Can i leave my spoilt dc at home

[Lestagirl]

Due to goves policies on school attendance we've had to lower our sights on holiday. We got away this year on the fact it was pre booked prior to the rule changes.

So we've booked a cheap deal to Spain next year and they are kicking up a fuss, I want to leave them behind. Ungrateful sods.

I could not agree more mrtumbles. I think some of the posters here are just a bit single minded as to what constitutes an enjoyable holiday (i.e. What they like) and I get the impression rather look down on those who might actually enjoy a couple of weeks in Benidorm.

I've never been to Benidorm but I have been to the Costa Del Sol quite a few times and loved it. You can do the Brit thing if you want or you get a bus and go up the coast stopping off at that bars and restaurants over looking the sea in the villages on the way. My absolute favourite place is a seafood bar in Torremolinos with huge displays of gorgeous seafood that they cook for you there and then to have with a glass of wine. It's right at the top of the main tourist street and full of Spaniards who don't look particularly repulsed by being there.

Any backpacker worth their salt does learn "hello", "please" and thank you" at least in the local language though... :o

Oddly enough I know some Spaniards who do a fortnight in Benidorm every year. They are the couple who look after my dad's house in Madrid and live out in Barajas, so maybe a similar demographic to the Brits who love it, Aurynne? They also return to their "pueblo" in Extremadura every Easter. They very kindly took me when I was 16, that was undoubtedly an authentic cultural experience but possibly not one for everyone.

If they were doing no harm I would not mind... but I have had the doubtful pleasure of watching hordes of drunk Brits vomiting on the floor and braying at 4 am once and believe me, I never want to see them again.

Holy God - I just looked up what a week in Benidorm costs for this week in July 2015 for 2 adults and 2 teens and it's a minimum of £500 EACH! I thought this was some fabby £200 each kind of deal, not 2k.

There are waaaay better ways of spending 2k and getting 2 weeks in the sun without culture shock or stroppy teens.

I'd be embarrassed that my children were that old and that spoilt to be truthful. A wistful sigh that it wasn't going to be as luxurious as usual would be as far as I'd allow them to go.
So I'd be working on changing their attitudes and understanding on a long-term basis as they sound very egocentric. Which is not a particularly lovely characteristic if you are over the age of 3.

I'd deliberately take them to tacky dives for the first few days just fit a laugh!

And yes, I'd happily holiday without them. Perhaps a few weekend breaks for you and your partner might be in order?

Not all Brits are like that though Aurynne just as not all Spaniards think bullfighting is a perfect night out.

aurynne I doubt that is what the OP is planning or maybe her teens would be keener I assume you wouldn't want packs of roaring drunks vomiting all over the unspoilt villages, better they stay contained in predictable places where they are easily avoided, surely?

Now that you mention it MrTumbles, you're damn right!

aurynne I had a great time in benidorm. But given the option (of time, budget etc) would have lived to go back to Barcelona, or hire a place in a more remote part of Spain and do some ex

Exploring. But, time not money wasn't on our side. And going to benidorm (or benneriffe as I mistakenly referred to it) meant cheap direct flights from our local airport.

I'd go back. It did the job. Nice hotel nice food lovely weather relaxing. But there are loads of other places I want to visit. Budget permitting.

I went on camping Haven holiday with my parents every year, only stopped this year (just turned 20). And next year me, my OH and our DD are going with them again, getting side-by-side caravans. A lot of friends my age also enjoy family holidays. We don't all automatically hate our parents when we become teenagers

OP, I can't quite get my head around how ungrateful and entitled they sound. (Hope you take this as it's meant; an observation rather than an insult).

To be honest I would love to go to Benidorm. Not to get wasted and show my perfect bikini body :) I grew out of enjoying downing shots in my 20s and if I ever had a bikini body I lost it somewhere. I cannot sunbathe at all (I have vitiligo and I am so pale naturally I have white eyelashes and eyebrows. Sunbathing for me is asking for a trip to A&E and I have managed to get sunstroke on an overcast day in August)

It would just be so brilliant to wander round looking at stuff. If I was there I would be the weirdo in long sleeved shirts and long baggy trousers, taking photos of the different landscape and trying out my nonexistent Spanish. I'd like to try some Spanish food, which I have heard is delicious. I'd like to rubbishly attempt to talk about Spanish politics. Please take me, OP! I am quite small and not problematic :D

Why on earth would you take them anywhere? Ungrateful, rude idiots. I'd be beyond embarrassed if my child behaved like that, let alone a teenager. Maybe you should spend the holiday time, you had booked, parenting your brats and teaching them how to have manners, before they're inflicted on the rest of adult society.

Jeez this has to be a wind up.

Take them. They might not want it now, but appreciate later.

My friend's daughter had a major sulk when she found out that the aeroplane they would be travelling on to their luxury holiday in Canada had no seat back TV Some kids are so ungrateful!

Berry how horrible. I can totally imagine and understand teens not wanting to go to Benidorm with their parents, esp. if they might be expected to share a room with their parents and have been abroad more than once before, so the pure fact of going abroad is not a novelty.

If they really don't want to go they may or nay not enjoy it once there - I would leave them eith grandparents if that is an option, not as a punishment, just as a natural consequence.

So where have the picked up there snobbishness from?

Have you told them its a cheaper holiday and not up to your usual standard?

We tell our girls where were going, they wouldn't have a clue whether its a cheap one or expensive, when we do a cheaper thing we wouldn't tell them that, they are just presented with this is our holiday and were going to have fun

Pimpf 15 year olds will have heard of Benidorm, as long as they aren't living in a bubble. Probably it has neen discussed or ridiculed at school. I really think they are behaving fairly typically for their ages, and only need to be given the choice - this is the holiday available, come or don't (as long as there is somenody they can be left with).

Gosh. There's more snobbery been shown on this thread than by the OP's kids!!

Although people have said their children went on holiday with them into their 20s etc. I don't think its remotely strange, and in fact very normal, for teens to stop wanting to go on holiday with parents at all at this age - especially if they are likely to be sharing a family room, which would be clostrophobic and "embarrasing" to many teens, esp if they usually spend a lot of time alone in their room!

Good lord, so much overreaction on here. They are not vile, ungrateful brats who should be banned from holidays and shipped off to evil aunties.

They are teenagers and teenagers moan and tantrum and are sometimes rude. They can be self obsessed, entitled and overly concerned with others' opinions of them. .

There is a lot of projection on here, understandably, from people who would love a trip to Spain but can't afford it. But let's not demonise kids who are just being a bit moany and who will get over it in five minutes.

Of course they need telling. My 13 moaned throughout our last holiday about the heat. I told him afterwards we'd never go on a two week holiday again because I couldn't bear it. He was chastened because he realised he was quite ungrateful. I laughed it off, we still tease him about it. Next week we go for a week and if he's loving it and wants to stay another week he'll know why we're not! I've also said if you're bored or hot I don't want to hear about it. I'll be reading/snoozing/walking/swimming and too busy enjoying myself to worry about that.