Relaxing holiday with toddler - is it even possible?!?

[Bearlionfalcon]

Our holiday experience this year has made me conclude it’s not physically possible to have a relaxing holiday with a child under three. Am I wrong?!

We shelled out a painful amount of ££ this year for a holiday in Ikos Odisia (all inclusive luxury family friendly resort). The resort is brilliant - older DD1 (8) and DD2 (5) couldn’t have been happier, off to kids club every day etc etc. if we just had them it would have been great. But because we have DS3 (17 months) it wasn’t at all relaxing for DH and I - he wouldn’t go to the crèche and we spent the whole holiday jumping up to try and stop him falling over, climbing on something or drowning himself in the pool, beach or various water features. And even though the buffet and restaurants were great and we never had to cook the whole time we were there, that didn’t stop him jumping out of the high chair, throwing food, making a massive mess, spiting it all down himself. It’s just been relentless!

I obviously know we signed up for this by having a third and going to the start again! - but I am wondering what we do next year. I think if we can’t even have a relaxing time at IKOS which is designed to make life easy for you families then we should probably give up on holidays until he is bigger or at least not spend much money on them?!

But DH thinks actually IKOS is not actually an optimal holiday for DS3 and that for all the ‘child friendliness’ a pool and beach holiday is not a good setup with a toddler - he is very hot, you have to watch him all the time as water is everywhere and nowhere is safe, and there’s nowhere like an air conditioned soft play sort of thing which we could use in the heat of the day (only a crèche where parents can’t do in, which he will not entertain!)

DH thinks we should go to one of those child friendly alpine hotels with lots of facilities and sports for kids - he thinks grassy play areas and indoor/ outdoor playgrounds and somewhere not too hot is better for a baby.

Has anyone tried those - or had any success with a toddler on holiday anywhere?! He will be 2 and a half next summer. And it needs to be somewhere with something for older DDs who will be 9 and 6 although they’re easy to please really. Suggestions very welcome!

It is the pits isn’t it @hellonuranus ! Honestly was such an error - I do wish I’d saved IKOS for two years time!!

The food was good! Obviously different style to Sani/Ikos as it’s a mix of Austrian and international but breakfast was amazing and dinner they tried to do ‘fine dining’ style for adults and the quality was generally very high (although with the kids I’m not a fan of six course meals, which seems to be a theme in these types of kinderhotels, so we sometimes just asked for al a carte or skipped a few of the dinner courses if the kids were playing up.)

When our eldest DD was 7 months we did a Greek beach holiday and we did take turns playing with her and relaxing. With just one it was fine! Once we had a toddler and a little baby, we stuck with Cornwall for a few years, partly due to Covid… it was lovely but I never found it that relaxing - I felt like there was a lot of gear to lug to and from the beach and a lot of cooking and washing up to do just in a smaller less well equipped kitchen. Of all the aspects of toddler parenting it’s the constant catering and clearing up that does my head in, so with self catering I just ended up feeling I hadn’t really had that much of a break; maybe that was just inevitable! But we first tried ikos when they were 3 and 5 and it was great …. I just think now we’re back with a baby again we need to figure out an alternative for the toddler years. I’m loving all the tips and am looking seriously into kindeherhotel type options as I think they look really good