To feel i didn't do anything wrong??

The whole tone of the way you are talking about her is very much positioned to signal that she is in the wrong and you have studiously avoided answering the question as to why you didn’t refund her for the accommodation.

You appear to be tying your unwillingness to pay to perceived sleights on her behalf. None of these are relevant.

Maybe she does like to “be in charge”, none of us can verify that. But even if she was your worst enemy you should have paid her back, instead of getting into whataboutery around her attitude towards the activities.

It sounds like there’s a lot of baggage in the friendship and some strain. She appears to have felt railroaded by you over this activity.

But knowing all this you still chose to withhold money you owed her until you had tried to talk her round into doing something you knew she didn’t want to do?

Honestly OP you sound quite manipulative. She may also have behaved badly but you seem to want to railroad your friends and use money as leverage. Not a good look.

I think she’s probably thrown in the towel on the friendship and I don’t blame her.

Thanks for your response OP.

Things were strained between you already ….you don’t say why.
Nevertheless, you both agreed the activity and the accommodation so you must have been communicating effectively at that a point.
All good and hopeful for a nice holiday so far.

But then, even though all was good, after she had paid her half of the activity costs, you decided not to reciprocate by paying your half of the accommodation costs until you had had a meeting to discuss your relationship.

So she thought all was good, hence she paid up in good faith, but you suddenly wanted to discuss your relationship as if you were blowing hot and cold.
Can you see how that might feel to her, especially if things had been strained previous to all this.

Maybe she just didn’t know where she stood with you any more.
Maybe SHE was perplexed and hurt at that stage, thinking you weren’t going to pay up until you were satisfied with her explanation of herself and the state of your relationship at the extra meet up.
Maybe she was simply over it by that stage.
And as she had paid for the accommodation, and you hadn’t reimbursed her, she decided to go with her husband.
As for wanting to do the activity with her husband, maybe she didn’t know you had cancelled it. She had paid you for her half after all !

I wasn't berating you OP, just trying to find the facts in order to help you, as invited by you, to decide if you were being unreasonable to think you had done nothing wrong. We can only go on the information you provide and it’s normal to ask for background info.

For the record, I still think you should have paid your half of the accommodation asap, regardless of you suddenly wanting to discuss your relationship.
It’s only fair to keep things square even if you were miffed. Not doing so doesn’t help, it makes things worse.

It seems to me that you deliberately withheld that payment until she met a new condition that you suddenly imposed….to meet up to discuss your relationship.

So, I’m afraid to say that I think YWBU to delay paying.
That is what you did wrong.

Also for the record, I think she was wrong to blank your messages even though she had had enough by that stage, and could have been thinking, my goodness this friendship shouldn’t be this hard.

I wouldn't be impressed by someone who let me pay for accommodation upfront, then wanted to meet up to 'discuss' the our friendship before transferring me their half.

Exactly. But OP keeps insisting its not this and yet she is just as much in the dark as we are

Maybe she thought OP intended to stiff her on the accommodation?

I wouldn't be impressed by someone who let me pay for accommodation upfront, then wanted to meet up to 'discuss' the our friendship before transferring me their half.

I don't see how the experience costs could have come to anything like the accommodation costs so it hardly seems like for like.

If you are perplexed then how do you know this isnt about you paying your half for the accommodation - you literally keep saying you have no idea why this is happening and when people suggest why it might be happening you say "its NOT that".

But you dont know why your friend is pissed off so how can you be so sure its not about the fact you've been acting like a scrooge

You’ve reinforced what most of the posters have been saying though. Your situation is still not clear.
Your friend likes to be in charge of what? The whole holiday? Booking the accommodation? Picking the experiences? It still does not make sense why she was unwilling to book the getaway.

Secondly, it is still clear that you made paying for your half of the accommodation contingent upon her meeting up with you to discuss why you were so upset with her responses. They’re two separate things and I think she is pissed off that you’ve conflated them.

Did you not offer to pay half for the accommodation? I think with that and along with the fact she did pay half for the experience too that by the sounds of wasnt her cup of tea anyway, it looks like you were taking the biscuit a litte

I'm confused as to why you didn't pay her back for your half of the accommodation costs?

Add that to suggesting the activity with a celebrity you know she doesn't like and I can see why she might be a bit pissed off with you tbh!

I dont know if I've read this properly, but it looks like you've left her carrying the cost of accommodation for 2 for a period of time while she paid you for half of the experience cost. You then get annoyed when she says no to an experience she has no interest in doing ( or paying for) because its something you are interested in, that in itself isnt a disagreement, as per the mumsnet mantra no is a full sentence, what did you need to meet to discuss?

If you take negative responses from her in the same way as you do on this thread then can see why she is off with you. You need some self awareness.

Thats what friends like my twin brother family have no ethics. We holidayed some years ago such a angsty so and so. Always walked 10 feet ahead of me whereever we went.
Pain in the backside and he's a thief having taken alot money off me and dad. Never trust friends trust your instinct.
Friends will bring you down hard. Learn from this experience

Well unless we've all missed something you've still not explained why you didn't pay your half of the accomodation?

Well OP, you could simply answer the two questions which you repeatedly ignore, since it is you who asked if YABU in the first place.

1. Why do you think she was slightly unwilling to book the accommodation in the first place?
2. Why didn’t you square up the finances as soon as she paid you her half of the painting activity costs ?

Why were you annoyed at her voicing her opinion? If someone asked me to do something I wouldn’t like I would also say no, I don’t like X. What’s the problem with that? The rest is weird though, it sounds like she’s unilaterally decided the weekend break is not happening without actually wanting to tell you that.

So you suggested painting, she was fine with thst, you booked the painting and she paid you back half.
She booked and paid for the accommodation.
You suggested a second activity - the celebrity.
She didnt want that.
You then decided not to transfer your half of the accommodation until she let you talk to her about the celebrity.
She never did so you just didnt pay her for your half, you cancelled the painting and now shes going away with her husband instead and wants to do the painting with him. ( Did you refund any of the money she paid you for the painting?)

Is that about right?

You said you were upset and annoyed about her refusal to do the second activity, particularly because she just said no and was quite firm about it. I wonder if you have form for bulldozing people to get your own way and she's had enough of it.

If I suggest something and a friend isn't interested I just say no problem and move on. If a friend suggests something to me and I say it's not my cup of tea I expect them to do the same. For people who can't take no for an answer I will be much firmer in my first refusal because I'm not starting a negotiation.

Holding the accommodation money to ransom until she'd spoken to you probably gave her the impression you were going to try to talk her into doing what you wanted.
She said no, it doesn't sound like you hid your disappointment and she doesn't want to deal with that.

Be honest with yourself; can you let things go if you don't get your own way? If not you may need to work on that.

YABU. That's a lot of text to say you didn't pay your friend your half of the accomodation.

You should have paid straight away. Do you have form for not paying your share, or not paying in a timely manner?
Then you decide to continue not paying her back because she doesn't want to meet up to "discuss the disagreement". All that happened was she wasn't interested in another activity. Do you often blow things out of proportion or make things more dramatic than they are?
You still hadn't paid even though it's "really close" so she was right to decide to go with someone else.

Yeah, this is on you. You wanted to talk her into the added on activity, knowing it's something that wasn't agreed in advance and someone that she doesn't like. You withheld the money you owed her until she'd agreed to meet up. Then you cancelled the painting, even though you'd only get half back. That isn't how you treat a friend of 30 years.

To be honest the way you’re communicating about about all this on this thread, and the fact that you wanted to meet up to discuss the fact that she didn’t want to go to an event featuring a celebrity she dislikes, is making me think you’re the problem here.

She booked accommodation ‘reluctantly’ suggesting she wasn’t that keen to go away and only agreed to please you. She then drew the line at accompanying you to an additional event that she wouldn’t enjoy because it’s something she had no interest in - which is perfectly reasonable of her. You felt you needed to meet up and continue that discussion because you weren’t happy with her saying no. That was bloody weird of you.

Weird that she had to pay you half for the experience when you owed her for half the accommodation already, which presumably cost more, so you could've just transferred her what you owed her, minus her half of the experience fee. Something doesn't add up.

To then vaunt going to see someone you know she doesn't like then getting upset when she didn't want to sounds like you created a way to get out of the whole thing, especially when you're now rewriting the history so that she was already a problem, in which case you wouldn't have organised a break with her let alone tried to get her to see a celeb she didn't like.

Sounds like you went off the idea when she wouldn't see the celeb, didn't come through on paying for your half of the accommodation and made it a fait accompli that the whole thing was called off by 'assuming' that on text and cancelling the experience. You got the hump, got away with not going and not paying and she made the best of it by going with someone more amenable instead.

I would hazard a guess, based on your previous posts and level of insight here, that your communication isn't the best and you struggle to consider other people's point of view.

If she is suggesting meeting up in a couple of weeks, put the disagreement behind you and try to be more mindful in the future.

You said that she reluctantly paid for the accommodation and later said that you were happy to pay for your half.

So why didn't you when you clearly recognised that she was reluctant?

Are you surprised that she is pissed off? It sounds like she was railroaded into paying for it.

I think that you maybe need to reflect on your own actions and question whether her actions are a reaction to your behaviour (either actual or perceived). There is a reason why she does not want to communicate with you, and when that happens between friends, it's usually been a long time coming and when someone is at the end of their tether.

Or maybe she is just weird.

Edited to add, though it's probably already been mentioned, no is a complete sentence whether that annoys you or not. People don't owe you a reason.

Why didnt you give her your half of the money for the accomadation before she booked or same day?

Inthink unwillingness to book and pay was your clue