Now worried about holiday, as intending to leave Dc's in room while we eat...

[OutragedfromTunbridgeWells]

we're going to villa Pia (as recommende on MN) where children eat early and then go to bed and parents eat later all together.

This seemed a great idea to me before.

but now obviously with tragic and frightening abduction of Madeleine, it's playing on my mind and feel we cannot do this.

Are any others having such dilemmas? what should we think/do??

Nice looking holiday btw. Worth bearing in mind but our kids just don't do kids clubs anyway so do resent paying out for something we won't use.

no ds doesn't do the kids club either, although the option is there if he wanted to. he loved the minni disco though and thompson the dog

we are going to turkey this year, with our friends and their daughter. they have a villa so we just pay for flights. i suspect we'll try for the siesta idea, as it's v hot in the middle of the day anyway, then the kids will just stay up later. never been away with friends before - hope we don't fall out! Tis only for a week though.

As our children get older then evening meals out become more reasonable - buy I've never yet seen a couple with a 1yo and 3yo actually have a nice evening meal out - they almost always look miserable ime, as if they've had yet another argument over who has to jiggle the baby around on their knee whilst eating with the other one having to pick up crayons from the floor.

Personally I'd have to say that there is no way I would go to MW if you had to have your children with you in the evening (ie if it was compulsary). In June at Lakitira there are usually over 120 under5s staying there. No way on earth would I want to have a meal with that many (tired) toddlers and preschoolers present. A villa holiday is very different, but frankly a villa holiday that included the same amount of sailing, surfboarding and tennis in the grounds is probably well out of our budget! Plus it is only now that I feel that my children are proficient enough swimmers for our own pool not to be too great a risk. I've been really surprised at how difficult it is to find a villa in Europe with door alarms (which seem very standard in Florida for example). I've even found that some villas rented out by reputable companies don't even have child-proof fences around the pools - again something that I would have taken for granted, but I've now learnt that I need to ask.

I really enjoyed both our Mark Warner holidays and our villa holidays - but they are different. If eating all meals with your kids is the thing that makes a holiday for you then there are plenty of places where you can do that. If you want to have an adult meal, then actually that is more difficult. I feel sorry for those who have had to give up all adult time - I don't think that that would work for us in our marriage, but obviously everyone is different.

Personally I don; thitnk that any resort or hotel will be offended if you ask detailed questions about security etc, and I would be amazed if MW didn't tighten up its arrangements in this and other resorts. I suspect that there will be more buggies in the restaurants though.

Villa Pia is lovely by the way

We like to have a bit of both, the boys enjoy kids clubs (especially when they can do them together) and we love doing things with the kids and having a bit of time to ourselves. So when we went to centerparcs for a long weekend they spent two mornings in the kid club and the rest of the time with us.

My kids don't really do adult mealtimes very well, so we like the option of eating without them and having them in bed or looked after. Personal preference is leaving them in kids club, eating and then picking them up afterwards.

I think that i won't change my ways but I will be more careful in my risk analysis

there is lots of good advice on here for op and i was very interested too as we are off on holiday soon too and was thinking the same

my friends have been to villa pia many times and we have looked at it too. I think go and enjoy yourselves. Everyone will be in the same boat so you can play it by ear. Keep kids up/ or stay with/or take it in turns and everyone will understand and it will be a lovely holiday.

My experiences of MW have been great in the past and I am sure the staff there are as horrified as anyone. I dont think it is helpful to critise parents who use baby listening/creches/clubs - where does this thinking end? Never use a creche at local pool/never leave your child at friends house/at busy nursery/with grandparent who might nod off/go to the loo?

please everyone enjoy their holidays - parents deserve them too!!

ladymuck and kaz33 - wise words thank you

Certainly I would not criticise the use of a creche- all I about is parents leaving their kids unattended. I'm not convinced about baby listening / half hourly check type services but if in proper childcare its a non-issue tbh, imo. After that it comes down to pure holiday choice, no more significant than caribbean or Cruise

Do you know you can get small alarms (shed alrams they're often called) that clip inside a door and emit a nasty screech if they're opend for under a tenner? if you're, say, in a villa and can only see the front door you could take one or two for the abck door / hotel doors / windows if you're concered? DH made up a large batch for a women we know who was hiding from a violent XP, they're not foolproof but they help.

That is the sort I mean Peachy - I just wish they came as standard where there was a villa being rented. Mind you at this rate I'm never going to get my luggage through security as I always bring my own smoke alarm (less inconvenient to other guests than trying to check the hotel alarm I find ), and I suspect that if I'm using a villa in Europe I may even take a CO2 alarm (yes I accept that that is paranoid).

It is interesting what risks we are prepared to take and which we balk at though isn't it. Abduction has never appeared on my radar (now would it to anyone else who has met my children), but I definitely wouldn't book a holiday in Turkey or Egypt.

For those of you who shudder at kids club, some of us have only children (not entirely through choice) who actually don't want to spend every hour of every day with their parents and no other children so a couple of hours of kids club is something they love.

Holidays are for the kids to have a nice time too you know not just us!

i think you should do whatever you would normally do on holiday.
everyone is different and needs to do what suits them.
i personally NEVER leave my kids alone, especially on holiday as i would feel i didnt know the place iyswim?
if we want to do anything without them we hire the hotel babysitter if there is one. if there isnt, we dont do it.

i dont think what has happened to poor madeliene (sp?) should stop you doing what you want to. as some people have said, it doesnt happen very often. but 'very often' isnt 'never' so it is really up to you.

It's not something I would ever have done anyway, I really don't get it. We have always eaten with our 3 children when on holiday, even when they were all 3 aged 4 and under. And no, it wasn't a miserable experience like someone earlier suggested!
It's always been a great part of our holidays.

If meals out as a couple were that important to us, we would actually not do it on holiday, but do it at home where we have people we know and trust who would babysit.

But this one isn't for me to decide, it's for the original poster. If she has a good long look at arrangements at her venue and decides she is happy with everything, then that's what her decision will be based on.

When I first noticed that hotels sometimes called themselves "family friendly," I was struck by how often they meant there would be plenty of entertainment for them and a special menu and separate eating times.

i'm with you, ruby, that's why we do self-catering these days. in the UK, although next year maybe france.

just pack and drive!

'am i the only person who wouldn't leave the kids in an apartment by themselves reagrdless of if a poor little girl had just been abducted?'

No, you're not, Luby Luby. I couldn't do it either. I'm really suprised by how common it seems to be.

I used to reject sc as being too close to staying at home, but we can now get through a meal out with the dcs without wanting to murder them (or each other) so it is proving more popular. Everything changes with time I guess.

We are going on holiday tomorrow.To Ibiza. We went to a similar place last Sept. Ds hasn't stopped talking about it since.
First choice resorts are a lower class version of MW.We eat quite early, together, but that is fine because we eat early, together at home anyway, and by 6.45pm / 7 pm , we are ALL starving.
Fortunatley ds(3.3) has a siesta, loves "dinner and dancing" - the fab mini disco- that I think is the best thing EVER and can stay up until ..... and then we go home.Dh and I are happy aswell. We have had a few drinks .
I know not every child will... allow their parents to do this. But for us, you couldn't ask for more, could you.

I appreciate that we are very lucky, because there is no issue of whether to leave him or not.

I personally would never leave my DS alone in strange room - more for fear of him falling out of bed, getting scared and me not being there etc - yes I can be a tad overprotective but I am a single mum, it's just me and him! I choose holidays where they run a creche goverened by the proper regulations etc so I get some free time during the day and we have an early evening meal together, he then goes to bed and I sit outside on the balcony reading a good book - actually very relaxing!

I find it very strange that many of you cannot understand a desire to enjoy some adult only meals when on holiday. We love spending time with the children but also enjoy long boozy adult banter type evenings. Most parents I know do. We enjoy this when at home and have people round/go out and we enjoy it when on holiday.

Isn't thast quite normal?????

and that is why MW and Villa Pia offer the services they do (or did).

Many young children are miserable if not alseep by 8.30pm and many couples like to drink/chat/eat with their spouses/other adults later than this and without the children they've been enjoying all day.

I can't quite beleive I'm attempting to explain this it seems obvious and fundemental to me and not at all equatable with putting them in kids clubs from 8-6 or never eating with them as has been suggested in here.

I like chatting to my friends and husband over a glass of wine without having to think about the children for a few hours sometimes.

Again, in my world that's normal.

The question therefore for me is how do you acheive this now, if at all?

Those of you who profess not to want this on holiday or long accepted it would never happen again until they greew up are alien to me.

Our holidays consist of all day being children's time (never used a kids club...yet) evenings either staying in eating together (usually self cater) going out as couple while grandparents babysit (usually take them) last year did siesta thing a good few times and kept them up later and once we went to a hotel for a weekend where they did baby monitoring.

I like all these options INCLUDING eatring without them sometimes!!!!

i think mw have been operating for 25 years - not sure how long villa pia and others - but in that time thousands of children were safe and had fun holidays. I am sure now they will be made safer still.

i agree with you outraged - i think my first mw holiday saved my marriage tbh! - some of us need adult time in the evening with dh and a very large glass of wine. And to know the kids are 1000 per cent safe. It is possible and we will figure it out x

Agree Outraged. And to those who think that only the upmarket operators have offered this , it wasn't that long ago that Butlins and similar did a door to door listening service while the adults enjoyed the entertainment.