Wistful holiday thread - what can I do for £3 k?

[Purplehatsandflowers]

Just wondering, and dreaming.

If you had saved about £3 k to put towards a family holiday- what would you do?

(Family of 4, Dcs under the age of 12)

You don't say what you like but depending on the ages of the kids ie; if they're very young a self catering villa in Europe with meals out. If a bit older then a nice all inclusive with activities in Europe. You might be able to squeeze a cheaper holiday further afield to Florida depending on the time of year (probably unlikely with school holiday prices). Or a ski trip to a cheaper resort.

Oh ihave no idea at all what I would like! So am very open to suggestions. :)

kids 11 and 9. Not sporty, have SEN. We went a few years back to a self catering villa in Greece and it was brilliant. :)

Love a bit of fantasising...

Norway in September!

Oh! That sounds intriguing..........

I had a budget of £3k for a family holiday next year. 2adults 3kids and a baby.

I just booked a campsite in Spain, with flights and car hire for £2k (the other 1k will be spending money)

I wanted all inclusive in Turkey for £2.8k but the flights didn't work with the school holidays. So we're trying something different!

The campsite has loads of pools with slides and flumes and is really near the beach and a little town. The kids love being in the water so will probably spend all week in the pool or sea. I would like to take a day trip to Barcelona as I love it but we'll see what happens. We're staying in a lodge not a tent!!!

That sounds blissful :)

I'd go to Turkey assuming travel restrictions etc allow.

It was not somewhere that ever appealed to me but a few years ago we ended up there as we really needed a relaxing sunshine holiday and it was all we could find still available in school summer holidays. We've been back lots of times since. Plus points for me are- completely reliable good weather (in the summer), very family friendly, amazing scenery, loads of places to visit if you want (historical/water parks/wild life etc etc). Also incredibly cheap when you are there compared to spain etc. As an example of prices, last time we went we had a day at a water park for 4 that cost around £25 in total including transport, then lunch in the water park total £15 including drinks. A day at a private stunning beach cost total £30 including transport both ways, lunch and a couple of drinks. It's also no where near as busy as spain etc (eg. at the water park we had no trouble finding 4 sun beds together and never had to queue for more than a few minutes for rides- and this was mid August).

@Hesnotlocal I love Turkey. Everyone is so friendly and it's so cheap! I was gutted I couldn't find the flights for next year! I took my mum for the first time last year and it's all she bloody talks about now 😂😂

Great idea. I went to Istanbul years ago and we flew to Northern Cyprus also. It was wonderful!

A second vote for Norway. We are planning to drive there next summer. No flights, just a ferry, and it’s a country with a small population, so fairly Covid safe. It’s also stunningly beautiful.

We did a 5 night break to Iceland with DC that age. It was expensive but our best holiday ever. Saw the northern lights, whale watching, geisers, glaciers, waterfall. It was all day trips which we didn't think we'd like so only booked the first one in advance but actually we loved it all.

Only issue (if your dc have food issues) was the food. The soups and fish are amazing, but otherwise it was tricky to feed youngest as everything sounded like it would be the same 'pasta with tomato sauce and meatballs' was 'lump of over cooked plain spaghetti in a bowl with some Swedish meatballs on the side and a little pot of ketchup' for example: supermarket sushi ( the failsafe of the time) all had a thin smear of dill mayonnaise in it.

And food was expensive, so when the only thing on the menu that she would eat/could recognise was lobster tails, we ordered them knowing that her dinner cost £40: twice the cost of any of ours.
So if you do go book a little apartment and take food for some meals with you.

@VenusClapTrap

A second vote for Norway. We are planning to drive there next summer. No flights, just a ferry, and it’s a country with a small population, so fairly Covid safe. It’s also stunningly beautiful.

What ferry? We'd love to go back but they stopped the Newcastle-Norway. and now even Ryanair stopped going to Haugesund. What is your route please?

@ODFOx

We did a 5 night break to Iceland with DC that age. It was expensive but our best holiday ever. Saw the northern lights, whale watching, geisers, glaciers, waterfall. It was all day trips which we didn't think we'd like so only booked the first one in advance but actually we loved it all. Only issue (if your dc have food issues) was the food. The soups and fish are amazing, but otherwise it was tricky to feed youngest as everything sounded like it would be the same 'pasta with tomato sauce and meatballs' was 'lump of over cooked plain spaghetti in a bowl with some Swedish meatballs on the side and a little pot of ketchup' for example: supermarket sushi ( the failsafe of the time) all had a thin smear of dill mayonnaise in it. And food was expensive, so when the only thing on the menu that she would eat/could recognise was lobster tails, we ordered them knowing that her dinner cost £40: twice the cost of any of ours. So if you do go book a little apartment and take food for some meals with you.

Mmmmm. My front runner I think so far. DH asked me what i wanted for christmas and I said a trip to Iceland but hsi thoughts were the Dcs would be bored. But whale watching and geisers... sounds perfect;

Food is an issue with DS1. But I can take food as you suggest.

Thanks everyone for answering my post. I am getting very excited. After reading about it on MN i have started a holiday account and am re-directing money I usually spend on crap into it. Am hoping the 3k target might be a reality sometime next year.

Are you all booking for 2021? I was thinking about it this morning but didnt know whether to hold off for another while.

I have a ds7 with SEN and his favourite holidays are the ones where we are busy! He loved walking around Rome for days and days seeing the sites, having pizza and ice cream outside the Vatican and the Colosseum etc.

He also loves f1, this year we were meant to be doing a double holiday of a grand prix in a city with lots to see.

Iceland sounds amazing, I think I'd like to book that too.

That sounds amazing Lazy

If I book it will be about Jan time- another 6=7 weeks or so to see what happens with things.

Rome sounds great! DS1 said to me today that he wants to go to paris 'because you are always banging on about it, mummy'.

He's right.

I forgot Rome! We did 3 days 2 nights in Rome and went to all the places in the film Roman Holiday with the kids as preteens.

It was fun, quite tiring, but nice to have a plan to aim for. Also sitting in a pavement cafe watching the world go by is something we'd never have got away with if the DC hadn't seen it in a film.
Not a 3K break but a lovely trip with older DC not yet sulky teens!

@ODFOx we are planning to take the Hirtshals - Stavanger ferry. We’ll make overnight stops in Holland and then Germany en-route. Then spend a couple of weeks pootling around driving from Stavanger to Bergen, then ferry back from Bergen, wending our way through Denmark, Germany and Holland again.

It’s a lot of driving, but we have an electric car which makes it all very cheap!

We’re doing Malta at the end of June. For the three of us it’s cost 1k all inclusive 4* with flights. The Spanish hotel equivalents were double the price! Popeye’s village has grabbed my attention.

We did Malta and popeyes village before aswell. Malta = amazing food... and so much of it. Very cheap there aswell.

I was looking at some photos last night and Costa Dorada was nice too. We stayed in blanes with a fab beach. We took a couple of day trips, one to a very good waterpark, another day trip to Barcelona where we saw the football stadium, then headed into the city and watched the light show.

The news of the vaccine has made me feel like these things can now be planned.

I saw some ads for Gibraltar last night as well.

So many options. :)

DS has SEN and is obsessed with boats, so we are potentially doing the UK to Spain ferry. Takes just over 24 hours, so we'll get to sleep on board etc and it'll be like a mini cruise. This takes you to Northern Spain, which is apparently lovely and untouristy, and I think the plan is to spend some time there, then drive across to Barcelona (7 hours or so) and spend a week at one of the Eurocamp type places.

If we didn't have much time, I'd probably opt for more of a villa with pool type holiday.