Tell me about your best CHEAP holiday!!

[geraldinetheluckygoat]

DH had seen the kids go free and save 40% and it still came out at over £1000 for three nights!!! Feeling dissappointed now, as the kids would have loved it, but we might save up and go next year......

In the mean time, tell me about your cheaper holidays...we are going camping for a long weekend over the summer, but would like another short break somewhere fun and not too expensive that doesnt involve a tent (dont want to have to rely on british weather being good). This country is fine, and under £500 would be good. Kids are five and three.

I don't know if it;'s your cup of tea but we had a brilliant holiday at centreparcs off season - think it was about £350 for a two bedroom thingy.

Otherwise, I think the Youth Hostel Assocation now down family rooms rather than dorms, and I wouldnt imaging they can be that expensive. Youth Hostels are often in brilliant locations

Thanks tattycoram, we have been to centreparcs once when ds1 was a baby, it was really good, but we need to go in school holls now and the prices are a lot higher. thanks for the tip on the youth hostels I will have a look at that

www.pgl.co.uk/PGLWeb/Families/email1.htm

Highly recommend PGL for an active family holiday and they have some good bargains at the moment as per above.

Don't worry if you're not terribly 'active' my ds wrote in his summer holiday report that i 'failed' at the abseiling and got half way up the climbing wall. Actually I didn't get even that far and I wasn't the only one!)

Was still a fab holiday, lots of friends for them and company for me if I wanted it. W also had a couple of excursion days too so was wasn't full on active all the time.

Oh sorry just saw that your dc are 5 & 3. They'd be too young for a pgl family holiday yet, they suggest 6 years old I think. Sorry

no worries, gillybean, thanks for the suggestion anyway.

lucky goat,
are you talking about Disneyland paris?

yes Milkybars...I put in 3 nights at the cabin things which looked about the cheapest and it came to over a thousand....

I wouldn't take them there yet, it's alot cheaper to rent a cottage for a week in france to be honest.

have you been Belle? is there not much to do for that age group?

I've not been but at 3 and 5 years the chances of them remembering anything are minimal. I do have family who have been there and the food is really overpriced.

Will they have just as much fun at the sea side?

what about Butlins? We just came back from a mid-week break staying at Bognor in the Ocean hotel and it was brilliant. Have a 3 year old and a 7 month old - the toddler was in heaven! Obviously it will be busier in the hols but I was very impressed by the cleanliness and there is so much to do without paying extras.
We were fine in the hotel without meals included - we had a Neptune room which had a chiller - I took cereal and milk so toddler could still have breakfast, and some breakfast biscuits for us plus other snacks - the rest of the time we ate sandwiches (bought from the big tesco down the road) and shared fish and chips/burger king/savoury pancakes from the stall in the pavillion etc. Not mega healthy but not too expensive. I just checked and the cheapest rooms in the Ocean (which is new and pretty spotless) are £526 for a midweek break starting 26th July.

Thanks for looking it up LynnieP! I had wondered about Butlins, I think it looks pretty good on the advert! What kinds of things were there to occupy the kids?

Belle, you are probably right, howver the inlaws live at the seaside so they go quite a lot. We wanted to do something that we wouldnt usually do, and as they love fairground rides and theme parks and all that, it seemed like a good idea. I'm not too worried about them remembering it, more that they just have a brilliant holiday while they're there.

Legoland is rather cool

I don't think there are any cheap holidays to be had anywhere in the summer, realistically.

oooh is it? weve never been, where abouts is it?

It's in Windsor. I went there with ds when he was 7, 99% of the rides were aimed at the smaller customer so it's better for little children.

www.legoland.co.uk

We booked jan 2010 and went with Canvas holidays for 3 weeks to france for £400. They have some good last minute deals on at the moment.

Wow, that's really good.

Forgot to add: it's cheaper to go with this and get some sunshine than it is to camp or go youth hostelling in this country.

We saved over half going to Centre Parcs in Holland in comparison to the British CP. Tesco Clubcard paid for the ferry.

We are going to a place called Atlantic Reach in Cornwall next Easter through Hoseasons for £320 for a week. It has a gym. indoor/outdoor pool, playarea and a whole host of things for the children to do. Will try to find a link.

I've just checked that site frenchygirl, it's just over 1K for ds and I for a week.

Atlantic Reach

I just clicked onto the Atlantic Reach site - which seems very useful. We also have to take holidays in school holidays and have a 3 year old and a 1 year old.

I have clicked onto the cottages and there seems to be reasonably cottages still available - less than £500 in August 2010 sleeping 4 in the south west.

Might be worth a look as we thought we were not going to get away this summer - now who knows...

Another possibility is to house swap. I would love to house swap but just never seem to get around to it! I have done an international career exchange pre-kids and think it would be an easy way to stay in different places.

If anyone is interested, we have a 3+ bed-house on the Isle of Wight!

thanks for the tip Belle! It does look good!
Fimbo atlantic reach looks lovely, bet you cant wait! Its a little far for us (were in bedford) but have been browsing the site!