Really struggling to find a nice affordable holiday at the end of August

[Catsarelovely]

Hi,

I'd love some recommendations of somewhere nice and not too expensive in Europe. I've been very unexpectedly given some money with the stipulation that we can only spend it on a holiday.

I've been shocked at how expensive package deals are so am finding tricky to find something. We haven't gone abroad in years as we couldn't afford to so I definitely had unrealistic expectations initially. Our budget is £5000 including flights for 2 adults and one 10 year old child.

Everything I've seen offers a room with a sofa bed which just doesn't appeal! I've tried looking at villas but there's very little left. Any help would be much appreciated 👏

I’m assuming you’re not intending to spend much time in the room so does the sofa bed need to be an issue?
it’s the usual arrangement when staying in a hotel as a family.

https://www.jet2holidays.com/beach/greece/crete-heraklion-area/gouves/gouves-waterpark-holiday-resort?errorcode=no-results-returned#tab-overview&utmmedium=referral&utmmsource=saveandshare&utmcampaign=shareholiday%7cvillas&utmmcontent=link&utm_userId=

It's a maisonette so no sofa bed and a free child place.
Lots of options on jet 2 if you have time to look through

What about doing an Airbnb in France drive over? Choose an area would go along way here as propert my prices are cheap.

Don't do a package deal. Look at flights and at air BnB or booking.com

Airbnb and booking.com will have lots of apartments etc if you don't mind self catering. And book flights separately- cheaper to fly mid week if that's an option. 5k should be plenty for family of 3 - we just did a week in Italy for 4, flights, spending money etc for 2.5k

Try "on the beach" website

I booked a week AI in Portugal 5 days before we went, which all the other sites had as "sold out" for the whole summer OTB had plenty of availability

Where do you want to fly from and when do you need be home?

We just went to Turkey with Jet2 for a week - cost a lot less than that and we had a suite with separate sleeping areas

Last-minute dot com have some great deals

If you need a 2 bed I'd look at apartments on booking.com or similar.

Have a look at Mark Warner - we went to Greece with them a couple of times when DC were young, short transfers,

this option 1 week in Greece with a suite (so separate room for child) comes in at £4.5k. They’re so convenient with DC, lots of other children, they can be in kids club all day and can sail/windsurf/beach games etc . Some of the resorts have options for rooms with private pools and to upgrade the half board buffet option to al a carte

this is a new resort (the one I went to doesn’t appear to exist anymore) but definitely worth exploring for an easy holiday

www.markwarner.co.uk/Book/Rooms/202_7469/6901619/10-/-/?rooms=1

Villa in Menorca. You can’t go wrong with Menorca. It’s a short flight, family friendly and absolutely beautiful

When you search on Jet2 it will allocate one room as a sofa bed is considered a bed. Ideally you want a 2 bedroom apartment. Try putting in 4 people and you will find more options.
I would have thought £5k would get you a decent holiday. Where were you looking and how long for?
I just randomly put 4 adults late August 1 week in Feurtaventura and there are plenty of very nice hotels for under £5k

Hi,

Thanks for all of your suggestions and for taking the time to look for us. I really appreciate all the links and ideas given. I had looked at last-minute
.com but got a bit overwhelmed with all the various options. Searching for two bed places does make sense, i'll look into that later. My dh is a snorer so that's why all of us in the same room doesn't work too well😴

Voyage Prive is another option. BA holidays also had some nice places. The biggest problem will be cost of flights.
Simpson travel had some lovely late avail villas with flights recently.

I really recommend jet2, there should definitely be options in your budget. They might offer you a one bedroom apartment which would have a sofa bed in living room but if it's available there'll be the option to upgrade to a 2 bedroom apartment.
Turkey, Majorca or Menorca would be good places to start. Or possibly Croatia.
Greece & Cyprus are a bit more expensive but do tend to have more apartment style accommodation rather than hotels so if you were happy with self catering that could work.

I just went on Jet2 Holidays and put in two rooms, last week of August, two adults, one 10-year-old DC and 'anywhere' and it came up with 921 options for under £5000. OP there are masses of options out there! But if you know where you want to go that will narrow it down a bit.

A nice villa in south of France or Majorca/Menorca. Lovely.

Quite often on Jet2 the first option will include a sofa bed, but if you click through you'll be able to pay extra for a 2 bed unit. I'm sure you'll find something for £5k even in August and booking late.

Or could you go to the Canaries in October half term?

Eurocamp do lovely apartments and mobile homes with multiple rooms, you can get half board options

If you go on Jet2 Villas, put in August and specify at least 2 bedrooms there’s a lot of villas, which come with free car hire, mostly. Obviously there’s a lot that’s for 29th/30th/31st because that takes it into the first week of September but there’s a good choice for the rest of the month imo

Book with the hotel directly and book your flights separately. We've saved £1k doing this for an August holiday this year.

Insotel hotels have hotels in the Balearics and have a good offer on summer bookings right now. You can just get a taxi at the airport when you're there. Get a decent travel insurance and all should be fine.

Pick your destination area, look for flights and air bnb and boom! We are doing Milan (cheap flights for 4) train to Verona and explore Garda. Family of 4 coming in under 3k. All the air bnb's have enough bedrooms.
Of you want a package holiday to a beach then it can be closer to 5k from a friend's recent travels.
We have chosen northern Italy this year as we did Spain a few years ago and it was in the 40's too hot.

Thanks again to you all, it's really helpful to have other peoples opinions. It's been so interesting to look at the different options and hopefully we'll find something soon😎