When is a family holiday not a family holiday?

The answer for me on this one is very simple. A family holiday is no holiday when you are all crammed together in one room.

The Thompson family is fairly compact and bijou (in numbers if not in stature). This does not, however, mean that we want to sleep within a few feet of each other for a week. I do not want a tossy turny grunty four year old in my room!

This morning I have been trawling various holiday websites (ski and others) looking for ideas and holiday inspiration. What has stuck me is how difficult and/or expensive it is to find accommodation which isn’t based on a family sharing a single open plan room. We don’t do it at home, why on earth would we want to pay for the privilege of doing it somewhere else?

Ski Famille does offer some family rooms – I appreciate not everyone shares my views – but for the most part we have family suites with separate sleeping areas for children, or offer adjacent double and twin rooms. Our child prices apply no matter which route you go down. Occasionally a family of three (like my own) may have to pay an under occupancy charge, but generally we’ll waive it if it's not a busy week. We'll also count babies towards room occupancy.

From a position of enormous bias (!) this seems like a logical approach if you are truly focused on the needs of families. I now need everyone else to catch up in order to holiday anywhere other than our family chalets in Les Gets and Reberty. Fortunately both options seem to be amongst the best available at the moment....

Chris
skifamille.co.uk