Finding a package holiday for family of 5?

don9999

Anyone got any tips on how to find a package holiday for a family of 5? 2 adults and 3 children aged 10,6 and 5?

It's a right royal pain using the tour operators' web sites! Whilst they allow you to enter
total number of people (5) and allow you to specify number of rooms required (1), they still produce a LOT of results. And only when you click through several more windows for a particular hotel, do you find that they are quoting for TWO rooms.

I appreciate that there are probably not many hotels that can accommodate 5 people, but is there any easy way of finding which ones DO?

I would prefer a Thomsons FamilyClub hotel, but second best would be the First Choice equivalent, and third choice would be any other hotel.

Am flexible on destination, so long as it is warm. Dates are over the typical Summer holiday period.

Please no advice on 'alternatives' such as camping, or caravan holiday parks etc.etc.. We've done the Eurocamp experience for the last two years, so this year we want to go back to a standard hotel-based package holiday.

Unfortunately all our favourite hotels that we have been to before eg. Bonaire in Cala Bona, Majorca can only accommodate 4 per 2-room apartment.

Advice would be appreciated.

Cheers,
Don

shop-to-drop

You are right I usually give up trying myself. Hope someone knows a solution.

richardw

Mark Warner or Club Med perhaps.

Do you want 5 in one hotel room?

sloppychops

What dates are you looking at?
Where can you fly from?
Is there anywhere you would prefer/not prefer to go to?
Whats your budget?

ethansmum

I have the same predicament, although my kids are 7, 5 and 2. We have never found a hotel that would let us book a single room. ON our latest holiday we have had to book 2 rooms knowing full well that one room won't be used and that we'll all be sharing the 2 double beds!

Incapuppy

Have you looked at any of the options recommended to you previously?

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=993159

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=1040581

don9999

Thanks for these early comments.

* Yes, all 5 in one 'appartment' - am assuming a 2-bed apartment.
* Dates are the school summer holidays, around July or August, otherwise I can be flexible on dates.
* I'm in South Wales, so would prefer Cardiff or Bristol, but am prepared to travel any reasonable distance, including Birmingham or London
* Have no real preferences for destination, so long as it is warm - though of course needs to be family friendly and not an 18-30 hotel!
* Budget? Not really sure. Have done Eurocamp/Keycamp the past few years for around £1,000 but anticipate a hotel package holiday would be anywhere between £2000 and £3500.


Ethansmum - don't give up. There ARE hotels that can accommodate 5 - I have seen them before. However the difficult thing is FINDING them.

(If you haven't done the Eurocamp/Keycamp thing, then maybe you'd like to try - a caravan can easily accommondate 5-8 people. I only recommend you travel as far South as you can, as otherwise the weather is not brilliant. Is relatively cheap too, as little as around £600-£800 for the family, not including the drive to the resort.)

We have done the 'buy 2 rooms' before - primarily when we have been to Eurodisney. Pay for two rooms, but only use one of them - 2 adults in one double bed, 3 kids in the other double bed, and then the other room is completely vacant.

Another option to consider, is going with a 3-person family. I've asked such friends if they want to come on holiday with us as a group of 8. We could then book two appartments, knowing full well that three of them in their family would occupy one appartment, whilst our family of 5 would occupy the other. Unfortunately, 'this' year no one can come with us :-(

Keep in touch, and let's see what's around for us 5-person families...

Cheers,
Don

don9999

Blimey, thanks Incapuppy. I forgot all about that thread last year.
You would have thought I'd have learned my lesson and booked early this year!

I didn't realise that thread went on for so long. Last year we ended up going to Chateaux Des Ormes in Normandy France.

In general, pretty good, as quite a lot of activities (though many requiring extra payments). However, weather not very good, and hence outside pool very cold.
I like it when you jump into the pool to cool off after a period of sun-bathing. That certainly wasn't the case last year!

'This' year we're going to go somewhere HOT!

Also at Des Ormes, there were no sunloungers near the outside pool - so you couldn't lie and sun-bath whilst watching the kids playing in the pool.

Anyway...I'll be reading right through that previous post, and see if anyone makes any decent progres this year. Though previous posts made significant references to caravan parks and Eurodisney etc. THIS time I want to be able to discuss ONLY hotel-based holidays :-)

Cheers,
Don

don9999

OK here's some info for starters....

I've just been through all the FamilyClub Thomson hotels.
I picked a specific date 18/08 and Gatwick airport.
All are self catering.
I'm sure availability and price would change for different dates and airports.......but I had to start somewhere.....

All I could find were...

Menorca - Talayot Appt - £2897 (one room)
Costa Dorada - Golden Aveida - £3278 (one room)
Ibizia - Hotel Presidente - £3211 (two rooms!)
Fuerteventura - Oasis Papagayo - £3140 (one room)

I suspect we could get some reductions by going through a broker, but probably still too expensive for me.
Will now need to start looking at the 'non-familyclub' hotels....

Don

sloppychops

29th July -12th August
Oasis Papagayo 2 bedroomed apartment then add on flights from Bristol Total £2555
http://www.thomson.co.uk/hotels.html

delwynshd

I have sent you a PM Don

Hope it helps

Thanks
Del