Holidays abroad

I felt I was extremely lucky, my Dad was in business in Insurance and in 1974, we holidayed for two two weeks in California, returning only to pack up and then spend an entire year there, whilst he worked there. I was 14 when we went and 15 when we returned.

My DM first husband, my biological Dad, was in the Army, I was born in Singapore, moved to Malaysia when I was 1, Germany when I was 2, and the UK when I was 3. He died when I was 4 in 1963.

My Mum remarried in 1964 and my “new” DF adopted me.

We went to Belgium, Ostend on the steam train and boat when I was about ten in the fifties. We were so excited but the hotel was very run down and food not good, they, like us were still suffering after the war. All I can remember are swan cream cakes and dad drinking beer out of a stein. We went to the thermal baths which were hot, steamy and sulphurous. Mum was sick on the cross channel crossing!

My childhood was a bit different as my father was in the army. For the first 8 years we lived in the UK and went on holiday to Broadstairs or Girvan, depending on where we were posted. Then we were sent to Hong Kong - and there was nowhere to go for holidays, so we did not have any.

We were then posted to Singapore and we went on holiday in Malaya. We visited the historic town of Malacca, first established in the 16th century by the Portuguese. It had many old buildings, all built in the Portuguese style.

Back in England, we went to Cornwall. Back in Malaya again we went up the hill stations and to visit Penang. Finally my father was posted to Belgium and then Germany. He bought a caravan and we went all over the Europe, Paris, Copenhagen, Germany all over Holland and also Italy.

Then I hit 21, so was no longer a child, and in the same year my father retired from the army

I was born towards the end of WW2, so all these holidays were mainly in the 1940s and 50s, although the caravaning dates to the early 1960s.

Cath9, I’m going to turn this round a bit and ask you the same questions. Did you go abroad before the 1970’s and if so, where and what was your experience?

Oh, we used to go to West Wittering too just after WW2 when it was very quiet and totally uncommercialised. Fortunately we owned a car and it was the nearest beach to us . We would go several times a year for day trips and it was lovely. My first residential holiday was at Butlins where I caught measles so that was not repeated!
MT60. We only stayed in Australia for two years. I was under school age so I don’t remember much about it but apparently life there did not live up to expectations according to my parents.

We had only one trip abroad, in 1974, back to 'the old country'.

It was a huge deal for us. My parents had immigrated in '56, so it was their first trip back, and for us kids, the first time meeting relatives. From Canada to a week in Jersey where Mum was from, then ferry to St Malo, a few days in Brittany where Dad was born, then off to Paris to finish the trip and fly home. My youngest sister had purchased a whirly-gig in Jersey, dragged it all through France, then left it on the plane on the way home! She was only 6 at the time and was devastated.

I have many good memories of the trip, but Dad's health was starting to fail and it was good that we went when we did.

My first holiday abroad was Greece when I was about 14 , so it was 1973 . My father went to Greece a lot on business , so we flew out there for a weeks holiday before his business trip .
Before that our holidays were in Cornwall, Bournemouth and West Wittering where we had family . I have a black and white photo of myself and my siblings standing on the stones at Stonehenge, en route to Cornwall .

Blackpool on the train. Us kids loved it back in the day.
Then camping south of france in the late 70s. Found it roasting hot & boring compared to Blackpool 🤣

Flew to Ibiza with my parents the week after I left primary school in 1968.

I remember the hotel pool, beach and horse riding in the hills.

We used to go to Worthing for our week's (later fortnight's) holiday. We went to Felixstowe once because my mother liked it, but I hated it. When we went back the following year I went down with pneumonia and ruined the whole holiday, so that was Felixstowe finished. My friend and I had a great package holiday in Ibiza in 1968, but it was many years before I coul afford another foreign holiday.

Greenfinch

In 1965 my father won some money on the football pools and could afford to take us to Majorca. It was lovely and our first actual holiday abroad though we had been to Australia in the forties as £10 Poms. That was obviously not a holiday though.Far from it!

Did you stay?

I first went abroad aged 30, my then husband’s father and stepmother had a one-bed apartment in Spain.

As a child we camped or hired a caravan at Hayling Island, Weymouth or Paignton. My mother didn’t go abroad until after my father died, in her mid-60s. She was encouraged to visit the local day centre and they did coach trips to Europe. In her 70s my sister took her on lots of holidays, to Europe and the USA.

I went by plane to Jersey with my parents in 1959, we flew in a Dakota. We stayed at the Hotel de France in Jersey and my maternal Uncle and Aunt also went. We hired an open top car and the weather was fantastic. I have no idea how my parents afforded it but it was incredibly exciting and I remember so much about the holiday. The hotel had a nightly cabaret, my sister and I were put to bed but if we got out of our bedroom window onto the fire escape we could watch it, so we did. It is one of the happiest memories I have from my childhood, the rest was pretty downhill but I thought my mother seemed happy and content on this holiday, which was not the norm! She bought a diamante brooch in the shape of a swan and hid it in a Terry's chocolate orange which I brought back home with me on strict instructions not to open and my sister and I scoffed it in the taxi on the way home from the airport.

Yes we went to the Costa del Sol for two weeks when I was 10, so late 60s.
Mum took us for swimming lessons before we went so we could go in the sea. We went snorkeling and it was magical 🐟🐠
I loved the Spanish food in the hotel. Mum told us not to eat the salad as it had oil on and would upset our stomachs. I ate it anyway and enjoyed it.

Mum and Dad went out to a barbecue party one evening and left us in the hotel room: me, younger brother (8) and younger sister (5).
When they showed us some photos of the evening there were other children at the party. It had never occurred to them to take us and they thought nothing about leaving us alone in the hotel.

We'd had a week off school, plus the half-term holiday.
I remember going back to school and realising I'd missed a whole project about sugar. I felt very out of step for some time.

Our other holidays were all in a touring caravan to Wales or Cornwall, to the sort of site with 5 caravans in a field, and dig a hole to empty the chemical toilet.

A caravan or tent in Cornwall was our yearly holiday- every holiday for years.
I can remember being so, so excited when my dad went and got whatever caravan they'd hired and parked it outside.

I went tojersey when I was 4 in 69.... Malta when I was 9 in 75 ....my aunty and uncle were living there for 3 years for my uncles civil service job....we got the ferry to France when I was 15 .....thats the only ones I went on

My parents were travellers before I was born. They met in S Africa and married in Rome, so I guess I was destined to go abroad a lot.
The first holiday I remember was to Switzerland, 1969, then to Austria the following year, and so on. I was then being sent off on my own to France for school in 1973 ish.

We never holidayed abroad but then neither did any of my friends so we didn’t feel we were missing out.

At grammar school one friend went on a Mediterranean school cruise because both her parents were teachers so far more well off than the rest of us. She didn’t enjoy it as she was the only one from our school, she missed her parents and burst into tears when they collected her on her return.

BlueBelle

We only had one holiday as a child when I was 4 years old and we stayed in a caravan at Hunstanton and I had food poisoning and probably ruined the one and only holiday we could ever afford 🙄

Not a good memory for you.
I hope you made up for it as you got older and had some lovely holidays.

In 1965 my father won some money on the football pools and could afford to take us to Majorca. It was lovely and our first actual holiday abroad though we had been to Australia in the forties as £10 Poms. That was obviously not a holiday though.Far from it!

I went with my parents and brother to Majorca in 1970, I was 7.

We stayed at a little hotel called La Cartuja, we could see the more luxurious and expensive Beverley Playa from the beach, this incensed my narcissistic mother as she felt she deserved to be there!

I can remember having a T-Shirt from C&A that my mother deemed common but I loved it, I also recollect a children’s disco and a nasty dog chained up somewhere near the hotel.

Rabbit was on the menu and we were told not to order it!
The food was all slop.

I have no memory of my brother on the holiday.

The whole point of the holiday would be to give my mother a tan and to brag at the Catholic Ladies Luncheon club.

I think we were left to our own devices around the hotel.

I do remember a thunderstorm and my parents having an almighty row, my father threatened to leave but he never did.
My mother then had a migraine which was the pattern!

We never went abroad when we were children. Our summer holiday was staying with relatives for two weeks each year. First Essex, then Sussex when they moved. Happy times.

I never went abroad until the mid 80s - France for a day on the hovercraft.

We only had one holiday as a child when I was 4 years old and we stayed in a caravan at Hunstanton and I had food poisoning and probably ruined the one and only holiday we could ever afford 🙄