Choosing the right Holiday (with a toddler)

Me and Blake decided to book a last minute holiday and for those of you that asked, we chose to stay at Riu Papaya in Gran Canaria (playa del Inglés). I looked at so many different hotels, my anxiety was sky high and I wasn’t sure if I was making the right decision, which is why I wanted to put together a blog post of what I chose to look for in a family holiday, in the hope it might help someone else.

First on our ‘must have’ list is choosing a hotel with something within walking distance. Because we had to take liberty for a stroll every day anyway for her afternoon nap it was lovely to be able to head out and have a look around some shops/ supermarkets there’s nothing worse than deciding on a hotel, getting there and realising there is nothing surrounding you. Although I’m not a massive fan of sand, it was also nice to have a walk to the beach (for one of the days), there was also a shuttle bus you could take from the hotel that took you there for free, which is great if you just can’t be bothered to walk (despite it only being 15 minutes away).

A massive priority for us was going all inclusive so I didn’t have the worry of Liberty going hungry or thirsty and we opted for 24 hour all inclusive so there was always something to grab as Liberty loves to snack. I would definitely recommend going all inclusive it’s definitely the easiest option.

We also decided we didn’t want somewhere with a long flight, Gran Canaria was slightly further than we wanted (4 hours) but with it being from our local airport (Norwich) I didn’t mind so much because we didn’t have the worry of a long journey to the airport. Flying with a toddler was so much better than I expected as long as you keep them occupied you will be absolutely fine (I will do another blog post about what I would recommend bringing).

We also wanted a hotel that had entertainment in the evening for both children and adults. RIU Hotels are known to have brilliant entertainment so I knew we weren’t going to have any worry there. Liberty actually preferred the shows for the adults more than she did the children’s entertainment (mainly because she was scared of the giant turtle ((not a real one of course)) that came out to dance every night). But she did love the children’s entertainment during the day which included painting, colouring, building blocks and much more. Our hotel also had a park which Liberty loved too.

Ive always loved staying in a big resort but this time me and Blake chose a slightly smaller hotel and I don’t regret that at all, it still had 2 bars and 3 restaurants so still plenty to choose from but it was nice to be only a short walk from our hotel room if we forgot anything (which was basically every time we left the room).

So to narrow it down a bit:

Choose a hotel with a good location
Go all inclusive
If it’s your first holiday try sticking to a shorter flight if you feel anxious
Check the entertainment programme – is there enough going on to entertain your toddler?
Resort size doesn’t matter