Recommend a half board hotel that does Breakfast and Lunch so we can eat out in the evenings?

[FritzyMousey]

My last few Europe beach break type holidays have been All Inc, however I find we get very lazy and just stay in the hotel as we know it's cheapest to eat there. Normally we love eating out, I'd love a hotel base where we could get breakfast and dinner included but then venture to the nearest town to try the local restaurants in the evenings? Does half board have to mean Breakfast and Dinner or can anyone recommend somewhere for us?

www.vilagale.com/pt/hoteis/algarve/vila-gale-lagos
Half board- you can swap dinner for lunch.

Thanks, looks like they own a few hotels too, have you been?

We were in Lagos. As a family with young kids we prefer breakfast and lunch ( kids get up at 7am and are in bed by 8pm) and I know how challenging finding that meal option can be!

Forgot to add that you can inform them on the day if you are eating lunch or dinner. Double check with them but we stayed there early 2017

We've stayed in lots of hotels that do half board and in all of them you could swap dinner for lunch. But I'm my experience lunches tended to be much less variety and obvious leftovers from the night before, and you end up paying the price of dinner for it. We tend to go b&b these days in aparthotels so you get a tiny kitchen area perfect for lunch, and then have dinner out.

This one for example hoposa.es/hotels-destinations/puerto-pollensa/hotel-apartments-hoposa-villaconcha/

Hotel Capodimonte in Sorrento, Italy - you can swap your hb evening meal for a lunch voucher to be used at the lovely al fresco on one of their terraces.

We used to mix it up because their evening meal wasn't a buffet anywaybut table service so it was great to have the options.

These look lovely, thanks so much. Does half-board ever include drinks?

We stayed at one of the H10 hotels in Salou this year. You could swap your evening meal for lunch if you wanted to. They prefered you to let them know the day before if you wanted lunch the next day, but in reality they just highlighted that you'd been in for lunch if you did so you couldn't rock up and eat again for dinner. Drinks were not included, but a litre bottle of water with dinner was a couple of euros. We drank other drinks at other times, but prefer water with the meal anyway.

Also, it wasn't that much more for the half board option when we booked, so we didn't feel we were required to eat every evening meal there. A couple of times we chose to try a different restaurant late afternoon after the large breakfast had set us up for the day and we'd not bothered with lunch. We went in for a supper type snack of fruit (and ice cream for the DDs) on a couple of days if we'd already eaten. But the fact that the food was there if we wanted it (and took advantage of it 5 out of 7 nights) really kept the price down without worrying about swapping meals.

Whenever we've stayed half board, drinks with lunch or dinner were never included, even water and soft drinks. Always at breakfast though, even champagne last year!

I must say one of the perks of All Inc for me is being able to order ice-cold drinks all day long in the heat, I'd probably get dehydrated if I had to pay for them out of my own pocket I'm so stingy!

Does half-board ever include drinks

I've just been looking at jet2holidays and I noticed they had a 'Half Board Plus' option which, it says is 'The Half Board Plus package includes buffet-style breakfast and dinner in the main restaurant, with a choice of wine, beer, soft drinks and water available at dinner'.

www.jet2holidays.com/deal-finder?board=10&airport=1_3&date=16-08-2017&destination=149_150_151_152_153_154_155_917_918_1335_1243_892_69_1467_94_95_97_98_99_103_1364_1452_1497_1442_125_131_1360_139_129_1419_156_157_893_1584_159_160_161_1424_1281_169&duration=7&flexibility=7&feature=&minprice=0&rating=5_4_3_2&sort=1&page=1&pagesize=25

I've found a lot of European hotels have a small fridge in the room, or at the very least a mini bar that you can squeeze things into.

We buy loads of drinks (beer, wine, water, lemon fanta) from the supermarket to keep in the room and drink on the balcony, take to the beach etc. You can usually also get away with drinking them by the pool unless there is a pay bar very close by. I don't want to pay hotel prices for drinks either.

We never stay half board or AI - we did HB once as it was only about £20 more than B&B but didn't like the buffet style or the fact that the restaurant was inside and the drinks were expensive. You weren't even allowed water from the water chiller unless you were on AI - I was told off for getting a glass of water to have with dinner - we did buy drinks after that but it added to the resolve not to go half board, because it doesn't suit us.