Has anyone NOT enjoyed a UK holiday with their kids/teens?

[Arrowheart]

Or is it just me? Please tell me that I'm not alone in finding the moaning, sulking, moody behaviour a little bit tedious. Especially after spending £££'s to travel somewhere else for a week to listen to it.

Years ago we had one holiday when our son was about 9 months old. The weather wasn't great, we all got ill and we didn't enjoy it much. I think it was our least successful holiday. We also had a week in Scotland when he was 18 months old which wasn't great either.

Toddlers and bad weather don't mix. But even if the weather had been amazing I don't think it would have been that great. They're awkward baggage between 6ish and 24 months old and you may as well stay at home. Once they can walk, talk and eat proper food and have some modicum of toilet training it gets easier.

(nothing to do with being in the UK by the way - we like UK holidays - just not with toddlers)

I didn’t really enjoy our UK holiday this year, although have enjoyed lots of UK holidays in the past (pre and post DC). I think that was my mental state - after a year and a half of making do/making the best of things etc, I just have no reserves left. So, for example, when the weather was bad we still “made the most of it” but I just didn’t have it in me to find the positive vibe. And it just wasn’t the degree of a mental/cultural break that I think I really needed.

@MissJeanBrodiesprime

Sorry to hear you had a rubbish time OP. We didn’t go away this year so my teens have just been moany at home instead. But if it’s any consolation, in the past when I’ve taken them away and they’ve been really grumpy and I’ve thought it was such a complete waste of money but years later they’ve spoken very fondly of the memories of that trip which really surprised me.

Quite a few years ago now, I took DD to Cambridge for a few days after her GCSEs, to give her something to aim for if she liked the look of it. We stayed in one of the older colleges, ate out, payed for multi-storey parking (My God, the price of that ) and I generally spent quite a bit of money. DD was a complete and utter pain, moaned all the time, and we drove back in silence with me on the verge of tears. When we got home, I went straight out to the village pub as I wanted to get away from her. I resolved never to take her away overnight, ever again.

Fast forward a few years and she is accepted onto a postgrad course in Cambridge, with a place in one of the colleges we visited on this disastrous trip. It turns out that, like MissJean said, she has fond memories of it

Yes kids can be so ungrateful. I remember we booked a waterpark day which cost us an absolute fortune the kids just dripped moaned and we're absolutely spoilt brats we all ended up falling out with eachother it was horrible.