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The Holiday

Is it ever possible to go on holiday with your extended family and not break the bank or your familial relations in the process? Justine Cullen takes a deep breath and finds out.

As far as ideas go, it was probably one of my more dangerous: a holiday with my entire family, including my two sons (aged 5 and 4), my mother, my cool, 20-something sister, my brother, his wife and their two girls (aged 4 and 15 months). It had to be family-friendly, warm-weathered, stress-free, do-able on a budget, and able to be crammed into five days. Surely that wasn't too much to ask? Here's what I learned along the way...

Lesson 1 Location is everything
The kid wanted Disneyland(too far). My sister wanted Cabo (too fun). The rest of us just wanted sun to dry up those relentless preschool sniffles and a decent sun bed from whic to enjoy it. Being Australian, our first thought was Bali, but this was supposed to be a quality-time-with-the-kids trip, not a bolt-off-to-get-a-pair-of-boots-made-in-Seminyak one. (I don't trust myself.) Hawaii was too long a flight. We contemplated Far North Queenland, but I had this fantasy of falling out of bed into the ocean (preferably not from the balcony of a high-rise apartment), and Australian resorts don't really roll that way (well, not within a standard family budget). Which left us with Fiji.
  I've never really been convinced when it comes to Fiji, classifying it as not-as-glamorous-as-Tahiti, not-as-cheap-as-Bali. But the longer I considered that option, the more I realised that it's hard to sidcount Fiji when it comes to a holiday with kids. To start with, it's a destination that's close to home. A five-hour flight from Sydney was, by my calculations, two moviess, something to eat, (hopefully) a sleep... and you're there. Fijians are famously good with children; the place practically invented the concept of the Kids Club. And the best time to go, weather-wise, when it's not too hot and not too wet? Smack bank in the middle of our winter. It was meant to be.