Or is behaviour at all inclusive hotels hilarious?

[inaminute23]

So in the last 2 months, I've been to Dubai, Cyprus and Jamaica, and now I'm in Greece, and 3/4 of those have been all inclusive hotels.

I've got to admit, and I'm as guilty as any, but it's so weird just observing behaviour at all inclusive hotels!

Getting up and starting to drink cheap and sugary cocktails straight away!

Piling 3 plates full at the buffets.

Getting up for 6.30am to nab a subbed before they all run out.

There are probably so many more but I'm just sat at breakfast, after going to get a second full breakfast (though I've had a gastric bypass so it is all relative) and it's made me chuckle.

I'd love to read any other weird behaviours typical of all inclusive holidays!

This is LIGHT HEARTED for those who soon enough will tell me I'm judgemental haha.

@susan12345678 You say “People are not 'better' at luxury AI resorts - there just tends to be less bad behaviour around the breakfast buffet. And less place-marking of sunbeds.”

This may well be true. But it’s 100% down to scarcity of resources. In a two star hotel with limited sunbeds of course you’re going to get people competing for them - towels out at dawn etc. In a five star hotel with loads more space and sunbeds there is no scarcity so no need for this competition.

Absolutely nothing to do with who’s ‘better’ ‘kinder’ ‘less grabby’ or anything like that. It’s simply a case of people responding logically to the the situation they find themselves in.

We were on an AI holidays and in the dining room there was a stack of ring doughnuts on a pole. We watched as a child licked the ones half way up the pole. His Mother saw him and pulled him away and that was it.
That was my first and last AI holiday

If you want to see how awfully rich people are capable of behaving when there’s a scarcity of resources watch the Fyre festival documentary. Rich influencers virtually fighting each other for tents and basic food when they realise there’s not enough to go around.

@EugeneLevysEyebrow

nothing to do with who’s ‘better’ ‘kinder’ ‘less grabby’ or anything like that. It’s simply a case of people responding logically to the the situation they find themselves in

If you read my post again, you'll notice I agree with you?

we love AI. I have two fussy eaters, who always eat loads on AI holidays because they can see what's on offer. In restaurants they'll order something and then not eat much of it when it arrives, as wasn't what they thought it was. They (teens) love going back and forth to the AI buffet to get a bit of this and a bit of that and eat loads! We've done self catering, hotels, cottages, villas etc and I never get a break in the same way that I do with AI.

@latesummervibes

thought you were gonna say your kids were like five and seven or something…not teens!!

Oh and one tip is to avoid those offering weddings. The one we’re at is fairly expensive and there’s two v different types of guests, those on family holidays with mum, dad and 2.4 children who are generally very polite and well behaved. The wedding groups of around 20 people, generally chavs. Security and life guards constantly having to tell them off (esp the teenage kids), chain smoking, apparently this is the holiday of a life time but complain about everything refusing to wear masks where it’s legally required. One complained about there “being no English food like lasagne so will be glad to get home” We do like this hotel for several reasons, mainly the kids facilities and activities.

looking forward to the time when kids activities no longer required.

I think people reserve sun beds at most hotels if they go for breakfast, I’ve never gone out for the day and put my towel on a sun bed. I would’ve say it’s just AL hotels as I’ve stayed at both.

I can be a bit of a snob so I agree it’s hilarious watching folk at these places. All the things you said, piles and piles of shit food, crap cocktails at 10am, lounging on a sun bed all day resembling a dead lobster … it really is quite funny.

I did all inclusive in Turkey once. I ended up spending twice as much money as I ended up going out every day just to get away from the people in the hotel, not to mention the nauseating food. I asked for a vodka and coke … they filled a pint glass with vodka and topped it up with coke. It was literally undrinkable 🤮 never again.

Cant imagine anything more boring and mind numbing than sitting in a hotel for a week eating, drinking and frying yourself to death.

There will always be people whose comfortable financial 'padding' immunises them from the realities of other people's struggles and are totally out of touch, even during a time of economic disaster.

You wait for this winter when people can't afford to run appliances or even turning on their cooker to heat up a tin of beans. There will still be posters starting threads on here giving a running commentary about their apres-ski socials at their ski resort in Switzerland, or having just touched down for their two week all inclusive sunshine holiday in the height of UK winter (adding that it's their 3rd holiday this year).

Whether it's fact or fiction is another matter, it won't stop them.

Social filter? Whazaaat.

Unless you are prepared to sit and watch around the pool area for an hour there is a real problem with just rocking up and removing towels from empty beds. I have no wish to engage in an argument with a family who got down before me and is staying around the pool all day but have left to sit at the pool bar for a drink or are in the pool with their kids. How embarrassing. That would make me the selfish one. Their family wanted beds, so did mine. They got down early to secure. I have been giving this some thought and I think the best solution would be if staff put a card on the bed with the time it was put there with a request that noone moves the towels for an hour from that time. Everyone would know this would happen so you could safely have a drink, take toddler to club ext without coming back to everything moved.
On my last HB holiday there wasn't enough beds. The hotel had taken over a section of the beach and you could book a half day there instead free of charge. 10 until 1.30 or 2.00 until 6.00. you couldn't book until the morning you wanted the beds. You handed the ticket in at the beach with your room no. If you booked a bed and didn't use it they refused your request next time. Worked well
. There was no empty beds. Someone told me they had to do that because otherwise selfish people were booking a bed just in case they fancied one then not using it. Also when they allowed all day bookings people were away hours in the middle of the day. This way people had morning then left for lunch or came after lunch and twice as many people got beds. I haven't seen the piled up plates thing though. There is only so much food you can eat and it's all a bit repetitive after a few days. That is why I mainly have holidays where I am off site all day. However on holidays where there are 6 of us and I am paying I don't fancy going off site much when I have already paid. 😃

I have recently been to an all inclusive hotel and, whilst I may have drunk more beautifully prepared cocktails than usual, I don't recognise the piling up of plates (though the food was very good) and the getting up early to bag a bed. It was a truly wonderful holiday but I didn't feel the need to eat and drink everything in sight.

20 minutes? We spend longer than that in the pool!

I can be a bit of a snob so I agree it’s hilarious watching folk at these places.

How can you be a snob when you frequent the same dire places? You are where you go.

@susan12345678

You might find it easier not to get in a muddle if you used less flowery language.

I sense you might be on a wind-up. Either that or you’re on a sort of Barbara Cartland creative writing course. (“Veritable cornucopia” 😂)

Just to clear things up: yes, I agree people behave in a less dignified way at cheaper AI resorts. There’s a “fill your boots” mentality. The only difference between our observations on this is that I didn’t come on here to sneer at this mentality, because I understand and sympathise with it to some extent. You came in to wonder all wide-eyed why people do this, throwing in your observations about how much better it is where you go.

It’s snobbery, plain and simple. And I don’t like it.

I love all inclusive, simply because once there you don’t need to spend more money or worry about finding a restaurant to eat at or booking tables etc.
I tend to go to family friendly places and never really experienced people having excessive alcohol throughout the day/or maybe I’ve just not noticed as don’t really care enough what others do.
I don’t drink alcohol and am a fussy eater so piling plates is also something I don’t necessarily do. I do hate seeing the amount of food wasted at buffet style restaurants though…. Both home and abroad… I also hate how people leave their tables in such a mess for the waitresses…. We always stack our plates and wipe the table down so there’s no mess.
The sunbed wars annoys me… first day on our last holiday there were no sun beds left and many just had towels on till midday! My husband did end up getting up each morning and reserving some sun beds just so he and my 4 year old could be guaranteed a bed with a sun shade… but we did use it all day and not leave it sat empty for half the day. I find that the most selfish… people reserving beds then going out for the morning and coming back late afternoon to ‘claim THEIR chair’ …
I want to book a holiday abroad and must admit the sun beds are what me off.. I don’t want to spend hours each day trying to get beds in the sun.. but last time we went we walked to the nearest beach to avoid this and it was just full of idiots so we had to settle for fighting for sun beds at the pool LOL

This is very true.

I detest the lounges at Manchester airport as most airlines use the pay lounges for their business class customers, so you're sharing what's supposed to be a relaxing pre-flight lounge with drunks and louts.

It's like walking into a nightclub at turning out time when the lights have just come on.

I'm sure people pay to use those lounges purely on an economic basis - cheaper to pay the entry fee and drink yourself even more stupid before the flight to Benidorm than buy booze at the airport bars/pubs.

I wish they'd quadruple lounge access prices, or something.

But people shouldn’t reserve loungers and go for breakfast. Someone else might have gone for an early breakfast without reserving and then fancy an hour in the pool before they go out for the day. Then find all the loungers are reserved by people sitting having breakfast for that hour! Most places would have plenty of lounger space if people just took their towels away when they weren’t there.

We have only done 2 AI hols. The first in Crete was a family hotel, but they had 7 pools including one aimed at those with young children with lots of shade and water squirters and slides, one large pool with a swim up bar where all the daytime activity took place, one quiet pool with no activities and one quiet pool fir adults only. They had a nice private beach, plus a long rocky shore with stone small patio areas, with a couple of sunbeds and a parasol. As it was a bit risky for children there were none in this area. So that is where we spent time, looking over the sea. If you wanted a beer they had beer taps that you just helped yourself to, wine at lunch? Help yourself to a bottle from the fridge. Ice cream at any time? Go and help yourself. The entertainment was a bit crap, but the village nearby had a Greek Night with traditional music and dancing. It was a really good relaxing holiday. The second in Mallorca was an Adult Only AI. It was good, but only one pool which was crowded with sunbeds, which were all reserved early. Although we had a good holiday, the following hol we did the opposite. Booked apt and flight seperately, took hand luggage only, used public transport and had a brilliant hol. So, would we do AI again? Yes, but probably in Crete and probably in the same hotel.

We went to an AI in Greece - place was pretty strict about being decently dressed for the restaurants etc. There was a bit of over eating going on - but I also think that’s sort of fairly normal in these sorts of places.

Not a fan, done a couple but prefer self catering and trying different restaurants and bars.

I've never been to an AI hotel (usually self-cater or go camping). I wouldn't totally rule it out, but some of the descriptions make it sound ghastly tbh. I realise you can do culture stuff, but any holiday that's mostly lounging by the pool, drinking, eating cheap international food, entertainments and going somewhere mainly for the sun etc is really not for me.

I do love the people watching at a hotel though.

There was an English couple on the sunbeds next to us in Greece one year. The woman kept getting up and going to chat to an American family, sitting on the other side of the pool. They didn’t seem that interested in talking to her and she didn’t seem to be picking up on their body language.

I got talking to her the next day and she said “oh we met them here last year and I noticed on Facebook that they were returning this year so we booked the same fortnight to surprise them”😳😳….. who does that!!

@BigSandyBalls2015 too funny! But the poor American family, so awkward.

@BigSandyBalls2015

Brilliant 🤩