If you had an amazing holiday this year…

[Sunnydaydreams]

…please share what you did, wherever you went. Having spoken to friends and colleagues, no one seems to have had their best time this year (although most of us have had the ‘pleasure’ of taking grumpy teens bringing down the mood!). Not to everyone’s tastes, but our best family holiday so far has been to Florida, visiting Universal Studios and Disney - it was such good fun.

We had a week in Lapland just after midsummer. Was lovely - midnight sun, reindeer everywhere, fishing, beautiful nature all around, and we went to the amethyst mine in Luosto which was brilliant, mined our own amethysts!

Been to Edinburgh, naples, Paris and Rome this year. Favourite was 8 days in sorrento.. great food and people. We went to pompei and herculaneum. Hired a boat and skipper to go to capri. Swam in the sea. Perfect day. Me and sons 21 and 24. Will be going back to Italy. Off to nice in a few weeks..

I had an amazing summer holiday this year full of music.

Solo trip to Liverpool for 5 days during their pride weekend. So much wonderful music about.

Solo and friend trips to London for a total of 6 overnights. 2 Oasis, 5 musicals/plays.

West Wales for a week with BF, seeing lots of local bands and DJ sets.

I've previously toured summer months in Cambodia/Vietnam/Laos/Thailand with the bairns We've been to the Maldives for a fortnight. Egypt. Greece. I've enjoyed all of them.

And I really enjoyed this year too. In the rain. And sun. And being close to home.

Holidays are all about what you make them. Each one through the years has had its own amazing moments.

We did a two week road trip round Netherlands and Germany. Had a great time (as did the DCs) but found it very expensive. And stressful at times.

next year we will choose a place and just stay there! Probably a French campsite.

Lanzarote in May AI, was beautiful 😍

Windy but sunny, pools, chilled, amazing beach with 2 DC aged 10 and 12.

Also a caravan holiday in Uk with full on activities and entertainment, weather not the best but you make the most of it.

Really enjoyed both ☺️

I did similar a few years ago and it’s my joint best holiday ever.

We went to Tenerife. Really enjoyed it. Didn’t do as many activities as we would have liked as we have a toddler to consider.

The hotel was great, staff really friendly, food was great as well. Some decent entertainment.

We did a buggy ride up to mount Teidi. More fun for the husband who got to drive but was still fun to do.

We went to Timberhill, near Broadhaven, Pembrokeshire. It was heaven. The sun shone, glorious beaches - sea as warm as the Med. Dogs welcome everywhere. Fantastic food. Wonderful!

I’ve been fortunate to have had quite a few really fabulous holidays this year.
I went to a China, visited 5 places and it was an incredible trip. It was really interesting and the people were so nice.
I also went on a cruise to Alaska which was amazing, the scenery was stunning, I really recommend it.

First summer working term time only so we have 10 days in Lisbon / Penha Longa which was nice but not much to do and then I took my 12 year old to Ibiza for 3 days to a very quiet resort in the north and we spent the whole time on the beach - was brilliant! We have already done Hawaii this year though which was just amazing!

We've had a great summer - took a month off and drove to Sölden in Austria to ride bikes with DS5 and DH. Rode loads of blue and red trails with lift access, like skiing really.

Also went to:

• Speyer Technik museum to see the space exhibit @crackofdoom what’s Sinsheim like? It’s on the list for next year 🤣
• Wilhelma Zoo and botanics at Stuttgart
• Winterberg bike park in Saurland
• De Panne beach and Malo Les Bains beach

DS5 did not want to leave the bike parks and come home - he’s also dreading having to sit still in school 🤣🫣

*DS rides bikes a lot as do we, so used to steep trails etc.
** DS has ADHD, so chilled holidays are never gonna happen in this house…

Salcombe for a week with a 15 year old. Husband and I went for an early walk every morning and then the child was up and ready for 9am and we walked into town (we were at South Sands for those who know it). We would then just mooch round for a bit and get a coffee. Had day trips out and went to the beach. We then were back at the apartment for about half eight and we played the games that were there - Ocean bingo was a big hit.

That sounds perfect!

DC 10 & 13
5.* All inclusive Greece.
Lots of chilling by the pool whilst the kids played, snorkelling in the sea, sipping cocktails and eating at nice restaurants. Bliss.

I had a fab holiday to the south of France; family get together with 12 of us. A truly wonderful and almost impossible to plan event.
And I’m off to Central Asia in 10 days to discover the wonders of the Silk Roads. Which I’m hoping will be equally good 🤞

I think Speyer and Sinsheim are two halves of the same thing, literally and figuratively speaking! Sinsheim has a Concorde, a Tupolev (like a Russian Concorde), various other planes, including one with a slide leading from it down into the hangar!- and a massive U Boat (my favourite bit of the whole museum was the film of how they even got it there!)

Otherwise, there is a massive collection of rare historic cars, steam trains, tanks etc etc- I imagine Speyer is very similar?? If I was to go to just one, in retrospect I might choose Speyer, because I hear it's a pretty historic town, whereas Sinsheim is definitely not.

Another thing I would do differently is not to go in the middle of a fucking heatwave, because those planes- up on a totally unshaded roof- turned into torture chambers, and we missed a lot out for that reason. Thank God the U Boat at least was air conditioned!

Which bit of the coast did you go to please?

I had a great two weeks travelling across France by train (via Disney) and then ferry to Corsica with my preschooler. Corsica was stunning - it was actually someone on here who mentioned it and inspired me to want to go (I think they were debating whether to go to a wedding there with their kids or something? Because the travel was expensive and awkward timings).

Honestly a week in a villa is absolutely deathly boring for a lot of adults, let alone teenagers. Maybe something more active would be better. Hiking, canoeing etc? Or more interesting landscapes/culture. We had an active holiday this year and all loved it. The children are younger than yours though

Croatia on a teen based activity holiday. It was amazing - kids made instant friends and had such a laugh. Therefore we did too! Perfect mix of activities and free time. We did river tubing, kayaking, rafting, canyoning. And as there were like minded families it broke the ice and the teens were goofing around like kids again. I kid you not when I say we had not one teen strop, and that’s saying something cos one of mine is a drama queen.

We used a company called Green World holidays and they were exceptional.

Nice, I need to check out the book.

If you visit try to stay on the island if you can afford it but it's cheaper to stay at either Mackinaw City or St Igance and get the ferry to the island.

The Grand Hotel is very... grand and pretty but pricey but there are other relatively cheaper options as well.

Great post! I’ve got a 17 yr old so my family holidays are numbered! We did 5 nights in Orlando- was fun but not my thing- then did 7 night RC cruise on Icon of the Seas - was fab and then 2 nights chilling in Miami!

Teen did still moan 🤦‍♀️

Sorry to hear about your child with the fear of flying. We don’t fly either, but for different reasons - we have a lot of food allergies in the family so tend to load up the car and take provisions with us. But we’ve had great holidays by ferry in Jersey, Ireland (we did the Irish CenterParcs as Irish school holidays were different from UK) and the Isle of Wight. We’ve also done a couple of cruises from Southampton to France and Norway. Plenty of fun to be had without an aeroplane x

I have one teen who needs lots of peace and quiet and downtime, a definite sensory avoider. And another who is a complete sensory seeker/adrenaline junkie. So holidays can be really tricky but this year I think I cracked it - we went to a centre parcs in the Netherlands which was fantastic, plenty for the children to do (or not do). We had a couple of trips into Amsterdam to do usual touristy stuff, and then when we came back one teen could ride off on a bike and chuck himself down the rapids multiple times, whilst the other could recharge. She was very happy to find films available on Dutch Netflix that aren’t on ours, and the wifi was really good so she could snuggle up in our accommodation and chill.
We found the Netherlands to be super friendly and very efficient, everything worked like clockwork. I got my history and art fix too, so a win win.

I agree, I’d go nuts.