British weather on holiday with bored kids help

[Towelles]

On holiday in Norfolk with DH and SDC for a week. It’s overcast and windy. I am an outdoors person but SDC (primary aged) aren’t so we can’t do activities any water sports. They don’t really like walking far

The caravan park facilities are ok but the arcade and food is expensive. It’s too cold to swim in the pool longer than an hour. The on site park is shit. The beach is lovely but very windy and the kids are bored after an hour or so. There is evening entertainment so that’s all covered it’s the day times

We have been mostly driving around trying to find things to do. Went to a play park today with a zip wire that actually charged adults to go in and frankly it was a rip off.

We went to see the seals the DC thought that was boring.

I would be happy to do coastal walks or hire bikes I think it’s beautiful here

About to hire a boat to go on the broads (for ££££) (I would also like to walk around but I don’t think this will be popular) so basically it’s me sitting in the back of a boat watching the SDC argue about who is steering it

Can anyone suggest ideas?

we tried crabbing yesterday but the kids got bored as we didn’t catch anything

they then slept in till 10am so most of the day was gone by the time everyone got dressed

please help me save my sanity - is this going to just cost me £1,000 to make this week any good?

We had a better day today once it got going properly. I had to keep prodding him to be proactive and hype them up when they became morose and making suggestions. I’m not going to take over and become some kind of a Butlins red coat children’s entertainer, fuck that. We got out and about and saw/did more but crucially, I made them all swim FIRST today so it was off the agenda and the pressure was off.

DP not listening to me is driving me bloody bonkers. I suggest and suggest and suggest and he doesn’t listen until I lose my damn mind and am at breaking point so he is listening now but I feel like I have to lose the plot to get him to hear me. And no I don’t shout or sulk, I mean when you are just trying to communicate with someone stubborn it’s crazy making.

To those who have spent the time making practical and sensible suggestions of local activities rather than picking my entire life apart and giving me a good kicking, I am grateful as it has helped and we have the next 2 days planned.

for the picky ones - he is my DP, we are engaged. I call him husband/partner interchangeably because there isn’t much difference. I’ve been with him a long time, I know the kids very well, I live with them and no, it’s never been this bad on a holiday before but they have been more spoilt with a hot destination and not used to slumming it in a caravan park like all of our childhood holidays were. This isn’t their normal I suppose, and they did not adapt to it very well. My DP is 100% the reason why we ended up coming here because he messed up his holiday dates and this was all we could afford. WE discussed it and HE also agreed to come here. I’m not sure what other responsibly I am needing to take on. I would expect their parent to encourage them to adapt and hype them up and be grateful they are on holiday?

Random I know but I just remembered today how much my son enjoyed table tennis and crazy golf at this age. Also pool, though I hate it so avoided it.

If you’ve got access to the sorts of shops that do games, or to Amazon delivery, try one called Just One. A very simple game to get the hang of but fun for all ages.

Bloody mini golf 😂! Can't stand it, would rather do laundry or clean skirting boards. Kids love it though so unfortunately we do it at least twice a month.

I seethe silently all the way round thinking that if I'm this fed up, I might as well be doing useful stuff like cleaning out junk drawers while pretending to get excited about holes-in-one and getting told off for hitting the ball into the water again.

I think budget is an issue. It is expensive to take DC out now. It costs about £70 to have a meal out at a big standard chain restaurant as a family and then doing anything on top is just extra. Zoos are £100+ I would probably budget £150 per day at least for a holiday like this so we could do activities, buy things during the day without being tense about it. We couldn't afford that this year so we are doing a staycation with the same kinds of activities (adventure parks, castles, zoos) but without having to travel or pay accomodation.

I'm glad you had a better day.

Sounds like you've got a real sulker there though (not the kids!) I think a lot of men feel resentment when holidays aren't relaxing.

Because a lot of men (not all) are complete lazy buggers when it comes to parenting and admin.

I have found it a real job of work over the years to come up with a holiday that works for the 3 of us. Successful holidays can be a lot of work. If you find a place or type of thing that works, repeat!

Glad you're having a better day. It does not sound like an unreasonable request to have fun days outdoors, but kids need to be trained for it and parents need to keep it fun.

We do a lot of walking because we all like it (well some of us tolerate it!) but we've had to train DC by basically offering nothing else for fun for years. Going for a walk is just what we do, moaning or not. And still DH and I have to put a lot of work into keeping DS engaged and on side. Endless chat about football, Fortnite, and our family's favourite game: guess what animal I'm thinking of 🙄 Like all things kid related, it's work, but if we didn't put that work in our walks would 100% resemble your days out. You describe them really well OP, and that is what my life would be like if DH and I didn't pull together and, for want of anything better to call it "make it fun"

This.

Go to Butlins next time, it would cost less than £1000 for a week and the pool time is unlimited.

Llama?

@Conversensational falcon usually, but I'm going to throw lama into the mix just to liven up our next walk 😁 oh the fun we will have

Even mini-golf will set you back 25 quid for a round now. I deeply resent handing over so much cash when I'd rather be sticking sharp splinters under my nails.

I agree, how can they find seal watching boring?!!! Luckily there are some good suggestions in the thread so hopefully OP finds something that gets them interested.

I do remember when I was a kid, probably around 10-13 years old, and being told that the activity we were going to do was "going for a nice walk to look at a pretty view" was groan-inducingly boring. What on earth was the point of that, I thought. I have improved since then.😂But we did go for walks very regularly, if nothing else because we had a spaniel we had to take for walks! And whenever we met up with uncles/aunts/cousins we always ended up going for a walk. So we were basically trained into it.

I do think there's been a bit of a shift into parents being/feeling responsible for keeping children entertained. There's less of kids having to sort themselves out if they're bored, and more push-back that mum or dad better arrange for something interesting or exciting to do. Friend's kids - the minute they're having to have a break from being on a screen, it's "I'm bored, what can I do?". Saying no to various suggestions of lego/marble runs/books/etc, demanding that an adult entertains them or takes them somewhere.

I’m a bit aghast that you’re doing so much more work on this than the father of the SDC!? Even though he agreed to do this holiday because of his fuck up?!

why?!

fuck this shit!!