Family holidays take a lot of planning, over packing, and saving. It can sometimes feel like a huge pressure cooker when everyone is supposed to be having fun because you paid for a good time but the kids are whining and it’s not quite the relaxing getaway you had imagined. Things can quickly turn into family holiday disasters.
Whether you take your family holidays to Canada, Spain, or Grimsby, rest assured if things don’t go to plan you will not be the first, or the last. And one day these will be the stories you laugh at and look back on somewhat fondly.
To be fair we’ve had a few family holiday disasters ourselves. Including the time my parents didn’t realise at 17 I need my own passport until the morning we were due to fly. Unsurprisingly My mums approach of “tie your hair back and don’t wear any make up”, didn’t work. My mum and brother flew and left my Dad and I queuing in the London Passport office and joining them a day later.
Then there was the accommodation that had a shower head but no hose, and a TV but no remote and a kettle with no cord. Or the time we broke down en-route, got stuck in snow, or maybe the time my son fell into a ditch full of stinging nettles. Holidays, such fun!
Check out these family holiday disasters and laugh along or sympathise, your choice!
Mix ups
My family & I rented a caravan when I was a kid. (This was the late ‘80s, so no mobile phones). When we got there, the key wouldn’t fit the caravan lock so my Dad went to reception & someone came out and confirmed it was the right caravan, then agreed my dad (A joiner & locksmith) should pick the lock as they had no spare. We unpacked & an hour later, an elderly couple came in & started screaming. It turned out we were in their caravan & ours was next door.
Some of the kids on site thought it was hilarious to swap the caravan numbers around!
Thankfully they were ok about it & my Dad helped them upgrade their locks the next day.
Weather
A friend and I thought it was a good idea to bring 3 children under 3 to Iceland. Now it would probably have been alright had the worst snow storm in 5 years not hit at that very time. We were left navigating it and it was definitely a near-death experience being on those icy roads with zero visibility. We got stranded at a roadside motel with nothing to do but for the kids to play in the snow in the parking lot. The two eldest boys still talk about our amazing trip to Iceland and ask when we are going again.
Car troubles
On our first holiday as a family of six our car broke down on the motorway going, ended up waiting 5 hours to be towed to a garage to be told it wasn’t fixable and we needed a hire car. Got in the hire car for an over night stop and woke up to see someone had smashed the hire car windscreen in the car park. Fixed that, finally arrived in Devon and all 3 kids got hand foot and mouth. After emergency treatment at the doctors as they couldn’t eat or drink, Harry then got bitten by a poisonous spider, his entire hand blistered and swelled up and ended up back in hospital on intravenous antibiotics. It still goes down as our most disastrous holiday of all time.
Road trip disasters
Last year we had a disastrous road trip back from an otherwise lovely holiday in Zimbabwe, and it was only after the 6th incident that I informed everyone that I and my children were not moving from that spot whether they liked it or not. Here is a list of things that went wrong that brought me to that point:
- small bike accident the day before we left injuring our neighbour and my husband and delaying our departure by a full day.
- A toll gate boom came down on the SUV and damaged it 130kms into the journey.
- 2 of the 7 passports were lost and this was only realised at the Botswana border.
- We nearly hit a black cow on a deserted road at night after we turned back to Bulawayo at 20.00 at night.
- The following morning, the petrol attendant splashed petrol into my husband’s eyes while he was filling his motorbike up.
- On eventually getting into South Africa the fuel attendant at the first fuel station filled up the Diesel Fortuner with Petrol.
Accommodation hell
We went on our honeymoon to Gran Canaria, we took our two children aged 18 months and 3 years, firstly we were delayed by 6 hours, then when we arrived there was no transport to take us to the hotel, when we did eventually arrive the room was full of cockroaches, so they agreed to move us, three days later we were woken at 3am with someone trying to break into our room, so we were then moved to another hotel, certainly gives us something to talk about when people discuss romantic honeymoons!!
Illness
Having moved from the US to Ireland, I have always noted some amazing differences in the two cultures. One is the way the Irish celebrate Christmas. It’s truly amazing and so fun. I would always tell my American family about our big family Christmas dinner, the parties and New Year celebrations too.
One year my godparents decided to come join us for the festivities. We had lots planned, even my sister in laws wedding was in the mix of fun that year. So there were high expectations of a good few weeks of fun and laughs.
A few days before Christmas one of my kids got a vomit bug which quickly spread through the entire house. Only it wasn’t a typical vomiting bug, it started with the voms them moved swiftly into a nasty flu complete with a chesty cough. Needless to say, all of the fun family parties didn’t happen. We were in bed for the few weeks of Christmas instead.
Accidents
We once took the kids on a camper van holiday to France & ended up having to restock the first aid kit 3 times as my son just kept having small accident after small accident including falling onto broken glass at the beach. Nothing too serious but we got through so many plasters!!!
Our first family holiday abroad was to Spain. We were staying in a small town in the Costa Del Sol. There was a lot of construction going on around the town and lots of the pavements were dug up. We’d been out watching the football, and on the way home I tripped and fell. Not realising the damage I’d done, I continued to hobble home with my group only to stumble again. The next day when I got out of bed, I couldn’t put weight on either foot. After a trip to the doctors, it turned out both ankles were badly sprained and I spent the rest of the trip in a wheelchair
For more severe incidents, such as vehicle-related injuries, it’s crucial to know about resources like motorcycle accident lawyers San Diego who can provide expert help.
Delays
We (myself, husband and our three wild little boys) went to Lanzarote a few years ago. The flight being at 8am on Boxing Day morning set the tone for the stress which was to follow…
We got into the departure lounge and they announced a 2.5 hour delay which turned out to be three. They then eventually boarded us onto the plane, put on the fasten seat belt signs… and we proceeded to sit on the runway for FIVE AND A HALF HOURS. The delightful woman sitting next to me asked if my youngest son was a ‘good baby’ because she wasn’t a ‘kid person’…
We took off eight hours after we’d gone to the departure lounge only for the captain to announce; “please don’t take it out on the air stewards because it can’t be helped now… but we forgot to load the food onto the plane. We have alcohol and some Twix’s.”
Babies and Toddlers!
When I told friends we were taking two babies and a three year old camping, I was mostly met with people questioning my sanity.
I shat myself on the first day when the Other Half headed to the shop and Twin Two went missing, only to turn up in the tent across the way – occupied by non-English speaking Germans who gave a polite wave and pointed as he crawled into their bedroom compartment. Not embarrassing at all.
Twinstantrumsandcoldcoffee.com
When my daughter was 2, we took her to the zoo at Copenhagen. We were already having a pretty terrible time staying in a rather dismal home swap in a depressing area. About an hour in to being at the zoo, she decided to lick the window of the penguin enclosure which looked like it was smeared with faeces and all the world’s dirt. Obviously I was beside myself, and guess what? The rest of our holiday was governed by pretty explosive diarrhoea outbreaks and a very poorly child.
Turning things around…
I have a disaster that actually ended up well, heading home from New York, i put my bag on the belt but noticed the zip was a bit down I bent down to zip it up at the same time the check in person was sticking on the looped label and by mistake hit me in the face quite hard ended up with a lovely black eye! She was so apologetic and we got upgraded to first class with lounge access!
I think we’ve covered it all bar calling new hampshire pest control! What about you? Have you had any family holiday disasters?
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