Please be my travel agent

[SellFridges]

I’m going around and around in circles and am currently threatening to never go on holiday again.

We had a low hols year last year for a few reasons, and would like to get something booked on top of our usual trip to Cornwall. Here’s our criteria…any suggestions would be amazing!

1. a week to 10 days max, in the second half of August.
2. DH hates flying so won’t go further than Spain ish (2.5 hours or so). We’ve driven to France lots before and happy to drive or take the train further too with stop offs.
3. there’s four of us - two adults, DD14 and DS10. We don’t want any bed sharing except for DH and I (this seems tricky!)
4. swimming pool access
5. something else to do - doesn’t have to be much, but either access to a town or village or activities within the hotel or resort.
6. max budget is £6k, ideally £5k but I am despairing at quality you seem to get for less!

My preference would be all inclusive, as I am the one who has to plan food and dinner and everything and I’d like to switch off. I’m more flexible on this than DH is on flying though!

Anyone had great hols they could share?

Hey not a chance of good all inclusive in school holidays for that I'm afraid.

2.5 hours would get you loads of places though. Croatia / Montenegro / Serbia etc. would you consider those? Money goes a bit further there

A cruise? If you don't mind sharing a cabin you might get a deal.

I’ve found a few all inclusives for closer to £6k that would be fine I think - Tui Magic Life or Blu. But I’m going round in a circle with them (we’ve been to one of them before and it was great!).

Would definitely consider those locations, but nothing has come up in searches. It all seems to be Turkey and the Canaries which just aren’t us.

I’ve looked at cruises, but I can’t put the kids in the same bed. It’s not fair.

If you'd be happy with not all inclusive, we've been to here Holiday Park Kohnenhof | Nature experience | EuroParcs in Luxembourg several times now and love it. Lots to do, cycling, exploring the forest, swimming, and lots of towns in easy walking distance for meals out. Very near a pool and sauna if you don't fancy lake swimming. It would be under budget for a weeks stay so that could be put towards food money out, and the dc would get separate beds. Also not a long flight out!

Thanks, I’ll take a look. We’ve done Center Parcs in France before and it looks similar. Only ruled that out because we’ve done it three times tbh.

@SellFridges We've done centreparks quite a few times, to me that park differs because it's not site centric- it's in a central location so you can go and explore the towns/ surrounding areas, so whilst there are on site facilities they aren't the focus like they are in centreparks

Club Med in Provence?

IME cruise cabins are better at separate beds for kid than hotels- often have a sofa which converts and another bunk that pulls down from the ceiling

Where are you flying from?

You could have a look at other center parcs like De Kempervennen, that has lots for older children to do. Likewise with a Eurocamp site, pay for better accommodation and put the remaining budget towards eating out. Eurocamp has a filter for "more for teenagers" to help find the most suitable parks.

With AI, if you find a hotel you like that's out of budget, try pricing up the flights and hotel separately. Sometimes it does work out more but other times it can be significantly cheaper so always worth a look. We booked our August holiday separately this year and saved about £2500 and had better flight times.

I've just put in your family from Stansted or Birmingham, All inclusive and at least 4 stars and got 111 results. That's with jet2. No further than Spain, France, Portugal or Italy. All under 5.5k

Sorry meant starting from 5.5k. If your dh was willing to travel a bit further you would get better quality in turkey/ Greece.

Hey not a chance of good all inclusive in school holidays for that I'm afraid

I disagree....you can get a decent ai for a week in school hols for 6k..I think it's a decent enough budget

You need to look at the family cabin configurations. Most have drop down single bunks or a single sofa bed plus drop down bunk, in addition to a double/twin.

We’re in Birmingham but can fly from London if needed.

Wow. Maybe the Stansted filter added some more options - I’ll take a look. Definitely some options though.

Thanks for the ideas so far. I’ll play around with departure airports and see if that gets some different options.

Totally get that we can spend more on eating out if we do a Center Parcs or something, but it’ll be me that has to sort it so I want it to be easy!

If your kids like to be active with other English teens then Beyond Beach in Greece. Unlimited water sports with free English tuition. With pool, beach and local towns. Not all meals included but in Greece you want to be able to eat out a few meals in the week, it would be awful to be AI and miss the great restaurants. Great value, small and friendly, social, authentic Greek family hotels rather than a Neilson/Mark Warner style. Very possible on your budget.

Beyond Beach looks great. Will explore that more. We’ve had a couple of sports injuries that I’ll need to check are compatible with the activities but it looks a great balance if I can get DH on the plane.

you can just lie by the pool, swim or canoe, paddle board or just join in the activities including yoga etc i think (although that is only thing not included). There is mountain biking in addition to sailing and windsurfing all included and sea swimming. Have been a few times if you have any questions

if he wont fly then u could drive to dutch/belgium centre parcs.

Turn left at Calais and go to the Netherlands, really love it, Landal is like a cheap centre parks.

Where did you in the end? We're currently at Beyond Beach in Kephalonia and having a great time, the beach and hotel staff are all lovely, lots to do (something for everyone) we may well come again next year. It's a €10 taxi ride from Lixouri which we've visited a couple of nights (all but a couple of evening meals are included in the price).

It's a shame your DH doesn't want to fly as far as the Canaries, as Lanzarote would probably suit. But you could also go somewhere within reach of a Spanish city so Malaga, Barcelona, Alicante etc.

You could get a 2 bed bungalow on a complex that would offer a range of board options. AI is likely to be the repetitive scrum at the buffet but that's up to you if you're happy to give up a nicer dining experience for total ease.

But if you self catered or went B&B somewhere within walking distance of the beach, supermarket, restaurants etc, you could stock up on drinks, snacks, easy food and ice creams at the start of the week and perhaps have a couple of top ups. Eat out at least once a day and everyone pitches in with the minimal prep and washing up - your DH can go with DC to the supermarket leaving you on your sun lounger.

As well as the pool, there will be beach, watersports, volcano park, waterpark, caves etc for something to do.