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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To wonder what your idea of the holiday companion from hell is?

196 replies

Summerbreezing · 14/05/2014 13:55

Just inspired by another thread, but what kind of person do you hate finding yourself on holiday with?

I can't bear the kind of person who wants to frogmarch everyone around to 'interesting places', and think a minute spent relaxing is a minute wasted. I don't want to spend my entire time in Paris up the Eiffel Tower or wandering around the Louvre or catching a train to Versailles. I want to spend some time just 'being' in Paris, wandering aimlessly around, stopping for coffee or wine, people watching, saying 'let's go down here, it looks interesting' etc. Please don't present me with an hour by hour timetable. It's a holiday.

OP posts:
alemci · 14/05/2014 19:58

I hate it when people have a schedule on holiday. I like to relax and do things on impulse.

I only go with my dh and dc.

mamadoc · 14/05/2014 19:59

I've had some odd hols with the in laws. Not altogether unpleasant but a bit odd.

MIL has allergies and intolerances to seemingly every food imaginable. This means you can never go to a restaurant together and nothing you could cook her would ever pass muster. I have now realised it isn't worth trying.

Before I came to this realisation I went on holiday with MIL and SIL and our collective kids (DH and BIL working). I came downstairs after putting the kids to bed and announced 'hey, so what shall we eat? Shall I cook something or we could get a takeaway'. To be met with bewilderment as they had already separately eaten (in MIL case I think some boiled spinach). I found it so sad that we were all just heating up an individual ready meals all week.

Have also had the holiday dictated around a small child's rigid nap time, mealtime and bedtime. We needed to get to tourist attractions on the button of opening time at 10am in order to maybe get an hour in before we had to go home so x could have a nap in a cot in a dark room from 12-2pm precisely. This lasted all of 2 days before we decided to go our separate ways to avoid wasting entrance fees and disappointing our non-napping kids.

jeanmiguelfangio · 14/05/2014 19:59

Last vent I promise
my dad, who will book a cruise round the med in august and then moan it is too hot. What the hell were you expecting?
Really I only holiday with my dh, and now dd. I can holiday with my mum and stepdad though.

Sneepy · 14/05/2014 20:05

Sneepy how awful. How on earth do you deal with this?

I live on the other side of the world from her. Am currently still recovering from a 10-day visit 6 weeks ago during which I wasn't allowed to eat anything without comment.

In her defense, she does ALL the dishes, all the time. And she loves her grandchildren very much.

MmeMorrible · 14/05/2014 20:06

Anyone except DH and the DC... I vant to be alone.....

SugarMiceInTheRain · 14/05/2014 20:40

Feel guilty about saying this but FIL. He is very generous in that he has taken us on holiday a few times (we wouldn't be able to afford it otherwise). His own words are that we provide company for him and he will foot the bill. However he doesn't like to spend money on things so will insist we eat at the cheapest places, usually places with awful food - as his criteria for a good meal out are cheap and lots of it Hmm I enjoy food and see meals as an important part of a holiday, particularly if you're holidaying abroad, and it was so frustrating being in Paris but eating in Flunch or Quick Sad instead of a nice restaurant. Awkward, because he's paying (and insists on it) and I don't want to seem ungrateful, but having to eat the cheapest, poorest quality food for a week or two does get annoying.

Also he teaches the boys all kinds of irritating habits/ new words, which they then repeat ad nauseam for weeks - it makes my life so much harder than it needs to be. Especially with DS1, who has Aspergers and in his mind, if something is ok to say whilst messing about with Grandad, it's ok to say to the headteacher/ a policeman etc - FIL refuses to alter his ways and when challenged, laughs and says it's his job to make my life harder Angry For that reason alone, I am trying to avoid going on holiday this year with him. He keeps asking if we want to do Disneyland Paris or something similar but I haven't got the energy to spend 6+ weeks post-holiday trying to un-teach all the bad habits Grandad has taught the kids. Sad Also we want to get a bigger car as we now have DC3, which means the five of us are quite cramped in the car on holidays but I'm stalling because the lack of space in our car is a convenient excuse not to go on holiday with FIL...

mswibble · 14/05/2014 20:46

Would 'who/what is your idea of a holiday companion from hell' have sufficed? Dont really understand the 'unreasonable' point to this?

mswibble · 14/05/2014 20:49

But anyhoo, anyone other than my OH. Im v intolerant (!) and cant really hack other people for very long!

KERALA1 · 14/05/2014 20:51

Anyone who doesn't read. The horror of not factoring in time lying around with a book. Anyone that doesn't like beaches. And agree on the marching round ticking off sights rather than soaking up atmosphere. Sadly my in laws tick all these boxes. Their ideal holiday is a coach tour or a cruise they love being herded round and told what to do.

DizzyKipper · 14/05/2014 20:58

There are far too many things to describe. To put it shortly, anyone who isn't DH or DC.

MiniatureRailway · 14/05/2014 21:01

Anyone fussy. I can't stand fussers.

BerylStreep · 14/05/2014 21:16

Mervyn Grin

JeanMiguel I once had a spray tan before going on holiday, as I am VVV white. It was a cruise, where they take a photo of the family as you are boarding. Not only did I look like I wasn't from the same family, I didn't even look like I was from the same country. Blush

Quodlibet · 14/05/2014 21:17

Flappy anxious people who get their knickers in a twist when they are anywhere new/when anything is different and who feel the need to overplan everything to mitigate for any perceived potential uncertainty, thus sucking all potential spontaneity out of life MIL

TwoNoisyBoys · 14/05/2014 21:24

Haven't read TFT but have to say my ExH. Wherever we went, found the nearest pub and made it his 'local' for the duration of the holiday. Permanently pissed, wherever we went......

foslady · 14/05/2014 21:33

My parents (love them to bits but hard work).
Ex PIL's (only woman who could read on a leaflet 'Oh, they have a tea shop' and insist on going)
Exh........6 weeks after he walked out on us for ow (that was a fun one....)

Janethegirl · 14/05/2014 21:34

I took my mum to Prague and the first thing she wanted was to go to M&S, my sister had a similar issue in Paris. What's worse is I still take her on holiday but she now knows M&S is a swear word :).

ViviPru · 14/05/2014 21:39

Stinkie I remember your thread/contribution to a thread about your odd friend with her weird aversion-to-sand-on-towels-at-the-beach and what not, in fact it stayed with me to the point I think of it when there's bits of grass in the tent!

SDTGisAnEvilWolefGenius · 14/05/2014 21:40

Eggybrokenoff - I went on holiday with my dmum and dsis last year. NEVER A-FUCKING-GAIN! Individually they are lovely, together they are smugly superior about everything, and share a lot of the same (smugly superior) interests. I trailed round various historical sites, listening to the two of them being superior about how much they knew about the different places. Now I like a historical site as much as the next person, but not when I am being smugged at.

I ranted so much to dh on email (it was that, or kill one or both of them, which would have spoiled the holiday a bit), that only 24 hours into the holiday, he'd already got options to get me home within a day!

MrsRambo · 14/05/2014 21:41

Does anyone else kind of forget how awful it was / kid themselves it will be better this time (because this year's cottage has 3 bathrooms etc) only to find that it is still really shit going on holiday with people you don't normally live with, no matter how many times and variations you try? I am finally getting it now. It's been a painful journey though.

My personal pet hate is parents and pils becoming completely helpless and turning into dependent saps the moment they step out of their home towns. Would make allowances if it was a far flung foreign destination but we are talking Wales here...

YouAreCompletelyRight · 14/05/2014 21:44

My mother, every time I've relented and gone away with her I come back saying never again. I'm not alone, every time she goes away with someone they come back not speaking. I'm amazed she manages to get anyone to go with her.

YouAreCompletelyRight · 14/05/2014 21:47

...my FIL on the other hand was lovely to go on hols with. He kept the kids occupied and DH and was happy to babysit occasional evenings. Bloody miss that man Sad

SDTGisAnEvilWolefGenius · 14/05/2014 21:48

MrsRambo - if I ever look like I might agree to another holiday with just dsis and dmum, dh is going to stage an intervention - like having me committed or locking me in the she'd until the urge passes!

MrsRambo · 14/05/2014 21:52

Grin Grin STD

That's the kind of intervention I needed!

MrsRambo · 14/05/2014 21:59

Sorry, meant to type STDG! (not SDT!)

SDTGisAnEvilWolefGenius · 14/05/2014 22:04

It's fine - don't worry. Thanks