What is the worst holiday you have had?

[TwinklyFawn]

I will start. In 2023 i went to the haven caravan park in Berwick. I stupidly forgot to pack a shower mat and i slipped while getting out of the shower. Anyway i had to phone an ambulance as i could not put any weight on my right leg. At the hospital the doctor asked me to stand up. I could put a bit of weight on my leg but i fell again when i tried to walk. My knee just gave way. I still shudder when i think about this holiday.

Marmaris November 2014. We were the only people in the hotel, it was seriously creepy. There was no hot water, breakfast was very strange, quite often it involved cold chips. The restaurant, for dinner was next door and was overrun with stray fighting cats. Fighting everywhere, under tables, on chairs. The pool was closed. We really shouldn't have been allowed to stay there.

Ours was also Haven at Berwick last year. We were in the touring part and they were the filthiest facilities I've ever seen. It was down to 1 toilet that I dared use. The fish and chip shop was rubbish. Burger king didn't have any burgers 🤣🤣🤣
Dirty nappies chucked on the floor of empty pitches.
We won't be going back.

Long weekend to Amsterdam with ex boyfriend in my early 20s. Neither of us were drug users or even smoked but somehow we wanted to try something at a cannabis cafe just with the thrill of it being legal. We had some 'space cake' brownies which we both agreed had no effect at all and sometime later went back to the hotel.

In the middle of the night he woke me up hyperventilating and screaming at me to call an ambulance because he's dying. His opinion carried more weight than your average person because he was a junior Dr at the time so I 100% believed him and tried to figure out how I would call an ambulance in Amsterdam.

Whilst I was trying to figure it out though it dawned on me that it was probably more likely the drugs and he was having a panic attack. I managed to calm him down and he accepted it but he was insanely paranoid and agitated (not usual for him at all) and every 20 mins throughout the night he would need me to reassure him that he hadn't stopped breathing or take his pulse or something so neither of us had any sleep at all and we had to spend the next day in a darkened room sleeping it off.

And then we went home.
Maybe one day I'll try Amsterdam again but probably not the space cakes.

Cornwall in a caravan about 10 years ago. It rained the entire week and DH worked from the laptop for the majority of it. Total waste of time! Such a shame as the beaches were so stunning.

Nothing quite as bad as some of these but when my daughter was a baby I thought taking her to my family’s holiday home abroad would be a great idea, we’d been with DH a few weeks previously and my mum was going to be there for the start of our break leaving us with about 4 nights on our own at the end of the trip. Those 4 nights were the longest of my life, none of our neighbours were around and I spent the entire time terrified of something happening to me and no one knowing and DD being all alone. I spent a lot of time in a local bar where we know the owner and staff fairly well, crying on FaceTime to DH who did offer to get us a flight home, but I was too stubborn. I later found out the bar staff thought DH and I had split up and I’d run off with the baby. 😂

just after we came out of the 2021 lockdown my mum and I booked a caravan in wales, first few days were horrendous, DD was having some sort of reaction to her antihistamines which turned her into a complete psycho, my usually super chilled toddler screamed for hours at a time and wouldn’t be comforted by anyone but me, lost her shit if anyone so much as spoke to her, I can’t remember how I worked it out but within 24 hours she was back to her usual happy self!

I can’t say it’s the worst holiday because I loved most of it but I finished our holiday to India with the most agonising stomach issues I was getting horrendous pains every 15 minutes and was convinced I was having a surprise baby 😂until I realised that dinner the previous night contained an ingredient I’m allergic to.

Yes, agree about site food - we don't stay on big sites with restaurants as they tend to be of the 'do you want burgers with your burgers' type places. We go for small sites with a decent pub nearby and do a mix of eating out, take away and basic camping-type cooking out of tins. Obviously not for everyone, but not hellish when it's a two adult holiday as I imagine it might be crammed in with DC or extended family.

A weekend camping with two of us in a one man tent with no airbed.

The fish shop gave me diarrhea. I once went to the on site restaurant for a sunday roast. The meat was so tough. It would have been easier eating a hammer. The first time i went after my granddad died i stupidly decided to have most of my meals on site. The train journey was not fun.

Holiday was ok but travelled back before partner so was alone. Had to change planes in Paris with only about 90 minutes to spare. Customs were on a go slow so got delayed there then the customs woman pointed to a staircase said that way madame and run. I did run but somehow ran the wrong way and ended up in a totally deserted departure lounge in the wrong terminal. It was 4am, I was too jet lagged to read the signs in french and there was literally no one there but me. I wasn't even in the right place to catch connection. I booked an other flight into London on my phone and ended up on a small shuttle bus driving around Charles de Gaulle with people who only spoke Russian. By some miracle ended up in the right place and caught flight. I was half a day late home and £350 poorer. Never flown through Paris since.

Some of these stories are horrific!

I don't think I've had a total disaster of a holiday but a week's camping in Padstow about ten years ago was hard going. We love camping and have often done battle with British weather on our trips but this one was particularly bad- I don't believe it stopped raining at any point. We also had strong winds and woke up one morning to find hardly anyone left on the site and a heap of broken tents/chairs dumped by the bins as if 80% of the campers had decided there and then that they would never camp again.

But we stuck it out- mainly because this was our one precious holiday of the year and we had used our annual leave on it and were determined to have a holiday. We spent a proportion of the week looking for launderettes in which to dry out sleeping bags and clothes. But on the plus side, the kids loved every minute of it!

Honeymoon with my ex. We were only early 20s and on the way there he developed a fever. He was really ill for days then broke out with the worst case of chicken pox. He got so ill we had to get home on the train - Scottish Highlands to Brighton (9 hours) with him barely awake. On the journey back I started with it too, not as ill as him but pretty rough. He ended up in hospital as his brain swelled but I was then too ill to visit.

so our honeymoon consisted of two feverish train journeys there and back and about 3 days there with him feverish in bed.

We went to Gumbet in 2008, AI ... hotel was supposed to be 5 suns(?) room was several hundred steps down from the pool/bar restaurant area. We jokingly called the room an open prison cell, but they're probably cleaner & more comfortable 😂
Food was absolutely awful, after the 2nd night we ended up eating out in the town. Young & skint we hadn't really budgeted for having to buy food so were really limited on what else we could afford to do.
Were going to buy some food at the airport before we flew home and could only afford a bag of haribo between us 😒
Just found the hotel on trip advisor and it looks like it was just as bad in 2015, then no more reviews so either shut or changed name.

Yes! Same resort, November 2011. I was very careful with food (have Crohn’s disease) but husband with a cast iron stomach was violently ill and bed ridden for 5 days. Got antibiotics from a nearby medical centre but it took years for him to fully recover. And to top it off, it was November, the beach got cold and windy after 2pm and the nights were so cold that we wore our travelling clothes and coats to have a drink in the evening. And it was full of very arrogant Russian people.
Holiday from hell (but got to see Luxor on day 2 which ticked off the bucket list!)

Kos, 2000. Our first and last all inclusive mediterranean experience. Food was poor, atmosphere of school canteen. Fell down some wet marble steps outside our apartment on day 2. Bad bruising down whole of one leg . Eventually managed to get rep to call local dr (ironic, kos was the home of hippocrates and his oath). Gave me anti inflammatoiry painkillers. Took them . Had adverse reaction. Face blew up yo twice the size, could barely open eyes. Had to hide in room while husband brought in food from cafétéria. Only had the first Harry Potter book to read on repeat. Local Dr called out again, given emergency jab in backside. Just as i'd recovered some dignity noticed a crowd around the tv in the lounge area. 9/11 had just happened and we watched it in horror. Understandably big delays and security restrictions (no hand luggage ) on flight home.

February 2023 went on holiday to Mexico with DH, first trip for both of us. Holiday booked with a company called Destination 2 - don't EVER use them. The holiday itself was lovely, the journey home dire. Firstly we were dropped off at the wrong terminal at the airport, cost us $50 usd to get a taxi to the correct terminal. Queued to check in, when we got to the front of the queue our flight had closed 10 minutes earlier. Destination2 had changed our flight number and not informed us, so while airport staff were calling out flight numbers that were closing, we were completely oblivious. Destination2 customer service was not open as it was the weekend!!! Cost us £2k to book flights back for the next day, overnight accommodation near by, meals etc. Destination2 customer service contacted me while we were on the way home from Gatwick and advised me to claim the costs on my holiday insurance. I laughed at them. It was so stressful but I finally received full payment for all the extra expenses but didn't even attempt to claim compensation.

Almost a diamond shoes are too tight except for it being totally shit! A trip to The Maldives. I didn’t want to go but my exH liked diving with sharks and that’s where the hammerheads were 🤷🏼‍♀️ Travelled 24 hours door to door with two young DDs to stay in the equivalent of the ‘little pigs house’. Their words. The hut overlooked an unbelievably ugly ‘service island’…which looked awful. There were giant ants everywhere! The restaurant, the spa, the hut! Loudspeaker call to prayer sirens could be heard every day. Beach erosion so half of it was roped off while they tried to import more sand. Sickly sweet housekeeping staff - until we tipped them out and then they literally didn’t even look at us. To top it off DD2 fell and split her head open on the final night and had to be stitched up 🤦🏼‍♀️

A holiday with my parents and youngest brother in Gibraltar. I was at Uni but agreed to join them for a family holiday. It should have been alright as we planned to drive into Spain for a few days as we knew the Island was small. The landing was horrible as there is a very short runway after a very steep banking manoeuvre. Hotel was lovely but after 2 days war broke out Falklands so the border with Spain was immediately closed trapping us for 2 weeks. The hotel was taken over by the RAF and from then on I was harassed by blokes at every meal time and at every other opportunity. I started to wear my mum’s wedding ring and pretended my brother was my son. This didn’t stop the harassment so I pretty much stayed in my room. We had a day trip to see the baboons and one of them jumped on me after I got out the taxi. It was the longest holiday of my life…..

Aquitaine in 2022. DH and I in a beautiful little gite with no air con. The temperature was in the 40s for the whole two weeks. The inside temperature didn’t drop below 35 degrees, even overnight. We had a private pool that was the temperature of a very warm bath. There were forest fires, and outside the air was thick with smoke, so we couldn’t really go out. I spent most of that holiday in the shower. The heat was inescapable for two solid weeks.

Two days before the end I threw a hissy fit and insisted that we go and stay in a hotel (with air con) in Bordeaux for a couple of nights. When we checked in, the air con was broken. I’ve never been so glad to get home from anywhere.

Road trip holiday around US with abusive exH.

When we picked up the rental car in California, and he was nervous as we were both new to left hand drive, I gave him quiet assurances and encouragement and kept an eye on other vehicles around us for him.

When it was my turn to drive, he screamed at me relentlessly for missing a turning on a roundabout, and when I told him coldly to never shout at me again, he gave me silent treatment for most of the trip.

The trip is just a blur of silent meals and silent drives.

@marble505 we went to Mallorca last year. Ended up in hospital with extreme food poisoning and dehydration for five days, missed our flights home and then had a 12 hour delay on the flight we eventually boarded. I don’t know anyone that’s had a positive AL in Mallorca!

Barge holiday with the in-laws and BIL, originally agreed to go for a weekend , surprise, surprise MIL booked 5 nights.
I was around 7/8 months pregnant with our 1st, we had to sleep on the “kitchen table” come bed, they are very early risers and wanted to sit at the table for breakfast, I woke up most mornings with them stood staring at me. The toilet situation was awkward, think I ended up with constipation.
Going through one of the locks was stressful, could feel it rocking a bit, all I could think of was getting off it and trying to scramble up the lock ladder.
When we left, my husband decided to go off for the day with BIL, to a car event , leaving me to drive the fussy IL’s home, stopping off to take them food shopping, I was soo tired.
I was so glad to be home, never again did I go away with them.
Had lovely holidays with DC’s , best times.

First holiday abroad DH and I went on together (weren’t married then of course). We were early 20s and had been together 4 years, been out of uni just under a year and had our first “proper” jobs and had saved and saved to go to abroad for a week. I was so nervous, never been abroad before without my family or on a school trip. 6hrs before I was due to go to the airport I was hit was a migraine. If it wasn’t for the fact I basically lived down the road from the airport, and my lovely housemate (who had just moved in so I barely knew) helping me, I’d have never been able to make the flight I was so unwell. DH had never seen me with a migraine before then - we didn’t live together and so if I got one and we had plans I’d just cancel and see him when I was better - so he knew I got them but never seen their severity and thought they were just a bad headache. So he hadn’t appreciated the phone call from me, in tears, saying I didn’t think I’d be able to get on the plane! And he wasn’t as sympathetic as I’d expected! Thankfully I made it - met by DH who had been and bought painkillers and anything migraine related from the nearest pharmacy - and by the time we landed my migraine had gone, but but I was still unwell with the migraine “hangover” for the next day and half. So I was staying out the sun, sleeping a lot and not wanting to be adventurous and try the local foods and I certainly wasn’t drinking. Poor DH! Not what he had in mind! And then the third day I finally felt well enough - only for us to go out and be pick pocketed of most of my spending money (thankfully some was left in the room). And then I was hit with another migraine on the fourth day. DH went to dinner by himself and spent the night holding my hair back and the following day round the pool by himself while I recovered in the room. We were only there for 6 days and I was ill for 4 of them. It was that holiday which prompted me to go back to my GP and push for stronger medication for my migraines!

4 yo twins and a 12 week old to Majorca at oct half term with my parents… they booked.
They’d booked it before I was pregnant and tho I didn’t want to go with a baby they would have lost £100s of deposits ( this was 1995).
Crap weather, beach washed away with storms and twins blue with cold after 15 mins in the pool.
Two bed apartment with parents in one, twins in another and me, husband and baby on a sofabed.
Mum talked about that wonderful holiday until the day she died. It was utterly awful. I remember getting home after two weeks and mentioning that I’d never opened my book and the reply was “did you really expect to?”

I has similar in Egypt 2010 at the First Choice Holiday Village. I cried most days due to us all having food poisoning. Just wanted to be back home

Kenya 2007 - constant diarrhoea as hotel food so unhygienically prepared.

fabulous breakfast tea though.