To be shocked at the cost of holidays?

[Fourpawsblack]

We haven’t been able to go away for years (pre DC!) due to finances. A falling down house, part time work due to childcare and the cost of living has made for a rough time.

Just started to look at a week away for a family of 5 (2 adults, 3 DC under 6) in Spain for August 2026…£4k was the cheapest I found and that was not a great hotel. It was more like £6k for somewhere with half decent reviews. AIBU to think this is crazy? Is this just what I am looking at?
It would mean saving at least £400 a month for a year to be able to do it which would be very rough.

How are almost all of the kids in my DC classes on holiday every year. Maybe I’m missing a trick. I feel sad for my DC that they should be able to experience going on holiday and can’t. I know it’s a first world problem.

Before anyone brings it up, there’s 0 way we can go at a time not in the school holidays so we are stuck with over inflated pricing. The joys of teaching.

My DC are now adults but when they were young we had a lot of cheap camping holidays, both in this country and abroad.

We used to drive to France which kept costs down (channel tunnel crossing was paid for with Tesco Clubcard points, don't know if they still offer that?).

We used canvas holidays (static caravan with air con and a complex with pools and flumes) when dc were little. You can put dc to bed and sit on the veranda with wine and have a truly relaxing holiday.

now my dc are teens we do the all inclusive thing because dc can be independent and it just works for us all. Magic life in fuerteventura with Tui was fantastic for food etc but on the cheaper end of the scale. Greece next summer is £7k for a week for all 5 of us (probably last holiday with all 3 dc as dd is 17).

We go away every sumner for 10-14 days. We are also a family of five but we never spend 6k on our summer holiday. Usually around 3k. Eurocamp or apartments close to a beach with a shared pool.

If you or your partner are teachers (just wondering as you said the joys of teaching) do either of you have a blue light card. They do some great offers with eurocamp. We've taken advantage a couple of times and had amazing trips away including Barcelona, France and Italy.

One way to do it if you’re quite flexible is to just look for wherever has cheap flights and then get an Airbnb nearby. We tend to do that for way under 4K. Guess it depends what kind of holiday you like though. Hotel discos and entertainment are my worst nightmare.

With a family of five it's going to be considerably more than with four sadly.

We love a camping holiday, especially when the kids are smaller.

When they are older and can appreciate abroad more, in terms of culture and sightseeing, we will save and go abroad.

Yep it is crazy! Even the ferry cost us a grand last year.

YANBU it’s madness

Where please?!

I am looking at TUi maybe that’s my mistake

I'm not surprised at all by that price. I'm paying £200 a month for a year for 1 weeks holiday for an adult and 1 child . This is how much it costs now.

If you are North, how about go at the end of August from Edinburgh? And a nice apartment complex with a pool, rather than a hotel. Also the Balearics rather than mainland Spain. Or canaries.

If you are in the North you could take ferry from Hull or North Shields and go to a campsite in the Netherlands. Weather very good there in August and campsites are great.

I have never considered this but will look at this now!

We used to swear by may half term eurocamp holidays. So much cheaper. But we are only 2 hrs from Eurotunnel.

I'm a lone parent to one child. We generally get an airbnb for a few nights, probably around £450 for a week. Then flights or transport on top, keep it at the cheaper end of the scale. Doing it this way is way cheaper! I can't imagine for four people it would cost more than around £1300 if you did it this way. Depends where you go of course. This year we're going to France. If you're looking for all inclusive I guess it would be way more.

There are ways of getting the price down - using SkyScanner to find flights, booking flights at unsociable hours, booking a self catering apartment instead of AI or HB in a starred hotel, not getting a package deal, just as a starting point.

We are a family of only three so flights are less for us, we are happy to go self catering as it suits us, we go to a cheaper country rather than Spain or Portugal (which looked expensive when I was researching them). But holidays have still gone up in price as economics dictates - other countries are looking after their economies too and price rises are global, not just in the UK.

There are posters on the Holidays board who actively enjoy looking for good holidays for others, you could try starting a thread there asking for help and describing your criteria? They seem to love it they must be mad

Don’t look at tui they’re so expensive. I always use on the beach or loveholidays or I book separately. A couple of years ago I paid over £1000 less with on the beach for the same holidays as the people who booked with jet2. They had a grumpy bus driver to take them to the airport. We had a private transfer. Booked through on the beach.

Had a Quick Look at Eurocamp for last week of august’this year’ as doesn’t go up to 2026 - you would get a really decent site with multiple pools etc for £800 to £1500 -add in fuel , tolls, crossings etc - probably come to about £2500 or pick a site relatively close to an airport and fly in - most though I would say you need a car.. you can keep costs down though by loads of picnic type food- campsite pizzas and takeaways ( often really good) onsite bakery etc

They are wild, but I guess it's just down to what people can afford. We're usually in the region of £10K each year.

We are in Scotland and have driven to France many times.
If you don't fancy the drive to the south of England, there are ferries from Newcastle and Hull to the Netherlands.

First week of September 😂

Love that's term time. Of course the price halved.

We get a loan out and pay back over a year/ a few years. I know people say live within your means but then- no holiday! This year not going anywhere though

Ditto. I’m not fussy where I go as long as I’ve got a pool and it’s an easy walk to bars and restaurants. I’m pretty good at finding hood deals but this year there’s definitely a pretty steep jump. The exact holiday we had last year is about 40% more this year.

Saying that, I’ve found a good deal but it’s a fair bit higher than last few years

We booked with easyJet holidays this year. Keep an eye out as all of the big holiday companies have discounts at various times.

We got £200 off our booking with a code

How far north? What about the Newcastle - Amsterdam ferry?
The ferry itself is part of the fun. Rent an apartment and don't eat out and that cuts the cost a ton. Can even take basics from the UK (like pasta, nothing fresh) and just top up with fresh food from the supermarket there. Stay in the countryside and take the train into the city (Holland has really easy train travel)