit adventurous when I was younger, went backpacking round Asia in my own, I’ve hitchhiked across a few African countries with a friend. But she has worse itchy feet than me. And I’ve turned into an anxiety ridden middle aged person who’s nervous about going to Cornwall 🤷‍♀️😆🙈

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Will you be my mum?!!🙂🙂😀😀😃

Hallamlass · 20/08/2024 06:44

Great! It's a nice change from people infantilising 25 year olds.

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