Please share your funniest family holiday moments!!

[GeraldineMumsnet]

What with far, far too much weather, January going on and on etc, we thought it would be cheering to ask for your funniest family hol highlights.

Whether home or abroad, sun or snow, we want your most guffaw-making memories.

Thanks everybody!!

[lousouthend]

20 December 2009 Rugby to Euston train. Had to run for train with DH, DD5, DD3, DS2. Get on train minutes to spare. Only free seats altogether are bay of six with one very well dressed women and all her bags neatly arranged on chairs to put people off sitting there. I ask her to move bags so kids could sit down. She not happy, very slowly does-DH still at door of train faffing with pushchair folding as to avoid associating with me and pack of feral kids. DD5 kicks over womans tea, I want to say if you had not cluttered up the fucking space then this would not happen, but offer to buy new. DD3 turns white, to womans horror I take off my jacket and offer it to DD3 to puke up in, she does violently I catch it. Woman stunned, she leaves muttering. I hand pukey child, and coat to husband for clean up. Only toilet is on same direction as departing woman, she starts to move faster looking haunted.I get out laptop, shove on Dumbo and pretend the kids don't belong to me. The entire carriage stares at us. The journey across London on tube was a delight too.

[alypaly]

went to crete on year with,now ex. The weather turned horrible,cloudy and rain. So ,we decided to head to a nice fish restaurant where i had a massive plate of prawns.Then we headed to a cocktail bar.(mistake No 1) I am not really a drinker, but we started to go through the cocktail list,as i was in deep depression with the weather.

Blue lagoon,mai tai,screwdriver and a few B52's ,i was well away.
Headed back to our appartment and then the alcohol hit me,so i decided to go to bed.
Ex could hold his alcohol alot better than me so he stayed in the bar downstairs chatting to other holiday makers.

I took to my bed as everything was spinning round and round including the bed(yes ,weve all been there). Then,felt very sick. Couldnt bear to throw up in the not so clean loo,so threw up in sink(sorry too much info).

felt a bit better later,so joined ex in the bar. Didnt drink anything else otherwise i would have been comatose.

Next morning the ex was having a shower and he called out to me ,such an endearing term'YOU DIRTY COW'.
I wondered why he had called me that,so i went into the bathroom,to find out that all the prawns that i had thrown up down the sink had come up through the plughole in the shower and his feet wee swimming i them.

SO MUCH FOR GREEK PLUMBING
It was funny though.

[Epiphelix]

Last year we hired a narrow boat on the Kennet and Avon canal. It was me, DH, four teenagers and a dog. The kids were no trouble, they just sat around listening to their Ear-Pods all week, springing into action only when we yelled "lock!".

We had to perform a complicated manaoeuvre by a road bridge which involved untying the boat, jumping aboard and getting under the bridge before getting mown down by passing canal traffic. This all went marvellously until, at the last second, the dog jumped back on to the bank and we motored under the bridge without her!

Reversing or turning round in canals cannot be done, so we had to find another place to moor up, get off, walk back along the canal, cross the road bridge and find the stupid hound. Luckily we found a route back to where we'd dropped her, or she'd still be there...

[madhairday]

On holiday in the Lake District, near the end of a long walk, dh decides he's found a short cut on his OS map off the beaten path 'which should get us back to the car park in about 15 mins'. Off we toddle trustingly. After 15 mins we seem to be in the middle of nowhere, but he persuades us to keep going, won't be long now. Half an hour, would be daft to turn back now. Hour, we're walking through bracken 6ft tall, ds (3) screaming because he hates walking through 'prickly stuff' and then the bog starts.
3hrs later we make it back to the car park, scratched from head to toe and soaking wet and muddy.
It is still referred to as 'Daddy's Bracken Adventure' and the dcs still persuade him to find short cuts, looking back through somewhat rose tinted glasses?

[BikeRunSki]

In about 1980, when I would have been about 9, we went to France to stay in a cottage that a friend of my mother's had bought as a "project". We was mum, dad, 2 older DBs and a younger DSis, aged 6-18. Whilst the cottage itself provided reasonable "entertainment", the most memorable moment was driving back to the ferry. We stopped at a local village bistro for lunch, and we all got burgers and chips. Once we'd started tucking in, veggie Dad said "You know that's made of horse don't you?". Instantly 4 children stopped eating, with the older boys protesting that they'd been tricked! Dad got an earful from Mum that we were quite happy with our meals when we were ignorant of where it had come from. We ended up with cheese baguettes.

[Tortington]

lake district - week long holiday with moany whingey and ver particular friends.

just took ds1 - who was about 10 at the time.

it pissed down all the timewe were there and despite weatherproofing tent - it leaked.

luckily for us we made out own entertainment, we had took away with us a joint.

we aren't at all weed smokers and we wern't particularly back then either - but this was in anticipation of the stupidness of the decision to go on holiday with said friends.

so its a rainy night, tent leaking and ds, dh and i are playing cards. tent is zipped up.

we decide to smoke the joint.

after about 10 mins ds starts laughing at things which wern't that funny. DH and i look at each other and realise we had got ds1 stoned by proxy.

we were all in fits of laughter - so much so the security guard came round and 'knocked' on the tent and told us to shut up.

[Tortington]

on the way to the alps - driving all the way there in DH's work car - which was a company hire car, - i drove becuase dh hadn't long passed his test and is a girl didn't feel confident enough.

i had been driving for a very very very long time, it really was the jouney from hell. i got pulled over for speeding by the french coppers who wanted to see my license.

it was at that point we discovered that we hadn't brought it.

they made dh drive

which he did - until we had to go up ver steep mountain with no barriers - at which point he said " fuck this" pulled over and i had to continue driving.

[Tortington]

france camping.

dh and i are a picture of happiness washing the dishes in the communal wash area - the sun is shining, the wash area is covered with vines - ver 'french' when some kids come over and say "Mister, i think your boy is passed out in the park"

Dh does superman run over to park to find ds1 asleep clutching cheap wine he bought from shop - after finding out he was allowed to buy alcohol aged 15.

I had carried on doing the dishes and the nex thing i see is dh, with ds1 literally thrown over his shoulder like a sack of spuds as he carried him back to the tent - with ds1 periodically saying " dad, i[m gonna puke...dad"

[tearinghairout]

Another toilet one - In France last year, DH & I had had a row so weren't speaking. After a long drive I was desperate for the loo. Saw one of those new-fangled concrete self-cleaning efforts. Put the money in & let DD go in on her own. A German lady turned up & was waiting. DD took ages & when she eventually came out German lady tried to go in but I hand-signalled that I hadn't been, took the door from DD & went in.

As I closed the door behind me I was just in time to see the toilet disappear into the wall and the floor start to fill up with water before the light went out. AND I couldn't open the door, so had to wait for what seemed an age in the pitch black for the door to release itself. Wrenched it open, gasped "The toilet disappeared...!!" to DH (while still trying to be dignified 'cos we'd had a row) and asked for more money to put in. German lady was really fed-up by now and I had to tell her I STILL hadn't 'been'...

[BigHairyLeggedSpider]

Camping in Wales. Me Dh, two DSs's and my nephew. Great holiday until poor DSs1 got a severe stomach bug, pooed in his sleeping bag then ended up passing out in the shower at the same time as evacuating everything in his bowels as DH was holding the poor thing up. Cue me cleaning him up in one shower, as DH was trying to wash poo from the walls, floor, blocked up plug, floor of the other shower. Was very scary at the time coz the poor thing was so ill.

We had a three hundred mile drive home with three kids, One of whom was carsick, and one who had severe diarrhea and we stopped at every single services, layby, hedge and pub all the way home. We got through six towels two pairs of trousers and the car stank. Poor love ended up going to hospital the next day and couldnt eat for 24 hours (massive deal as he loves his food). Epic journey.

[alypaly]

like your story tearinghairout... i can just imagine your face as the floor filled up with water and the loo slid away..........ha.ha

[tearinghairout]

Thanks aly. Yes, it was surreal.

[tearinghairout]

This has dredged up memories of a family holiday when I was about 8, we went to Symonds Yat, in Somerset (?).

We were walking along a path in the woods next to a very fast-flowing river. My dog, a dachshund, found something disgusting & rolled in it. It turned out to be human poo, and he'd really gone for it, it was all stuck round his neck.

So my dad held him in the river and was trying to wipe it off, but the dog escaped and was swept downstream! Dad went hurtling along the riverbank for what seemed like ages & then waded into the river and managed to grab him. Mum always talked afterwards about going to Symonds Yat and the dog rolling in the Yat!

[solo]

I travelled home from Aberdeen to London(looooooooooooong way)on my motorbike in 1990 with cystitis in sweltering heat and backed up traffic. I had to stop at every service station...was a nightmare. Can't concentrate when at home on the sofa with cystitis, so it's a wonder I got home still breathing!

[Docbunches]

We've had loads, but the funniest and most embarassing was when my DP drove into a car park in Newquay which had one of those very low overhead yellow barriers and got stuck for ages because he forgot we had a large roofbox on our car .

Eventually after much to-ing and fro-ing we got out with an extremely crushed roofbox (it was like a scene from Top Gear).

We then had to drive through Newquay town centre, which always has traffic jams, complete with crumpled roofbox and plenty of spectators pointing and laughing..... as you can imagine, me and the DCs were crouched down on the floor of the car, leaving DP to face the humiliation on his own.

[BeatrixRotter]

On holiday in Wales doing a bit of window shopping with my Dad. We stop outside a gift shop and notice that a woman from within is looking at us. We carry on looking in the window and after about 30 seconds I say 'Dad why is that woman staring at us?'. Dad: 'I don't know, perhaps she fancies me.' Woman from within (in forceful tones): 'Can I help you?'

It wasn't a window, but an ice cream serving hatch.

[tearinghairout]

lol at Beatrix. Dads, eh?

Solo, I feel your pain. My cystitis nightmare was a (very slow, in heavy traffic) bus journey from Croydon to Brixton - bad, but not really in the same league as yours!

[cakeywakey]

Another camping one. A big group of us where going camping for the first time together with our clutch of toddlers.

We'd borrowed a tent from my Mum and Dad, but DH wasn't able to come down on the day to help us put it up, he came later that evening.

Thankfully two of the other Dads were ready and willing to help and set about getting the tent out and up. Which is when we discovered that there were no tent pegs to keep the ruddy thing stable. Luckily we were able to beg and borrow enough pegs to do the job properly, or we would have been bunking up in other tents!

When I called my Mum she just commented, 'Oh yes, I did wonder why we had so many tent pegs left in the garage.'

[Astrophe]

On a driving holiday (in Australia) with my family, back in the day. I was sitting in the back row of the van, by the window, ejjoying the fresh air, and my brother sitting in front of me in the middle row of seats. Brother started to feel sick and was told to open the window. Brother did this, promptly vomited out the window, and the vomit came back in my window and all over my face! Argh!

Also driving in Australia, a giant huntsman spider (not v dangerous, but as big as a child's hand) walked across the ceiling of the car above my 2 brothers and me...cue brothers and me undo seatbelts and all scramble into the front seat onto mums lap, screaming, as the car hurtles down the motorway and Dad bellows "GET BACK IN YOUR SEATS!".

[GeraldineMumsnet]

Thank you to everyone who has posted on this thread

[solo]

It didn't generate as many funny stories as I thought it would though , perhaps most people just have fantastic hols...

[cakeywakey]

Either that, or they're too embarrased to share

[solo]

Hehehe! could be...but this is MN where anything goes...