Ever been on holiday with friends or family and it gone very badly?

[crosser62]

Away at the moment with family.
Ooh it’s a challenge despite them being a very lovely person.
It’s me, dh and our kids plus bil.

He is a single fella, no kids, mid 40’s and lives at home with fil. Works ft.
Used to doing his own thing, not having to worry about anyone else in the whole world but himself.
He is a perfectly lovely bloke, we get on well.
Things like he almost chain smokes outside but it leaves the patio doors open so we get the fumes. None of us smoke.
He drinks cup after cup after cup of coffee. Isn’t quiet with his brewing technique so at 2am, 4am, 6am when he gets up to smoke there’s much banging of cupboards & drawers, slamming of fridge door, noisy stirring of coffee then patio doors opening for several cigs.
He is a faffer. Continuously tidying, folding tea towels and dishcloths, emptying bins, filling and then rearranging dishwasher contents.
He also hums, makes strange sounds, can’t stand silence so fills it with humming & daft noises.

He is driving me bat shit.

Tell me your stories as this is mild and tolerable but glad the holiday is coming to an end. I’m not the only miserable old bag when it comes to this kinda thing am I?

Oh dear - lesson learned. You are definitely not ‘a miserable old bag’ other peoples’ living habits are the very worst to deal with when on holiday.

He sounds particularly annoying to share space with and thoughtless. First rule of sharing living space with friends/family on holiday is ‘you’re not at home on your own - there are other people here’
Second rule is to have separate accommodation.
Third rule is - don’t do it at all if rules 1 and 2 can’t be followed.

When it works it’s fun - when it doesn’t it’s a struggle and you just don’t always know which it will be until it’s too late.

Truer words have never been spoken my friend.
Too true.

Who wakes up at 2, 4 and 6am to drink coffee and smoke?! He must feel terrible all the time.

No wonder he's up all the time if he drinks so much Caffeine. Replace the coffee with decaf - he might sleep through!

I have had a few disastrous holidays - shared dorm in Egypt where I had a tummy bug. I think I was top bunk too. Couldn't even try to sleep it off as dorm was noisy in the evening.

Camping with friends and a family they were related too. They wanted to go on a day trip hours away. I had 3 young kids - 1 with travel sickness. So stayed put. The weather blew a gale so after a soaking wet morning out I spent all afternoon pegging down 3 tents to stop them blowing away. I called a few times to 'suggest' they returned more quickly as the weather was terrible. At 7pm - just as it was getting dark a pole snapped on my tent. I Had to pack up everything that was soaked and blowing away. My eldest was only 8 and was a superstar helping me by holding the tent while I packed up. The other 2 were in the car keeping dry and were upset. My partner at home sorted us a hotel. We left before my friends returned. I laugh now. And we are still friends.... although when they asked me to wait as they were nearly back I just said sorry we're off. They also had to abandon camp as there were leaks in the tent, wet bedding and worse weather forecast for the morning.

My mum is one three. The two other sisters and grandparents and families went away together one year to a shared house in France.

My parents were very relieved they’d already booked a holiday.

None of the ones who went to France came back talking to each other. That healed itself, slightly, but laid the grounds for the fact that within four years one of the sisters (the one who instigated the holiday) never spoke to anyone else in the family again.

We once went to France with a good friends from University and his girlfriend.
Our friend had found himself a drinking problem and she used it as a carrot.... they spent lots of time in bed so we just left them threaded went on trips of our own. Then she rammed our car into a wall and didnt even apologise...never spoken since ...it was hell!

Ex and I went to Tuscany with his parents who were the most aweful people in the world. No longer remember the details but it ended with a screaming match lasting until 2 in the morning and them telling him to choose between me and him. He chose them. Thank fuck we didn’t have kids together and thank god for EasyJet to get me home solo the next day!!

Went away with two other married couples and children Wife A was at war with wife B because she felt B wasn’t pulling her weight with the shopping etc. B was certainly pretty lazy, but A was ridiculously uptight and expected us all to be Stepford wives producing endless delicious meals for the menfolk. So far as I was concerned, it was my holiday too and our respective partners could bloody pull their weight, so I was soon in the doghouse as well.

Then A wanted to dictate the children's bedtime routine and didn’t like me spending time settling DS age 2 when he struggled with a strange bed. When I found her interrogating my children on whether they had cleaned their teeth I had to tell her to back off and the atmosphere got even frostier. We left making almighty vows of ‘Never again’

Went camping with a large group of friends. One couple were trying to conceive and she was on hormone injections or something. She is a firey red head anyway who suffers mood swings. She was in her tent a lot having these screaming fits which everyone at the campsite could here. Everyone was treading on egg shells around her

When we had a young family, we went away on 3 occasions with other families and I don't recall any problems. Twice more recently with another couple and all seemed fine. Perhaps it's me they're all talking about!!

My sister joined us on a family holiday a few years ago, and that was quite stressful. A bit like the OP's experience, she's quite nervy. Endless fag breaks, odd sleeping times, talking and singing to herself quite loudly and not concentrating on what she's doing. There were a few words when I realised she'd left the gas hob on, unlit, after she'd cooked breakfast....

Group friends holiday have always reverted into stereotype roles "we'll go to the pub while the girls open a bottle of wine" i.e. scrub the dishes and wrangle children into bed.

Or, Jack and Jane want you to make the lasagne tonight. "Heres the lasagne"
"Oh Jack and Jane have gone out for a meal didn't we say? Not too much for me I had biscuits at 5"

In law holidays intensify all the slight annoyances that you can walk away from at home.
FIL is on yet another monologue about Clive hogging the telescope at the astronomy society, standing infront of the fridge while you're trying to get breakfast. Oh yeah, at home I can nod while doing the crossword then leave when my ears start ringing.

I refuse to holiday with other people, even my parents unless we book separate accommodation. This summer we're going to a French holiday park and have booked separate lodges. I need quiet in the evening (chronic health issues and introvert) and they are very chatty. Massive faffers also! It costs more but it means the time we spend together is happier because we've had enough space. We'll go to the beach and pool together, out for lunch, have dinner together but our own living space. DH hates mornings and can't interact before 9am so it suits him too 😊

My friend went away with their BFs for years. They had their first children at the same time and decided to go abroad to a villa together. The children were 2. When they got there though the other couple decide that my friends child shouldn’t go anywhere near theirs and would scoop them away if they did (my friend said like he was going to murder their child, just for standing near each other). They spent the week apart, went home, never spoke again. He said it was bizarre and I should never ever go away with friends.

We were forced to go away with DHs family. BIL was noisy until the early hours keeping us awake, wanted to dictate everything. Furious I wasn’t able to do all the activities he had planned with a tiny baby (his children were teenagers- BUT MY CHILDREN ARE DOING IT).
DD was poorly one day and needed to sleep so I was stuck in, this pissed him off. Thing is, I had no interest in what they had planned anyway. MIL also hated it and made it very very clear. It was just awful, BIL just wanted us to enjoy all his choices.

DH, DD and I went away for 5 days with a friend and her DS who was the same age as DD. Well we ended up not speaking for over a year afterwards! (Although we tried many times to speak to her, she ignored us!)

Her DH was supposed to come along too but last minute said he couldn’t due to work though we think it’s because they had to get a train there (uk holiday, couple of hours from us) as they don’t drive and we had a car but a very tiny one and wouldn’t be able to give them all a lift. Well when it was announced last minute that he wasn’t going, she basically told us that her and her DS would fit in our car. They just about did but it was a massive squeeze and not ideal. But we got over it. The accommodation had 3 bedrooms and all along we had said that it would be one for her and her DH, one for me and DH and one for the two DC. DC were excited to share as at the time they were both only children. Well when we got there, friend decided that her DS would now be sharing with her, leaving our DD alone and upset so we had to deal with that!

We went to the supermarket as we were self catering and split the bill although we paid more as there were 3 of us so that was fair. However the bottle of wine she picked up, she sat and drank the whole thing herself without offering us. She never offered to cook even though we had agreed before to all take turns. She only cleared up once and it was a half job, quite literally - half the washing up was left for us! One night when we’d cooked (as we did every day) she sat at the table and turned around (tiny kitchen/diner) and got herself and her DS some cutlery out the drawer but none for the the rest of us so we had to ask her to get us some as we couldn’t get there. She left mess everywhere, I ended up sitting on a dining chair and Dh on the floor once as she was laying on the sofa and all her cardigans, bags etc were on the other seat.

Before we went she made out her DS loved it there as they had been before but really he only wanted to do about 10% of the activities available (think holiday camp type thing) so we ended up separate in the day anyway. We ate out a couple of times and she went and ordered and paid at the bar before we had even decided what we wanted which meant her and her Ds always got their food way before us, leaving DD disgruntled.

There were loads more things but this is already long, sorry!

The whole thing was a nightmare. Oh and I was 37 weeks pregnant.

Never ever again.

Oh and then it all got blamed on us when we eventually got to speak to her! She had said that we kept going off for lunch without her etc which simply wasn’t true as we messaged her every day asking where she was and if she wanted to head back for lunch and she always replied saying she had already been back and had lunch. We had the messages to prove it! In the end we agreed to disagree but our friendship has never quite been the same.

He has a secret cupboard.
We have been doing shopping and he contributes a bit but then is hiding food in a secret cupboard!
He keeps making comments about people eating his food. So a tube of Pringles on the side, everyone diving in, he commented that he put them in the trolley for him.
Counting out the cupcakes in the tray..commenting on how many have been eaten.
I literally dare not eat a single thing.
Last day today and there’s a tiny amount of milk left, not enough for breakfast cereal but enough for his coffee... wonder what he will do??

3 times I have been away with 'friends'.
Camped uk with another family. They had a trailer tent, us a caravan +awning.
We arrived first with dc and full weeks' shopping for ourselves..
They rocked up with the dw carrying a plate on her lap - a cooked chicken...
No more food items emerged... It rained the whole week. Guess who hosted?
Family 2 - camping abroad. We hosted their family a great lunch.
Day came for their turn - apparently the shop was shut so they couldn't get supplies. Never rescheduled... We gave up and left early after a few days..
Last attempt was a one dc family who's dc demanded ice cream and fast food at every single opportunity. The dw wanted to spend ridiculous money in the amusements but not actually do anything else. And hit the roof that our caravan was better theirs..
Vowed never again.

crosser62 talking of pringles reminds me of when we went away with my parents and DB and his girlfriend. We all took some different snack foods with us and DB and girlfriend took some tubes of Pringles and DB told us all to help ourselves. Well one time my mum was with my DD and she wanted some pringles so my mum gave her 3 pringles and DB kicked off and said they were for his girlfriend! So that was awkward.
Also that holiday was the first time I saw how lazy his girlfriend is. Lovely person but she did absolutely nothing to help.

Honestly, there’s 3 full tubes sitting on the side and I dare not have s single one.
I’ve just baked a tray of cookies and I’ve had half of one then felt like he was watching me eat so haven’t had any more.
He has no milk for more coffee, he usually boils the kettle continuously. He has gone into his room now to eat his lunch 😬 awkward.

Done it once with family member I love to pieces and get on so well with. The difference in routines was hard though and we swore never again.

The idea of it is always great, but the actual practicalities of it a mistake. Won’t be doing it again.

Went with another much loved aunt a few years ago and she drove us batty with having to find somewhere for her to smoke every half an hour. Stopping, waiting then finding the next smoking spot, then toilets frequently then a shop for her to buy a can of Diet Coke to have permanently to sup.
Love her dearly but had no idea that this was the habitual cycle of her time.
We were pretty much slaves to this ritual for over a week.

I went away with a very dear friend once, but we just weren't interested in the same things and we had very different ideas about when/if we were going to eat... when I go on holiday, I want to enjoy the local food and drink, and take in some museums and things. She was only bothered about shopping, and was the sort of person who can go all day without thinking about food, so when I suggested stopping for lunch she would screw up her face and say "I'm not really hungry, but I'll get a cup of tea while you have something, if you want." I didn't really want to sit there while she watched me eat, so I ended up feeling very grumpy and hangry for most of the trip. I know it wasn't her fault that she didn't have much of an appetite but it made me feel like a big greedy pig and I got all resentful about it by about day 3.

Oh went interrailing with a friend after A levels. We both wanted to go to the same places and see the same things. However, when I went abroad with my parents it has always been bottle of wine, local cheeses, bread, salami etc but she wanted to just go to McDonald's everywhere! It wasn't a money thing coz about the same price. Once I suggested we got a slice of cold pizza for takeaway lunch. To her cold pizza was a novelty. I was shocked. But, maybe I'm unusual?

We were, luckily, friends but not best buddies and stayed friendly afterwards

I have learnt that if you are going to go away with people it is best to have separate accommodation.

We've gone on holiday with friends of our DC for about 6 years and the only reason we are still friends is because we ALWAYS 'stay in separate accommodation.

So, we meet up daily for beach/pool/meals but have mornings to ourselves and work to our own timescale re getting ready. And then evenings to ourselves to wind down and chill out.

I don't think we'd still be friends if we stayed in the same villa.