Your worst ever holiday

[DanteThunderstone]

I know this has been done before but it's cold and grey outside and I haven't been on holiday in years and can't afford to any time soon. So please make me feel better about being stuck at home surrounded by rain puddles with tales of Holiday Disappointment. My worst ever holiday was when I was 19. I went on a two week package holiday to a cheap hotel in Rhodes with three friends. Almost immediately I got the worst flu of my life and spent pretty much the whole fortnight in an uncomfortable bed in an overheated room feeling like death while they all went on day trips and beach visits and nights out. Them rolling in pissed every night and waking me up was especially fun. I barely saw any of the island and I wasted two weeks leave and a few hundred quid lying in bed wanting my mum

[quote TeaStory]**@Aroundtheworldin80moves* please* tell the turtle story![/quote]
On a snorkeling trip. A group of turtles were nearby, but our guide told us to keep our distance. One swam up to the group and just went for DH, headbutting him and chasing at him. Tour Guide got us out the water and said afterwards they usually avoided humans. No idea why it went for him!

August 2012. A beach house near Dingle in Ireland. Holidaying with our best friends and they're 2 little DCs. Our DDs were 8 & 9. Should have been idyllic. The house was stunning with huge, sea views and the garden had steps down to a beautiful white sand beach.

Not that we ever, actually saw the view or even the beach, for that matter. Thanks to the heavy morning fogs (yes, fog). And the fact that it absolutely pissed it down. All day. Every fucking day. For 14 days straight.

I think we managed a grand total of 2 hours on the beach, traipsing glumly in heavy drizzle. Our poor friends' baby was teething and howled All. The. Time. I had the period from Hell, accompanied by several nasty migraines in a row. Then DH & friend got food poisoning from a seafood platter. We watched the Olympics. All of the Olympics. And I fucking hate sport.

Never been so glad to go home.

My worst vacation happened just recently when instead of a New Year's trip to Turkey I ended up in the hospital with a coronavirus infection. Fortunately, on New Year's Eve I was already home with my family.

I have a couple of contenders, from my younger days:

1. After a very busy few months at work, a colleague (new job, and we'd become friends recently) and I decided to have a cheap week in the sun. The plan we discussed was self catering (to keep the cost down- we were both on a budget), lazy days at the pool, a bit of sight seeing and relaxing drinks in a beach front bar. Friend booked everything and we ended up in a small room with no cooking facilities in a block with no pool/bar etc. Friend spent the whole holiday hanging out with groups of men she met on nights out and getting them to pay for her drinks/meals- including spending half the week staying with one of them all the time. The local nightlife was aimed firmly at 18-30 type holidays so going for a drink on my own was a disaster (men who assumed I must be there to hook up).
2. I got sick of my then boyfriend being out getting horribly pissed with his mates every weekend and his response was to book an expensive holiday for both of us. When we got there, he had 'forgotten' his credit card so we had to give my details to the hotel for any extras. He found a new group of male friends on holiday and spend the whole week getting pissed with them. I went alone on all the excursions etc we had booked. When we got home, I realised he had charged all his drinks to my card (rather than paying with the cash he'd brought) and I had a huge bill to pay. He offered to pay half- ignoring the fact that I had not charged any drinks to the card and hadn't even been with him. He was an ex very very soon after that

I realise this may make me sound like a boring git that no-one wants around on holiday- luckily my DH doesn't think so!

@peaceanddove

August 2012. A beach house near Dingle in Ireland. Holidaying with our best friends and they're 2 little DCs. Our DDs were 8 & 9. Should have been idyllic. The house was stunning with huge, sea views and the garden had steps down to a beautiful white sand beach.

Not that we ever, actually saw the view or even the beach, for that matter. Thanks to the heavy morning fogs (yes, fog). And the fact that it absolutely pissed it down. All day. Every fucking day. For 14 days straight.

I think we managed a grand total of 2 hours on the beach, traipsing glumly in heavy drizzle. Our poor friends' baby was teething and howled All. The. Time. I had the period from Hell, accompanied by several nasty migraines in a row. Then DH & friend got food poisoning from a seafood platter. We watched the Olympics. All of the Olympics. And I fucking hate sport.

Never been so glad to go home.

I remember that August!

Fog bound going into Dublin airport and the auto landing gear fails what feels like millimetres from the runway.

We circled for half an hour waiting for another slot, only to end up low on fuel. Got diverted to Shannon.

Say on the tarmac at Shannon for 7 hours on a plane with supplies for a 45 minute flight. Got into Dublin at 3:30am to be collected by a now ex-boyfriend as we’d split up in the preceding 7 hours.

To add insult to injury I needed physio on my arse for 3 months afterwards

Not bad in scheme of things, but still sucked. Also, another thread has touched on this (overseas wedding).
DP friend was getting married in Crete. Don't get me wrong, she's nice enough but I don't really click with her.
Think the issue was that it was out of tourists season. First day was spent mostly traveling. Week was mostly overcast or rainy. As it was out of season, there wasn't much to do on complex, expect use swimming pool or watch TV (only English speaking channel was CNN). We wandered around the local town and DP was tired for days afterwards. Actual wedding was nice enough (never been to a Greek wedding). Although I got heatstroke and a migraine at reception)
Did go on excursion on dotto train to local deserted village- rudest tour guide ever seen. Then had cheek to ask for tips.
Was glad to get home. As mentioned in the overseas wedding threads, I resented paying hundred of pounds and using up precious annual leave.

Also bugs me that (in most places) the reps seem more interested in selling
excursions than Actually helping

UK. Both small DC got chicken pox. Accommodation wasn't very clean. DH broke a bone. I got a stomach bug. It rained every day. Now in our family stories as one to laugh about though.

This will out me but never mind! Weeks holiday in off grid cottage with no signal. Work emergency meant I spent the whole time in the pub on wifi (a good ten mins walk away) while DH and DS chilled at the cottage without me. One eve I had to stay there well after dark.. had taken the car torch 🔦 but 2 mins into my walk back it started to flicker out. No street lights no houses no moon no nothing. It was windy and I felt like I was in the Blair witch project. Had phone torch only (pathetic). No mobile signal so couldn't reach DH nor could he have reached me or left cottage since Ds asleep. I was 30 mins later than I said I'd be so he was freaking out. Got back safe but the whole trip was just ruined by all the work stress and the fact I couldn't deal with it efficiently either bc we were so remote.

@Marmite27 !!! You need to explain the arse physio thing...!!

@WakeUpLockie

Centreparcs.

I just don’t get it. SO expensive, hard to leave (car is ages away). We have awesome pool, woodland, outdoor activity centre etc near our house so should have just stayed home in our comfy house. Shitty pokey chalets. Pool seemed particularly germy (more than 1 kid pooed in it). Manufactured-feeling nature. Expensive accomm, extra for activities, and then on top of that it’s self catering so you still have some mental load. Tried it twice, never again!

Urrrrgh I will NEVER go to centre parcs thank you for validating this

In the middle of March 2020, a colleague retired. A few days later, so did his wife, and few days later they flew to Oz for a trip they’d been saving for for years. Whilst they were on their way, all sorts of pandemic pandemonium broke out, they spent 4 days in a hotel room in Perth, then flew home again.

Gran Canaria with two mates after sixth form. Two of us were in the bedroom with the other in the living room on the pullout bed. Let’s call that one Sarah. Sarah and I fell out really badly then she brought back a different bloke every night and shagged him loudly in the living room whilst me and mate 3 listened, mortified, in the bedroom 😂

To top it all off, got back to Gatwick and Sarah’s mum screamed at me at baggage reclaim whilst everyone looked on in horror. She literally stormed up to me wagging her finger!!

Had a few scary incidents on holidays over the years (food poisoning, minor bike crash, groped), but I'd look back and think overall the holiday was good.

My only really bad one was when my DSis and I were staying in "villa" in rural France (really a small house, with a small pool). DSis had her BF, but my BF had to cancel at last minute due to family issue. The weather was too hot, no AC, 3 mile walk to small village and I did not have full driving license, pre-internet days, so really nothing to do. 10 days of mostly boredom, interspersed with sounds of DSis and her BF shagging every morning and evening. Awful :(

North Wales, August bank holiday weekend 2014. 'D'H decided to go out clubbing the night before we were due to go, leaving me to deal with a 4yo and a 1yo and packing the car. He rolled in at 3am and I shouted at him, then spent an hour sobbing on the sofa because I was so fed up with him pulling that kind of stunt. We left at 6am, spent the day at Thomas Land and arrived that evening at the youth hostel we'd booked. The room was damp and mouldy round the windows, the shower flooded the bathroom and the bedding was covered in stains. We didn't have any money to go somewhere else so had to stick it out. It rained solidly every single day. The kids had a lovely time but I've never felt so miserable in my life.

Towards the end of our marriage, all holidays were awful with ex H but probably the worst was one where he picked up a drink the night we arrived and I didn’t see him sober and rarely without a glass in his hand for the rest of the holiday. I remember we arrived and I took three year old ds down into the beach and looked up to see ex in a world of his own knocking back drink after drink. I took ds out on day trips alone, to the beach alone, swimming alone. The one day we went out as a family he left us to walk back to the hotel alone in the dark as he’d seen a bar with a snooker competition he wanted to enter . On the final night we had an argument so bad because I refused to go for dinner with (drunk) him - that onlookers called the police. Believe it or not he sobered up for a few years after that and we carried on together. Every holiday we went on though he insisted he needed A Night Out Alone and of he’d go, rolling back in in the early hours. Clearly an alcoholic but my I had brought up round heavy alcohol consumption so couldn’t really see it.

A few years ago we went camping for a week in Holland. We're seasoned campers and had a large tent with all the camping paraphernalia.
Day two we decided to go and have lunch then spend the afternoon on the beach.
We came back a few hours later to an empty patch where our tent had stood.
While we were away, not only had someone robbed the contents of our tent, including two fishing beds and expensive sleeping bags, they had also taken the BBQ, the food and the tent too!
All we had left is what we were stood up in and the car.

It's not as bad as some of these but we went to the Isle of Wight when DS was 1. H put unleaded petrol into my diesel car on the way down to the ferry - despite me reminding him as well pulled into the petrol station. We had to call the RAC, be towed to a garage and then pay £200. We missed the ferry and had to wait in a queue.

Once we got there, It was cold, DS was ill and didn't sleep and then I caught it towards the end of the holiday. Couldn't get an earlier ferry home so had to stick it out. Never again

Lovely Mediterranean cruise planned. On the day of travel one spot appeared on the abdomen of dd (3). Looked a bit like chicken pox to me but she was fine and literally only one spot so we went. Next day loads more spots, high temp etc Poor dd was so miserable. Definitely chicken pox. We confined ourselves to the room mostly to isolate her, not a lot to do, cheapest cabin so not even a window. One night particularly she spent the whole night crying saying 'itchy itchy, cream' - she even had itchy spots in her girly bits poor thing. After a week when she was better we tried to take her to the kids club only to be refused and sent to the ship Dr who told us off for not taking her to him in the beginning when we probably would have been sent home from the next port! Quite memorable for the wrong reasons!

Centreparcs. Paid a fortune for activities only for DS to refuse to take part in any of them. Pool was too busy for him and onsite restaurants were terrible for food allergies so we had to cook the whole time.

Went to the owl experience thingy where the guy just kept going on about how rich the people who go to Centreparcs are in a really passive aggressive manner (I mean come on I know its expensive but I doubt truly rich people go to bloody Centreparcs, not going to see Wills and Kate there are you!)

Then to top it all off I caught a terrible sick bug (and I'm emetophobic so this was the.worst.thing.ever!) this totally wrote off the second half of the week.

DH and I took DD1 then aged 15 months old to California/ Las Vegas.

DH wasn’t feeling well and he went to a walk in clinic.

Turns out he had severe gallstones and spent the next 11 days in hospital, having open surgery to remove the gallstone and necrotic flesh around his pancreas (complete with pancreatitis).

There was talk our travel
Instance might not be valid ($200,000 worth of costs)

I spent my days walking DD around toys R us 6000 miles away from home and anyone I knew, visiting DH in hospital absolutely whacked out on morphine.

DH got a business class upgrade to fly home and I got DD on my lap for 11 hours (his seat next to me was sold to a stranger).

It took me years to get on another plane!

I got food poisoning on our honeymoon in India. Spent an awful couple of days violently vomiting loads (so hard I wet myself each time) then trying to recover. The owners of our home stay accommodation were very helpful (although I'm pretty sure it was there I got ill) but kept giving me coconut milk to ease the nausea. I hate the stuff so my very new dh drank it. We had to change our itinerary as there was no way I was going on a 3 hour drive to the next place feeling like that. Not very romantic at all! Once I'd recovered we had a great time, India is lovely and one day we will go back.

@WakeUpLockie

Centreparcs.

I just don’t get it. SO expensive, hard to leave (car is ages away). We have awesome pool, woodland, outdoor activity centre etc near our house so should have just stayed home in our comfy house. Shitty pokey chalets. Pool seemed particularly germy (more than 1 kid pooed in it). Manufactured-feeling nature. Expensive accomm, extra for activities, and then on top of that it’s self catering so you still have some mental load. Tried it twice, never again!

Exactly what I was going to say. We went with friends and I went to Bath on my own for the day, just to escape! I didn't want to go in the first place but at least ex-h had the good grace to agree it wasn't the best.

Long time ago I went to Barcelona with a friend to visit a mutual friend that lived there. She lived with her BF, and the other two of us had to share a double bed in their spare room. I’m a light sleeper, so for a start that was not good. Weather was very hot too. My friend slept very well, but moved around a lot, would put her arms around me (not sexual, she was asleep). I barely slept for the first days. Then I figured out I could get a few hours nap in the afternoon… life saver!

Dc were little, 3 and 5. Don’t know what possessed us but we decided to go camping for 5 nights in Isle of Wight.
Lovely campsite by the sea, near a cliff
First night was fine except I needed a wee in the night and walked into a metal bin in the dark abs really bruised my leg
Next day there was a violent wind storm. Lots of tents blew away. Not ours (ex girl guide) but it was cold and wet and miserably with the dc
Then oldest gets an ear infection and needs antibiotics that must be stored in fridge. No fridge. Spent half the day borrowing ice blocks to put in the cool
Box
It continues to rain and be windy.
In the end we decamped to a b&b. We didn’t have much money at the time so it was a big expense for us. But I nearly cried when I walked in and saw the bed. Never really liked camping. Now I hate it.

Oh and the holiday to Cyprus which the dc both hated as they missed home. Dc1 was 4ish had a tantrum every day - usually a happy child.
Neither of them would go to sleep at their usual time in the family room. So we ended up going to bed at 7pm every night. If we kept them up late they still woke at 6:30 am
Dc 2 (18 months) developed a fear of the water- until the last day when he tried to drown himself but randomly jumping into the pool at every opportunity and he couldn’t swim.
Flight back was delayed by 4 hours. Then Dc2 tantrumed the entire flight home (4 hrs) and all through Gatwick. Everyone was looking at us. And DH didn’t order us food on the place becuse he thought it was too expensive. So everyone else was eating and the dc were very unhappy about that 😂 When we finally got home they went round all their toys, picking them up individually looking at them and then putting them down. After that we only went on holidays to cottages as they clearly couldn’t handle being in a place that didn’t look like a house. DH was too traumatized by the flight experience with dc2