ARGHH! Any ideas for family of 5.....rooms not big enough!!

[cherrycake]

Am getting square eyed and fed up of looking for family rooms/appts/studios whatever which sleep more than 4 people.Possibly Greece, Portugal? Will consider most places!
How do all of you with 3 children manage holidays abroad?
Inspiration please!!!
Thanks in advance!
x

What about a villa or is that too expensive?

If I am honest, just having 5 of us is expensive!! But yes you have a point. I had a secret hope there would be somewhere we could at least have b&b so there would be one less meal to think about!
Just wanting someone to wave a wand I suppose!
x

We have just been on holiday to Portugal and it didnt cost the earth.

We used the web site Independant Traveller.

We stayed in a travel lodge the night before the flight even though there were 5 of us, DH when he booked it just told them that there would be 5 and they were fine about it, even gave us extra bedding. Even in Portugal we stayed in Lisbon for a night, even though the rooms only specified 4 people, DH told them there were 5 and we actually got upgraded at no extra cost!

With regards to Villa holidays there is a website called Owners Direct which is worth a look as some of them don't put the prices sky high during school hols.

We have 4 children and have recently done a 6 mth trp round the world - it was such a hassle trying to find cheap decent accom that would fit us all in. Not even "family" rooms in Youth Hostels could manage to squeeze us in. One internet place I used a lot was holiday-rentals.com .Hope it'll come up with something good for you. Now we are back home methinks it'll just be camping in the UK from now on. Happy hols!

Hi, We have three but our youngest is just one and therefore we're still getting away with saying four + 1. I think the big issue here is internet sites. They're set up for standard people and we're not standard. I'm going to hunt out an old fashioned travel agent (i.e. one that's not a chain with a computer that wont accept 3 kids).

HTH

Hi there
Can't help a great deal but I've been told that in France, the maximum you can have in a room in 4 people and that is due to Health & Safety legislation. So it isn't always the websites - sometimes it is the crazy rules in the first place!
I'd go for a villa every time though!
Good luck x

would you consider a mobile home? Eurocamp/keycamp etc? You can usually get 3 bedroomed mobile homes, and the sites tend to have lots of facilities for children. Might not be your cup of tea, but we've done several of these and really enjoyed them

I second the mobile home option. My DC really love it. When they are older and safe around a swimming pool, will probably do the private villa thing. With selfcatering you have the choice of going out to eat in the evenings or doing a barbeque, and can stock up the fridge with goodies (ice lollies & wine) at a fraction of the cost.

You can try Tots to France

They have gites of different sizes and in different price ranges - and some of them offer a home cooking option where you can order meals to be made on your behalf so you don't have to cook all the time

Why not drive to northern France and stay in a Gite in Normandy. Have a look at www.gites-de-france.com. I just did an availability search for Gites sleeping 8 or more (lots of bedrooms is always good) for Sat 21 July for 1 week and it came up with 116 (and that's just in Normandy)! Prices range from 400 euros upwards for the whole property for the week. I've used them loads of times and would receommend it.

self-catering is definitely the only way if you have more than 2 children - at least until they are old enough to sleep in an adjoining room in a hotel. But you will need to rent a cottage or villa, apartments rarely are big enough. We usually do a cottage somwhere but are trying a mobile home Keycamp-type holiday this year. had lots of trouble trying to find a family room en-route (due to the H&S rules mentioned already). Have booked two adjacent rooms now but dh and I will have to sleep seperately as the children are not old enough to leave them all in the one room (not interconnecting)

Ooh thanks guys for all these ideas...will be online a while now! We would love the keycamp idea, I get the brochures in the post, just need to hold my breath for the journey down...and hope they don't harm each other too badly on the way there!
And yes, villas are lovely....don't think we could stretch to ordering catering-in though!!
Spudz...so envious of your trip! Where did you go?
Happy hols everyone!x

Thomson have some family rooms for 5. We went to majorca to (not too far from poerto pollensa? not too far from Alcudia?) in a hotel room that was like 2 oblong bedrooms with an arch in between. half board. usually we have a cottage in Cornwall.

Cherrycake, last year we went to a campsite in St jean de Monts in the vendee. the family opposite had 4 children and beacsue they didn't fancy the drive with all 6 of them in the car, they got chep flights to Nantes, hired a Zafira and drove to the campsite. The 3 bed mobile was fine for them and they had a fab time (as did we!!). they just paid the extra £20 or whatever for the bedding. You can get really good deals on the campsites and flights - their flights to nantes with Easyjet were the 99p ones!

Hi Cherrycake - sorry haven't been on for a while. Hope your brochures have arrived and all goes well for you.
As for our trip we did (long list coming...): East coast States (N.Carolina,Washington,New York), Toronto,Vancouver,Rockies, San Franciso than picked up campervan and did Yosemite,Grand Canyon,Las Vegas,Los Angeles. Then onto gorgeous Cook Islands, then 6 weeks touring New Zealand then Sydney and up East caost in another campervan to Brisbane then flew up to Cairns and Port Douglas, then onto Thailand and home! A grand time had by all . Really don't fancy packing or flying again for a long time though!
Have a lovely time wherever you end up

We had the same problem,2 children & 3 adults.We eventually got 2 weeks at the Matina Apartments in Pefkos Rhodes for £1430 for all of us.We had 2 ground floor apartments next to each other & both the resort & accomodation were fantastic.Very child friendly.I highly reccomend them.

Try ww.holitots.com they have apartments that sleep 6

This apartment here sleeps six! Otherwise I would recommend www.holidaylettings.co.uk, www.homelidays.net and holiday-rentals as mentioned below.

Hope you find something!