It’s that time of year again when the sun attempts to make an appearance and the shops become littered with beach wear and sun cream.
It’s that time of year again when the sun attempts to make an appearance and the shops become littered with beach wear and sun cream. With the holiday season just around the corner and a trip to Lanzarote to look forward to, as I now have so much free time after finishing uni for the year, I decided to reflect upon past family holidays that I’ve been on.
I was a pretty lucky child to be completely honest. Every year my parents took my brother and me abroad to a range of sunny destinations, including Turkey, Tunisia, Majorca, Egypt, Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Portugal, Spain and Gran Canaria. Every holiday was focused around relaxing and chilling out, playing on the beach and in the sea and messing around in a swimming pool. We have always gone all inclusive and I always returned from a holiday with a selection of new friends and happy memories which I’m extremely grateful for.
I know that lying horizontally on a sunbed on a beach for a fortnight is not everybody’s cup of tea, (why this is however I will never understand) but it is my personal idea of a holiday, both as a child and as a 20 year old student. I have decided to list the seven holidays that I don’t think parents should ever take their kids on, although they are all strictly based on the sort of child I was and generally still am.
Walking Holidays
This is quite possibly the worst kind of holiday a parent could inflict on a child. It’s not so much the walking itself that is the issue, it’s all the ridiculous things you have to bring with you and carry in a stupidly heavy unattractive looking rucksack. The straps rub on your shoulders against the sun cream you are forced to wear and your back feels like it’s been snapped in half. Trekking up and down a mountain in blistering heat sounds like a nightmare, no matter how old you are.
Sight-seeing Holidays
As a restless child prone to the odd tantrum, a sight-seeing holiday is probably not one that would go down too well. My parents never inflicted a holiday like this on me and for that I owe them my eternal thanks. Traipsing around some classical city staring at art-deco statues and historic architecture is quite frankly my idea of hell. Sight-seeing is wasted on a child and should be left to retired couples who will genuinely appreciate the intricate detail of a cathedral roof.
Camping
This one is pretty self-explanatory. Tents, rain, insects, lack of personal space—it just doesn’t bode well for both parents and children together. Camping with friends and at festivals is an entirely different story to camping as a child with your parents. If you are a parent considering going camping with your kids, just don’t bother, save yourselves the stress and the arguments and stay at home. You will thank me for it in the long run.
Caravans
Similar to the points mentioned about camping, caravan holidays I would imagine to be a severely stressful experience for a parent with a child. As a kid I know I would’ve hated staying in a caravan and having to live under my family’s feet. There is no room to breathe, the bathroom is tiny and the whole idea just seems like a waste of money. I would rather not go anyway than go to some dodgy trailer park at an English pleasure beach with a host of other families. It’s not for me, sorry.
Golfing Holidays
Don’t get me wrong, I’m sure for the right sort of person a golfing holiday would be brilliant, but for a child like I was then it is definitely a no go. It would involve a lot of patience, waiting around and being quiet and I think I speak on behalf of every child when I say that these are three things which would be virtually impossible. As a parent as well, having one eye on your child running round a golf field would be a slight inconvenience, but it’s either that or shove them into a kids club all day. I know what I would do.
Heritage Holidays
A bit like sight-seeing holidays, I don’t think that as a child I would’ve enjoyed being dragged around a ruined castle or a National Trust nature reserve. I appreciate the work that these organisations do in preserving our country’s history and natural beauty, but again it is unappreciated by the majority of children and leads to boredom and arguments. I couldn’t think of anything worse than having to hike around King Arthur’s ruined castle (I have done this twice by the way and I wasn’t impressed) and look at pile after pile of fallen stone. Once you’ve seen one castle, you’ve seen them all.
Coach Holidays
No matter what the destination, whether it would be St Tropez or Mars, travelling for 47 hours on a coach to get there is not, I repeat NOT a good idea. Irrelevant of age, being seated on a sweaty, claustrophobic, toilet-stinking coach with other members of the public may be a cheaper mode of transport but from what I can see, it isn’t worth it. Children get bored and irritated very easily and add that to the confined surroundings of a coach and it is a recipe for disaster. Our flight to Majorca was cancelled once, and we were all taken by bus to an airport the other side of the country. Although the journey was only 4 hours, I remember it so vividly. It was hell.
Despite everything I have said, I know not everybody is like me and some of the holidays I have listed would be perfect for other people. Being able to go on holiday at all in today’s economic climate is a bonus so I shouldn’t really complain.
Enjoy your summer and your holidays!
What are your holiday plans over the summer? What destinations will you head to? Let us know in the comments section below, on Facebook or on Twitter.
