Interesting holidays with kids - get us out of the all inclusive

[HeyDiddleDumplings]

Hello,

I’d like some ideas for interesting holidays with kids (5&7). Where have you been / done that’s more interesting than an all inclusive.

Up until this point we’ve loved an inclusive (not that we cash to holiday lots, but have managed a few) it’s given us all a break we’ve needed. We recently had our holiday cancelled last minute so had to book something else very quickly & last minute. There wasn’t much left and the place we ended up wasn’t that great and still cost quite a bit. It left me feeling a bit over all inclusive’s - the waste, the ‘pack em in’ approach, the cost, the lack of culture. And now the kids are in school holiday they are just so expensive.

I would love some ideas for summer holidays where you get to do a bit more stuff and are more affordable in summer. What have you done that your family has enjoyed?

Any yelloh village campsite would be great but serignan plage particularly so

Took my dc all over. Favourite thing for them wherever we went was the pool! Even better with water slides.
Best interesting holidays were:
Cruises
Sorrento- Capri, Pompeii.
City breaks in Europe near a beach with a pool at the hotel - Lisbon, Barcelona, Dubrovnik etc.
California and Las Vegas
Toronto and area.

We’ve never gone on holiday with the dc without the car (or camper). Ferry trips are so much nicer than navigating airports. The dc always seemed to sleep really well on the boat when they were small.

I know people have very strong feelings about self catering, but we found it great with small children to be in control of mealtimes and not dealing with the hangry, or trying to navigate the autistic food issues. We still ate out but it gave us a lot of flexibility.

I loved city trips- we would do at most two sights in a day, broken up with playgrounds, parks. It’s a lovely way to experience a city - feeding pigeons near the Eiffel Tower, seeing the cats at the colosssum - it just changes your perspective.

We did a week in Normandy exploring the d-day beaches, which was a great mix of adult and dc interests. I’m looking forward to taking them again as teens in a year or two.

What about a cruise?
Lots of the benefits of AI but with the addition of every day in a different location. Ours were older when we did it but loved the ability to visit so many new places. Monaco, Venice, Barcelona, Split, Dubrovnik etc.

Centre parcs in the Netherlands, so much better than centre parcs here.
Ferry over or fly to Amsterdam and hire a car

We sometimes just fly to wherever's cheap on Ryanair. Germany's been fab - amazing public transport so incredibly easy to get to anything you want to do.

If you want a more traditional destination you can save a fortune flying into the "wrong" airport and travelling by car or train from there. We once saved £1600 on flights by flying into Madrid instead of Malaga and driving 4hrs to the coast. We spent £500 of that (including extra meals and activities) on two extra days' holiday in Madrid after the coast and pocketed the rest.

When our DD's were little we went to a lovely campsite near Fontainbleau and stayed in a big caravan. We did day trips to euro Disney as it was only 45 mins. You could get a train to Paris in 25 mins.
We explored the region and did some bouldering which the area is famous for as we were into climbing.
Did this a few years with our friends with little ones and it was perfect.
Then we did a few years of Cornwall and Devon for body boarding and boating exploring little creeks and NT gardens.
Now they are teens we are off to a self built explore of Spain with 3 City locations over 2 weeks using trains to get around.
I can see where AL must be relaxing but it sounds a bit samey to me.
If your DC's enjoy water you can build in a beach location or pool.

Costa Rica is amazing and our best holiday ever. Our dds were 6 and 8 when we went and had an amazing time - seeing wildlife, ziplining, idyllic beaches.

We also had a good holiday in Egypt - started at Cairo and saw the pyramids and then worked out way down to Luxor on the Nile seeing the sights.

Next plan is Japan once travel there is a bit easier.

Our original plan (waaaaay back in summer 2020) had been for a 2 week interrail/sleeper trip here - ended up with BA vouchers that we needed to use so flew instead, but I still hanker after the trains!

@IbizaToTheNorfolkBroads - Carinthia region, south Austria. It borders Italy and is where the majority of large lakes area

@JassyRadlett We also had that planned for summer 2020! I’ll report back but we’re very excited right now. Thinking of heading home on the Zurich-Amsterdam sleeper then Eurostar.

I would love to do 3 weeks in Japan, a kind of road trip north to south via train. Se friends went a few years ago with then 4 and 8 year olds and loved it.

Camping on the Ardeche in France, Our DC were a bit older, but we kayaked the whole of the Ardeche river, this can be done in stages on different days, then slightly out of my comfort zone, canyoning, hiking up the mountains, then zip lining or jumping into rock pools to descent down, all done with a guide, was exhilarating, scary and fun! On the way back we stayed overnight just outside Paris and went to see the sights. Now with one late teen and mid teen we mostly do city breaks, both very excited for New York later this year.

We like a bit of a dual base holiday- so a few nights in a city then off to somewhere with beach, lake and/or swimming pools for a week. We've done Barcelona then Tossa de Mar, Verona and then lake Garda (flew and hired a car for both of those), Paris then Loire Valley, about to do Amsterdam then Duinrell.

We have just been to krakow and that would also be great with kids. There are theme parks and water parks plus mountains with hot springs just outside the city so if you hired a car you could do loads of different things. Eating out is pretty cheap and there are restaurants to suit all tastes.

When our kids were this age we enjoyed several holidays which were basically a group of gites/cottages/apartments around a pool, with a playground, baby sitting service, either a small restaurant on site or meals delivered to accommodation, and easy days out nearby.

There are lots of places you can do that kind of thing all over Europe, but a few examples: Grange du Moulin (Charente Maritime), Emerald Coast Gites (Brittany), Pian di Cascina (Umbria), Caserio del Mirador (Spain).

Club La Santa in Lanzarote. It's set up for active holidays for adults and children, and you can do as much or as little sport as you want. Both me and H are very active and kids loved it. We took some time out and did beaches, cafes etc too, but absolutely loved it (and all came home fitter haha). Not a plan for anyone wanting to lie in the sun and chill all week, but we like being on the move.

@zafferana thanks so much for posting and sharing your knowledge. They look absolutely wonderful!

there’s some wonderful suggestions here. Thank you all.

Just to clarify as well, I know we can leave the AI resort but I think when we’ve picked a AI holiday we’ve done so for the facilities and ease with young children. And at the moment I think with so many cancellations and last minute bookings you end up paying a lot of not very good quality. Whereas before we’ve had amazing quality and a good break. But I think we’re keen to do other things now that have a balance of ease and adventure and you’ve all suggested a real mixture of that.

Great thread! I love all these ideas. We are looking for something a bit different - don’t want an AI hotel, but still something family friendly - so lots of great ideas here for something a bit different.

@Doubleraspberry can I ask what train route you are doing? We like the idea of the train, we did Eurostar to Paris previously and much preferred it to flying. I’ve been looking at the route options to Austria and it seems like there are a lot of changes!

This is a great thread.

It's also worth thinking about how sociable you and your children are. My kids like messing.about with other children (regardless of nationality) so being in a nice campsite suits us. We have fun by the pool, it's familiar and there are activities organised for kids if they want. But we can dip out of that and head off for culture, activities or local gastronomic delights if we so wish. Some ideas on here will entail you being more self sufficient - such as an airbnb. It's less easy to mix with other families. I think it depends on what you and your children like.

I was totally the same as you in 2018, in 2019 we did Disney at Easter it was fabulous. Then for 2020 we booked the Netherlands…we are going this July after postponing twice.
we are getting the overnight ferry from Newcastle to Amsterdam and staying firstly at Duinrell with fun fair and water park. Then going to Efteling and staying onsite fir 4 days it’s a theme park set in the woods. Then we are staying outside Amsterdam for a few days before the overnight ferry home. There is a huge choice of places to stay look at Little Cloggs for ideas. They have cheaper centre parcs, Euro parks, Landal parcs, all look like they have lovely accommodation and you can stay by a canal. Leiden looks lovely too and Wassnar near Duinrell, Berkse Bergen looks fab too. I wish we were going for longer!

@Wandamakesporridge - There’s a night train now that you can put your car on also to Austria. It goes from Düsseldorf (northern Germany). That’s about 4 hour drive from Calais. Good way if you want car to use once you arrive, as car hire very expensive since covid. You can get private cabin with beds, and I think board around 11pm, arrive 7am in Villach. ( there’s other earlier stops I assume as well)

We've only ever taken ours away in the UK. Our favourite thing to do is visiting historic sites and beaches so our destinations alway have that sort of plan in there somewhere.

Dorset- fossil hunting at Charmouth on the beach. Maiden Castle - fantastic earthworks.

Devon- Cotehele- the most stunningly situated medieval manor. Perched by the sea, beautiful walks, stunning gardens. Plus beaches etc.

Equally beautiful- Pembrokeshire in Wales but much quieter roads than Cornwall. We went to a gold mine in Wales that was fab.

London-lots to do and see with kids. We try to do a weekend break in London every year to 18 months. They are country kids but love the buzz.

Norfolk - we've stayed in a yurt which the kids loved, and a shepherds hut. It's the novelty of sleeping somewhere different that makes it.

Hadrian's Wall- visited all along there plus a few towns. The scenery was stunning.

This year we're going back to Northumberland, but a bit further up. We wanted to take the kids to Lindisfarne, Alnwick, out on a boat etc. It's a trip DH and I did years ago but they'll enjoy it.

Next year we'd like to take them to Italy (where I am currently with friends). The heat is something else though so the itinerary will include many more pool and rest days than previously.

Ideally we would want to take them to Rome then travel onto Naples. The trains are easy to use.

@Wandamakesporridge we’ve got an Interrail pass so are going a windy route through France to get there. But coming back we are biting the bullet and doing Nuremberg to home (Yorkshire) in one day with a few changes coming back from Brussels. The Rail Planner app is quite good at showing you options for very unlikely journeys!

@Caspianberg I did look at the car train but it seems to only go from Hamburg to Austria now unfortunately - some of the routes seem to have been discontinued.

The Netherlands, Eurotunnel then fine or ferry depending where you live. Our DC loves Efteling but also the forests/bike riding general exploring etc You've also got Beekse Bergen we've not been there yet. A lot of the campsites have lodges etc and there are lots of outdoor type activities for the DC