Need holiday help!

mushtafa

mushtafa

mushtafa

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West Sussex, UK
2 adults and a 14 year old, May half term (give or take a few days) 2023

This will be our first proper holiday so want an all inclusive so not have to worry about anything! It seems I've spent hours on holiday sites, but still not sure what to pick.

We'd prefer a short flight time, somewhere with some luxury (not expecting too much with our budget) and plenty of activities and entertainment. - Sitting by the pool relaxing sounds good, but I know I'll be board after a few hours!

Can anyone help make the decision easier? Thinking Greece or Spain - think Turkey flight times are closer to 4hrs? Somewhere with a water park or near a theme park perhaps?

Budget of around £2000 all in
 
Good luck.
We last did all inclusive a few years ago, 2 adults and a teenager, we'd done some the previous years also. Cost was usually 3.5k plus. In school holiday times anything less and your going to be in with the chav families and not having fun... unless you're one of them :D

I didn't want to pay that amount but just came to the conclusion I had to suck it up and pay for a holiday I would enjoy.

The best one we did was Cyprus with Thomas Cook. The entertainment team (Thomas Cook) was excellent, so were the facilities and hotel, and Splash World down the road was lots of fun.. it was 40C though! Toastie :cool:
 
£2K for an all inclusive week during half term .... Are you seeing those kind of prices anywhere ????? I'd be thinking twice that as a baseline given what I had to fork out this year for May half term (family of 4).

Greece, Cyprus, Turkey, Canaries will be ~4 hours fight time. Spain, Balearics will be ~2 hours.

Thomas Cook went bust. You're generally looking at Jet2 or Tui now for full package, otherwise you're sorting flights and hotels separately which becomes a compare nightmare if something goes wrong. I rate Jet2 better than Tui based on the experience we had this year - we got our holiday, unlike a lot of people who'd booked with Tui.
 
peterwalkley said:
£2K for an all inclusive week during half term .... Are you seeing those kind of prices anywhere ????? I'd be thinking twice that as a baseline given what I had to fork out this year for May half term (family of 4).

Greece, Cyprus, Turkey, Canaries will be ~4 hours fight time. Spain, Balearics will be ~2 hours.

Thomas Cook went bust. You're generally looking at Jet2 or Tui now for full package, otherwise you're sorting flights and hotels separately which becomes a compare nightmare if something goes wrong. I rate Jet2 better than Tui based on the experience we had this year - we got our holiday, unlike a lot of people who'd booked with Tui.
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Thomas cook are back but are like on the beach.

Use jet2 holidays imo. Coupons about taking £60 off and they are usually the cheapest.
 
Jet2, Tenerife, Siam Park.

We're just heading back home tomorrow, cost was £1700 for 10 nights half board, 2 adults 1 child. We prefer to eat out a few nights as there's heaps of restaurants and hotel food can be hit or miss, hence the half board as you can choose between dinner or lunch each day. I also avoid all inclusive because the snacks are basically a pile of chips and hot dogs & burgers, plus the cheapest of beer (we won't drink through the day anyway). Hotel entertainment is dire and when all inclusive you end up feeling you should sit through it for the "free" drink.

Each to their own, but I'd only be all inclusive if it was top notch digs and food, and for £2k it won't be. Plus... Get out and explore the place!
 
I'm seeing a fair amount in the £600-700pp bracket, that's browsing Easyjet, First Choice, TUI.

If we went for half board instead, what should we budget for per day for drinks/ice cream/meal etc? I'm wondering if they'd be much cost saving
 
Dirk Diggler said:
Jet2, Tenerife, Siam Park.

We're just heading back home tomorrow, cost was £1700 for 10 nights half board, 2 adults 1 child. We prefer to eat out a few nights as there's heaps of restaurants and hotel food can be hit or miss, hence the half board as you can choose between dinner or lunch each day. I also avoid all inclusive because the snacks are basically a pile of chips and hot dogs & burgers, plus the cheapest of beer (we won't drink through the day anyway). Hotel entertainment is dire and when all inclusive you end up feeling you should sit through it for the "free" drink.

Each to their own, but I'd only be all inclusive if it was top notch digs and food, and for £2k it won't be. Plus... Get out and explore the place!
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Which hotel did you choose? I see they show a few in the same area.
 
Dirk Diggler said:
Jet2, Tenerife, Siam Park.

We're just heading back home tomorrow, cost was £1700 for 10 nights half board, 2 adults 1 child. We prefer to eat out a few nights as there's heaps of restaurants and hotel food can be hit or miss, hence the half board as you can choose between dinner or lunch each day. I also avoid all inclusive because the snacks are basically a pile of chips and hot dogs & burgers, plus the cheapest of beer (we won't drink through the day anyway). Hotel entertainment is dire and when all inclusive you end up feeling you should sit through it for the "free" drink.

Each to their own, but I'd only be all inclusive if it was top notch digs and food, and for £2k it won't be. Plus... Get out and explore the place!
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This :D
 
mushtafa said:
I'm seeing a fair amount in the £600-700pp bracket, that's browsing Easyjet, First Choice, TUI.

If we went for half board instead, what should we budget for per day for drinks/ice cream/meal etc? I'm wondering if they'd be much cost saving
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We stayed in Costa Adeje, Hotel Fanjabe.

If you're lying by the pool then you can buy a can of ice cold Heineken at the hotel shop for 1.50, with ice pops and soft drinks all around 2.00.

There's lots of restaurants around and if it's dinner or lunch for 3 then you'd be between 40 & 50 euros when you add a couple of drinks with the meal. Being half board, then you'd only need to plan for 1 meal per day.

Siam Park is on the doorstep, a free bus or (our preference) a taxi for under 10 euros. It's one of the best water parks there is, and I'm saying that having been to Florida's finest. :)

There's actually loads of options for excursions and beach activity but we don't get involved in any of that, so maybe someone else could chime in with some tips there.
 
Turkey is 20 Lire to the british pound right now. Very favourable to the Gbp.
I went to Turkey 4 years ago. If my memory is right the exchange rate was roughly 8Tlr to 1Gbp back then. (Could be wrong, I'm an old fart)
A gorgeous meal for two, with drinks, was the equivalent of around £17. Better value now, I'd imagine.
 
Here's me with my fam of 4 (kids nursery ages) now dreading holiday costs for the next forever. Reckon it'll be a pull em out of school thing lol
 
out midgets are a fair bit younger than yous but I'd certainly recommend both menorca and majorca there's been plenty to do for them :)

as for all inclusive, unless you get some super duper discount I'd really consider half board, breakfast and one of ya meals sorted (a lot of the hotels let you choose which) then you can go out for a meal as well.

We've been to Turkey a few times, went on a. all inclusive that cost use I think about 3.5k and that was really good. went on a cheaper one... junk you deffo get what you pay for.

tui
holiday hypermarket
icelolly

Are the places we normally look, feom where we've been and stayed I think Spain is better for. kids.

what's your may dates?
 
www.holidayhypermarket.co.uk

Globales Los Delfines in Cala n Blanes - HolidayHypermarket

A holiday at the Los Delfines serves up a laidback mix of pool time and family-friendly activities. <br /><br /> A figure-of-eight-shaped pool takes centre stage in the grounds of these family-friendly apartments and hotel. The closest beach is in the centre of Cala'n Forcat – it takes 15...
www.holidayhypermarket.co.uk www.holidayhypermarket.co.uk

sub 1.5k, half board, nice area, waterpark at the hotel.
Globales Los Delfines
Cala n Blanes, Menorca, Balearic Islands, Spain

We've stayed around here before, some nice places to eat and drink across most budgets, frankies is fantastic value for money. es replec for a more adult night out do amazing steak. los Delfines is pretty decent too for what I'd say is a proper witty down meal haha.


There's loads available at mallorca too around the 1.5k ish mark leaving plenty spendy money we'll if I've got ya dates right

my favourite is the cala bona/cala millor/sa coma area, Some great beaches restaurants n pubs for drinks as well as some really good walks that are all pretty level.


jump on holiday hypermarket with the right dates, hit half board and all inclusive and see what tickles your fancy.

Do bear in mind some all inclusive places are limiting drinks to like 3 with ya main meal and similar. We also do self catering quite often but think half board is tipping our favour now.

We've ruled out Turkey and Tunisia for now but these are the places you'd really want all inclusive as when we went there really wasn't anything worthwhile within walking distance of the hotel.


I'm also gonna throw into the ring my favourite place to travel to..

Gozo, a little island off malta, so laid back, great people, walks, bike rides, shooting, swimming/diving (meant to be some of the best diving spots in the world). There's also some great historic sites and world heritage stuff to visit as well as some fantastic beaches. and the food Is always great.

We used to go twice a year and got married there, unfortunatley there's no flights from newcastle any longer :( so takes a little more effort to get there haha.

We normally went with family and got like a villa or farmhouse but there's still plenty of hotels and the likes available, the grand Hotel at mgarr has had some great discounts in the past.

let us know where you end up going :)
 
goldy6660 said:
Here's me with my fam of 4 (kids nursery ages) now dreading holiday costs for the next forever. Reckon it'll be a pull em out of school thing lol
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free kids places.... sometimes haha but they typically limit it to 1 per booking.

last holiday we took my mam and dad, booked as a seperate booking but with one of the kids with them for the free child space. Worked out only a little bit more to take them than paying for one of the midgets.
 
May half term is Monday 29th. Having a browse about suggests it's around £300-£600 cheaper to go the week before. School fine is £150 I think, so cheaper to pull her out of school for a week.

My Mrs isn't keen on Turkey due to terrorists!

So spain or Greece is her preference so far
 
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