London: How to spend a penny without spending a penny!

One of my pet hates when travelling in any city is paying to use the toilet. I know - it's very petty. But going to the toilet is a necessity rather than a luxury. I resent having to pay for taking care of a basic need. And principles aside, I don't always have the money - or at least the change - to pay to use a toilet. And just think what that 50p could buy! (Okay, not much, but I'm thinking chocolate...)

It seems to be becoming more widespread now, but the first time I encountered having to pay for the toilet was in London, back when it only cost 20p. I was 16, I was at Victoria Station, I was desperate and I didn't have any change. My friend had change but I refused to take it on principle and tried to duck under the barrier. Needless to say, I got caught, pleaded lack of money and had to take my friend's 20p after all.

I don't duck under barriers these days - I don't think my back would let me. But I do try to avoid paying wherever possible, and am making it my mission to find as many free public toilets as I can. It goes without saying that using toilets in restaurants, pubs and cafes is one option, but that isn't always practical or convenient (nor fair if you're not actually a customer). But there are other options, and here are the ones I've found in London. I'm sure some of you have found other examples, and I'd love to hear about them. I'm hoping to keep updating this post, so if you know of any free public toilets in London that I've not mentioned, please comment at the bottom or let me know on Twitter @holidayobsessi1 (that's a 'one' and not an 'L' at the end!) and I'll add them to the list!

St Pancras International
These are my favourite. There may be others elsewhere in the station but there are free toilets behind the escalators going to the Southeastern trains (platforms 10-13 I think). Look for the Starbucks, Yo Sushi and M&S. I can't speak for the mens', but there are around 10 cubicles, all of which generally lock and have toilet paper. There is usually a toilet attendant about so they are pretty clean. Best of all, you feel smug, because you have to pay for the toilets in Kings Cross just across the road.

North Greenwich tube station
Sticking with stations, this is another option I use fairly regularly. On the Jubilee line, a few stops away from London Bridge, it's not somewhere you'd go from central London, but it's still handy if you're heading to the O2, the Emirates or the Thames Clippers. We often park here if driving into London, as it's reasonably cheap (especially on Sundays), so we always take the opportunity to use the toilets before heading into the city. There are plenty of cubicles, usually with locks and paper (though not quite as clean as St Pancras), and you don't often have to queue for long.

Museums and art galleries
Obviously, you'd expect to have free use of toilets at any paying attraction you visit, but the beauty of museums in London is that they're free - and they still have toilets! I won't use this blog to write an exhaustive list of free museums in London but just a few I've been to include: the Natural History Museum, the Science Museum, the V&A, Tate Modern, Tate Britain, the Museum of London, the National Gallery and the National Portrait Gallery. There are museums spread across all of London, so they can prove a convenient option when you need the toilet. Extra benefits include the fact that they're usually very clean and pleasant (for toilets) with no queues, and you get to look at some interesting stuff while you're in the building!

Little Venice
I discovered these recently. For those who don't know, Little Venice is an area five minutes from Warwick Avenue and Maida Vale tube stations, where the Grand Union Canal and Regents Canal meet. It's picturesque, with little gardens, lots of water (obviously) and copious amounts of pretty canal boats/barges. You can take a trip on a narrowboat from Little Venice to London Zoo or Camden Lock. There are some free toilets here in the little gardens - only a couple of cubicles, and not the nicest of toilets but hey, they're free. I visited during a festival when the area was packed, so the queue was pretty awful, but I'd guess it isn't too bad the rest of the time.

Hyde Park
I spotted these while wandering through Hyde Park last week - they're south of the the Serpentine, just by the lido. I didn't use these myself, so can't make any further comment. It is vaguely possible that there was a pay point hidden inside, but they certainly looked like they were free. Maybe one of my readers can confirm!

Well, that's it - a pretty short list currently. I'm not sure if this is representative of how few public toilets there are in London or just because I haven't found many yet. So if you know of any free conveniences in London, let me know and I'll add them to the list!

Swapsies!

A couple of years ago, I wrote about one of the real reasons behind my holiday obsession (What's really important). Much as I love sun, exploring, doing new things and seeing new places, a major reason for my love of holidays was the quality time I got to spend with my family. Up until a couple of years ago, my husband had been a teacher (as was I, pre-kids). Anyone who has been or known a teacher will understand that the 'long holidays' thing is a bit of a myth. My husband spent evenings and weekends working. He spent much of the 'holiday' time working. And when he wasn't working, he was thinking about work. It was only when we went away on holiday and he physically couldn't work that he would actually start to relax. He would spend the first day or so visibly uncomfortable, clearly thinking about the things he should/could have been doing, and feeling frustrated that he couldn't do any of them. But after that, once it was clear that he couldn't do anything about it, he would relax and start to enjoy the holiday, and we would actually get quality time together without the spectre of work hanging over us. Since he gave up teaching, things have been so much better. We get evenings and weekends together. And much as I still love my holidays, they have become less 'necessary' in terms of ensuring family time.

My last blog was all about going on too many holidays (Too many holidays? Okay, I concede). At least, that's what it looks like at first glance. Dig a bit deeper, and you'll realise I'm moaning about two things: too many short holidays and too much work. And it's just started to dawn on me that in many ways I've swapped places with my husband.

First things first, let's make it clear: I haven't actually got too much work. I only work part-time, and this year was the first time in years I've earned enough to pay tax, so I'm clearly not working 'too much'. However, because I 'only' work part-time, I'm also responsible for the children and for the house, and this means that only a little bit of work can feel like a lot when it's on top of everything else. You see, as well as the obvious jobs, like the washing, cooking, cleaning, school run and cooking, there are all those niggly little things that also need doing - things like paying bills; making sure birthday cards and presents are bought, written, wrapped and sent; filling in school forms; making sure homework is done; and a whole host of other things that don't sound like much but actually take up a lot of time. I could spend an hour a day doing things that don't 'show' and don't feel productive but without which things would start to quietly fall apart. For example, in the last couple of days, I've filled in a whole bunch of forms for Cubs and Scouts; logged onto online banking to pay a credit card bill; organised a costume for my son's French day at school; remembered to feed my son's triops (look it up!); and ordered and collected a prescription for the cat's flea and worm medication, among other things, and top of work and the usual chores. Ask most working parents and they'll tell you that it's staying on top of these 'little' things that often pushes them over the edge.

The other reason why work can often feel too much is due to the nature of being self-employed - I work as a freelance copy-editor and proofreader. And while there are many advantages to working from home and being in charge of your own time, there are disadvantages too. Work is like buses - you can go some time without much or any work and then all of a sudden loads comes at once. And the trouble is, because you've spent time without work - or you know you might do again in the future - you don't feel like you can turn work down when you get it, and so you agree to everything. The trouble is, if you turn down a job, you're not necessarily losing just that job - the client will have to go elsewhere, and there's a risk they may return to that 'elsewhere' for their next job too, so you may be turning down future work as well. And because you don't get paid sick pay or holidays, you feel extra pressure to take on work when you get it. As you can imagine, holidays can be a particular issue, as no one covers for you while you're away - I often end up working all hours before I go away and as soon as I come back so that I don't have to turn anything down. The end result is that although sometimes I have very little work, and can comfortably fit in a little 'me time' as well as housework and childcare, other times I end up taking on more that I can comfortably manage, and have to work evenings and weekends just to get it completed. And when I'm not working, I'm thinking about work and all the things I should be doing. Yup, I sound just like my husband.

So why did my last blog post complain about having too many holidays? At the beginning of this post, I said that holidays were the only time when my husband managed to relax, so why isn't it the same for me? The key is in the word 'short'. At the beginning of this post, I also mentioned that my husband would spend the first day or two worrying about not being able to work, and it would take him a couple of days before he could relax. And because the majority of my 'holidays' this year have been short breaks, I've not really had the time to chill out and forget about work. I have spent the first couple of days or so worrying about the work I should be doing and then, just as I should be able to start relaxing, I have had to come home again. Add the extra work needed to accommodate the holiday in the first place, not to mention the usual holiday organisation, and the holidays have actually ended up adding to the stress rather than relieving it. We end up with a vicious circle where I'm working all hours and in desperate need of a holiday, and then said holiday results in me working all hours to make up (and pay) for it. And as my husband takes the kids out at the weekend so that I can get some work done, and as I say no to watching a film together or going out for lunch because I can't spare the time, I realise: I have become my husband.

For once, there's no real conclusion to this post. I still stand by everything I said at the end of my last post. I need to practise saying 'no' more - no to more work than I can comfortably manage, no to badly timed days/nights out or short breaks, and no to those little mundane things that shouldn't stress you out but somehow impact so much on your time. I need to switch off from work when I'm not actually working, making use of my auto-reply, not checking my emails and making a concerted effort not to think about work during my spare time. I need to schedule in time to enjoy the simple things like reading, exercising, getting out in nature - even just watching Netflix with my husband and sharing a tub of Ben & Jerry's. I had already realised the importance of these things, but it's only since noticing the parallels between my behaviour and my husband's that I have realised just how important it is to achieve that work-life balance. I don't want to spend my life living for my two-week summer holiday or my week in October - that's just wishing life away. I want to live the rest of it, to enjoy my evenings and weekends and my short breaks - hell, to enjoy my work (which I actually kinda do, when I'm not feeling pressured). I don't know a magic answer, but I'm working on achieving this. It's hard to change your habits or your mindset, but I'm well aware of the trap I'm falling into, and I'm determined to drag myself out of it rather than fall in deeper. Things are slowly changing for the better. Despite being super-busy with work the week before, I made sure I didn't think about work when I was away for my sister's wedding recently. I refused to check my email and we made time to catch up with friends, go for a walk and have fun with the kids. I can't say I was physically relaxed when we got home (I was shattered!) but I certainly felt better mentally. Work was very busy in the week after I got back, due to an unavoidable deadline, but I made sure I took time off at the weekend (even though it was tempting not to) to enjoy the sun and spend time with my family. This week, work has calmed down. Instead of using the spare time to do all those other jobs I keep putting off, I have fitted in some exercise, activities with the kids and some good old time in front of the TV. Tomorrow I'm catching up with some friends for brunch, and I won't feel guilty about it. I have spent enough of my spare time working recently that I shouldn't feel guilty about enjoying the spare time I have this week. I confess I still really can't wait until my two weeks in France in August, when it will be impossible to do any work and I really will be able to relax and forget about it. But until then, I am going to enjoy the other things in life: the bigger things, like the two other weddings I have coming up, the night away to celebrate my mum's birthday and the concert in London with my husband, but also the 'smaller' things, like just spending time with those people who matter to me. At the risk of sounding like a cliche, life really is short and we shouldn't waste it worrying about work. Much as I generally enjoy my job, I work to live rather than the other way round - and if that's you too, make sure you get out and live that life you're working so hard to have!

Taking the time to appreciate the beauty of Corbridge on my recent trip to Northumberland

Too many holidays? Okay, I concede

I'm just coming to the end of what has probably been the busiest spring of my life. Over a period of 12 weeks, I will only have been at home for four full weekends. This might not seem like a big deal to 'proper' travellers, but when you have two school-aged children and you are trying to keep on top of a job, the housework and other commitments in the meantime, it becomes pretty difficult. The sad thing is that I have discovered there really is such a thing as too many holidays. All but one of these weekends away have been for 'leisure' rather than 'business', yet I've found I haven't been able to enjoy them as much as I should because I am too busy thinking about all the other things I need to be doing and haven't had a chance to just sit back and breathe.

It started with a short break near Chichester with friends (see How to holiday for free). It was lovely - we walked, we ate lots and we generally chilled out. Even better, we didn't have to worry about money. At this point, I was still relaxed. Even so, there was lots to sort out to enable us to go away in the first place. Because we went without the children, we had to sort out who was looking after them while we were away. Who would pick them up from school on Friday and take them on Monday? Would they do their homework? Did they need to take anything in on Monday? Who would make their packed lunches? Was their uniform clean and ironed? Being self-employed also makes things more difficult in many ways. I can't walk out of the door and come back from my holiday just to pick up where I left off. There's no one to cover me in my absence. I don't get paid for my holidays, so I have to work stupid hours before I go and when I come back to make up for the time I'm away. I have to justify to clients why I'm not replying or why I can't meet a perfectly reasonable deadline because I'm simply not there. All of this meant that going away and coming back were just slightly more stressful than they should have been.

The next two weekends were at home. They weren't exactly relaxing, though - we had various activities planned, including a bridesmaid dress fitting and a day out at Dover Castle, plus I was working a lot at the weekends as well as during the week, having agreed to more work than I probably should have done (another downside of self-employment - you can't often afford to turn down work!). Still, the exhaustion wasn't kicking in quite yet.

The following two weekends were either end of our family holiday to the Isle of Wight. We had a great - if busy and rather cold - time. BUT it was the first holiday where I hadn't really been able to relax and forget about the rest of life. Niggling in the back of my head was all the work and other stuff I had to do when I came back. I'd also been working pretty solidly right up until we went away. In fact, the day before we left, I'd had to stop work mid-afternoon to go to London for a concert. I got home at 1.00am, set the alarm for 6.30am and got up early to finish some work and meet a deadline before we left to catch the ferry. Okay, maybe the exhaustion was starting to kick in at this point. I was also well aware of what I was coming back to. Having told a client I'd be back working on the Sunday to pick up anything I'd not done during the last week, I realised it was my son's birthday party that day. Add to that unpacking, washing and shopping, after getting back late the night before, and it didn't leave a lot of time for work. Worse (well, not worse - it was lovely, just not in terms of timing), it was my mum's 70th birthday the following day - a family day out followed by an evening meal - which meant working stupid hours on the Sunday (around party, unpacking, etc.) to try to get on top of everything. I knew all this was coming while we were on holiday. I also knew it would still be the Easter holidays when we got back, so I would have the kids at home while I was trying to work, and I knew that I would be going away again the following weekend. I tried really hard to relax and forget everything while we were away, but I just couldn't stop worrying about how much I had to do when I got back and how I was going to fit everything in. I was also starting to realise just how few weekends I would have to recharge over the next couple of months.

The following weekend, I went to Champneys. Yes, I know, how awful - a spa break. Any ounce of sympathy you may have had has swiftly evaporated. I think this kind of made things worse - I was off for a lovely, relaxing pamper weekend and I didn't feel like I had any right to be stressed about it. Of course, I was working right up until we went went, including all day Saturday (we went on a Sunday) and I was pretty tired. I also had to get everything ready for the kids on Monday as I wouldn't be there for the school run. Still, I got up to date (as far as I could) with work, had a lovely long chat with my friend on the way and resolved to try to chill out and forget everything. I did a pretty good job. We swam, we ate, we exercised (yes, really), we had massages and we spent a lot of time doing very little. It was bliss. Even if my brain didn't quite switch off, my body certainly needed the downtime. And actually, by the time we left, I was feeling fairly chilled mentally. Maybe the timing was better than I thought. Then I got home on the Monday night to find I had a whole pile of new work and everything had gone tits-up with an event I was supposed to be organising the following weekend (another reason behind my stress over the previous few weeks). I felt like all the good of the spa had been undone in one fell swoop.

The following weekend should have been the afore-mentioned event, but it was cancelled in the end. On the one hand, this took away a lot of my stress; on the other hand, cancelling brought a whole host of other things to do. Regardless, it was lovely to have a weekend sleeping in my own bed - I can't really say 'at home', because I was at the hairdresser's, a fun run (for the kids, not me!) and a St George's Day parade (kids again) - plus working, of course. But at least I had a reasonable chance of getting some sleep.

The same couldn't be said of the weekend afterwards, which was my sister's hen do. It was a weekend of fun in Nottingham - fancy dress, quiz, soft play, laser quest and crazy golf. Basically, it was a chance to pretend to be a child for the weekend, and it was great. I had by now got used to not being home for the weekend. I duly did as much work as I could beforehand, left Lee a shopping list and made sure everything was ready and organised for Monday, as I'd be back late on the Sunday. Fully prepared, I resolved to forget about work and take some me-time on the train. The latter wasn't quite as successful as it could have been, as I didn't go more than an hour without having to change trains. Still, I was having so much fun (at the hen do and not on the train) that I did manage to put everything else to the back of my mind. Unfortunately, I didn't manage to sleep very much (if at all - hard to say!) on the Saturday night. I also left home early on the Saturday and got home late on the Sunday. And despite the fact that I spent a lot of time sitting down (on the train this time), I always find travelling really tiring. The end result was feeling absolutely shattered by the time I got home.

The following weekend, we had tickets for a show in London with the kids, so we'd booked a hotel to make a weekend of it. I can't say it was entirely relaxing, as it was with the kids - cue constant sniping at each other and whinging about being hungry/thirsty/tired/hot. (On the plus side, we didn't have to sort out childcare.) Still, I was finally managing to concentrate on the 'here and now' and enjoy myself, rather than worrying about all the things I should have been doing. Work was at a manageable level and I'd had a little time off the week before to begin to recharge. The weather was glorious (hottest early May bank holiday on record!), which really raised my spirits. And we didn't have too many expectations of what we were going to do, which allowed us to wander at our own pace without rushing to fit everything in. Although part of me would probably have liked to stay at home, the rest of me really enjoyed being away without too many constraints on my time. Plus it also helped that I knew I was going to spend the following weekend at home.

Yup, the next weekend (last weekend, in fact) was spent at home. It was great. Other than a trip to the theatre on the Sunday night, we had nothing planned. We caught up with chores, did some shopping, visited family and watched a lot of TV. I lay in both days. I didn't do any work. It was a much-needed weekend of normality, and never have I been so grateful not to be on holiday.

This weekend I will be back in London, and this time it's not for a holiday. I'll spend Friday night in a hotel and then all of Saturday will be spent training, before getting home on Saturday night. Sunday through to Thursday will be spent on heaps of post-training work on top of my usual work. I will be putting in extra hours to get as much done as humanly possible, because on Friday I will be going away again. This time it's my sister's wedding in Newcastle. The wedding is just one day, of course, but as it's at the other end of the country we'll be spending all day Friday travelling there. And seeing as how we'll have travelled all that way, we feel it's only right that we catch up with a few friends who live in the area, so we won't be home until Tuesday night. Needless to say, the rest of the week (and no doubt the following weekend) will be spent catching up with work again. It's also half-term. Plus point: I don't have to have everything prepared for school when we get back. Downside: I'll have the children at home while I'm trying to work. I've been here before...

But I'm going to try my hardest to put work and everything else out of my mind while we're away. Although the rest of the year is pretty busy, I know things will start to calm down after that week, and I should have more time to keep on top of work and actually relax too. It's the last of my 12-week marathon. More importantly, it's my sister's wedding - it's a one-off, joyful, amazing event and one that I want to enjoy every moment of. I want to be there for it mentally as well as physically and not have the back of my mind filled with thoughts of all the things I should be doing. That has happened too many times this year; trips away have certainly not been spoilt - God, no, I'll always love holidays! - but they have definitely been marred by taking too much on. I've learnt my lesson in that respect.

So what am I going to do to make sure I don't burn myself out again? Mostly, I have to learn to say 'no' - no to work and no to fitting too much in. This spring has been unusual in that I've had no say in the timing of a lot of events, but I need to make an effort in the future not to plan too many things too close together. I need to make sure I have some weekends at home that aren't spent working. I need to try not to work evenings and weekends unless I really have to. I need to not take on more work than I can comfortably manage. I need to switch my email to 'out of office' during weekends and holidays so that I don't take work with me. And I need to enjoy what I'm doing and make the most of every moment - work and chores can wait. As I've read so many times, no one gets to the end of their life and wishes they'd spent more time at work.

Trouble is, if I don't keep on agreeing to extra work, how can I afford the holidays? And is it wrong that after a few weekends at home, I know I'll really be looking forward to going away in the summer? Yup, don't worry, it's only a temporary blip in the holiday obsession. Normal service will be resumed shortly...

How to holiday for free (if you know the year of the Battle of Culloden)

I've not long got back from a long weekend in West Sussex. There were six of us altogether; we shared a huge and rather luxurious converted barn (The Granary at Pitlands Barns), with three en-suite bedrooms and all mod cons. We had two pub lunches, two pub dinners, a takeaway Indian, coffee and cake, and copious amounts of alcohol. And the best bit? It didn't cost any of us a penny. 

Lounge at The Granary

Hallway at The Granary - you could hold a party here!

Chichester Cathedral

So how did we do it? Well, it's all down to my second love - quizzes. Lee and I have been regularly quizzing with two of the group that came away with us for nearly 20 years, and the other two joined us over ten years ago. We do a regular pub quiz together every Wednesday; we also take part in regional 'Big Quizzes' organised by our local newspaper, along with occasional wine and wisdom events and other quizzes in other pubs. As you can imagine, the more quizzes you go to, the more you learn (and, admittedly, the more you also forget). Over the years, our knowledge bank has grown, and we make a pretty good team. Our success also lies in our range - we have an equal match of genders, we have differing interests, and our ages span from forties to seventies, so we cover a range of different eras and specialist subjects. (When we first started, Lee and I were the 'young ones', able to answer questions on up-to-date music. Sadly, our music knowledge hasn't progressed along with our advancing years...) The result of this is that we win quizzes fairly often, and our wins paid for our holiday - and it wasn't the first one. 

Over the years, we've won a variety of things - mostly bottles of wine and the occasional box of chocolates. One of my favourite prizes came when four of us won a national quiz organised by the CSMA - we won a large Fortnum & Mason hamper and a £250 leisure break voucher. We travelled up to Ghyll Manor hotel in Sussex for the formal presentation of our prize, and snagged ourselves a free three-course lunch. We then returned for a night's B&B and a three-course dinner, courtesy of our leisure voucher. 

Another favourite prize, which we have won several times, is P&O ferry vouchers. The Big Quiz I mentioned earlier takes part in four locations across the county each year (we usually attend two or three but have been known to go to all four), followed by a county final. In the early days, there would be around 80 teams, and you would win a 5-day return crossing for each member of the team (that's one each for me and Lee) for coming as 'low' as sixth. Over the years, as the number of teams reduced, the prize became restricted to first place winners, and was 'demoted' to a day-trip. (Eventually, a year or so ago, P&O withdrew their sponsorship, but the Big Quiz has recently snared DFDS as sponsors, so I have high hopes again!) Regardless, we have come first or been high-enough placed over the years to have won a fair few ferry vouchers. And even when they were only day trips, we were able to swap two of them for a longer-duration return. We've used them to pay for our travel for numerous summer camping trips to France, a couple of day trips, a few Easter breaks and a long weekend in Bruges at Christmas. If I'm honest, using up a ferry voucher has actually been the reason behind (read 'excuse for') several of our shorter holidays...

A day trip to Boulogne many years ago!

Anyway, back to our long weekend. It dawned on us years ago that it was a bit of a waste putting our cash winnings at the end of a pub quiz back into our pockets. Anything we won would get swallowed back into everyday life and not really 'enjoyed'. And if you're going to win something, you should really enjoy the prize. So one of us came up with the genius idea of pooling our winnings and saving them each week, rather than splitting them up and taking them home. The idea was that when we'd saved enough, we would use them to do something special and treat ourselves, so that we felt like we'd really got the benefit of our prize money. In the meantime, we'd put the money into premium bonds in the optimistic hope that we might win a little extra to help us on our way (we haven't yet, sadly).

Our first trip was back in February 2013 - a visit to Ypres. I believe we paid for our own travel (although we probably used one of our ferry vouchers...), but our winnings paid for our hotel (the rather lovely Ariane) and all food and drinks. It was absolutely freezing but we had a lovely weekend, exploring Ypres, visiting the WW1 Passchendaele battlefield and cemetery (extremely moving), wandering around Lille on the way back and eating lots of lovely food. It gave us a taste of what we could do with our winnings (not to mention a much-needed 'adult' break from our lovely but exhausting children), and we were soon planning what we'd do when we'd saved up enough money to go away again. 

Menin Gate Memorial

Passchendaele

Freezing in Lille

It was October 2014 by the time we'd saved up enough. This time we decided to stay in the UK to avoid wasting our kitty money (or spending our own money) on travel. We plumped for the Cotswolds and booked a couple of nights in the lovely Falcon Inn in Painswick. We went for a long walk in the countryside and visited Gloucester (beautiful) and Cheltenham (disappointing), as well as drinking and eating out lots - all paid for again, of course.

Our room at The Falcon

View of Painswick from our room

Gloucester Cathedral

In April 2016, we went to Redditch with our winnings. Okay, that might seem like an odd destination, but we found a bargain break at the Southcrest Manor Hotel through Travelzoo. The hotel (and its food) turned out to be very nice. We also went out for a curry, had a pub lunch or two, went for a walk around Arrow Valley lake, explored Worcester and its cathedral, and visited Kenilworth Castle. Again, all paid for.

Our room at Southcrest Manor

Arrow Valley Lake

Kenilworth Castle

As you've no doubt gathered, our recent trip to Chichester was our fourth paid-for holiday: another much-needed break, where we came back no poorer than when we went away - always a bonus. Even better, we still have £500 in the kitty ready to put towards our next break. We're thinking possibly the Norfolk Broads. And, of course, first we will have to have the obligatory 'planning meeting', which involves dinner, drink, much discussion of where to go and when to go there, and no actual decision - followed by another planning meeting to continue the process. Not to mention lots of pub quizzes in the meantime to try to win the money. Life is tough...!

Cards in the bathroom

Some of you may have noticed my frequent references to 'cards in the bathroom' and wondered what I'm talking about. Read on...

Picture the scene. It's August and you're staying in a hotel in Spain. You've had dinner, maybe gone for a walk or a drink or watched the hotel entertainment, and it's now 10.00pm* (*replace with an appropriate bedtime for your children). The children are tired, it's past the time they'd normally go to bed, you know they'll wake up early regardless and you'd really like them to get some sleep. However, you're not tired yourself yet and you feel you're due some child-free time. So you put the children to bed, turn out the lights and relax outside on the balcony with a drink and a game of cards* (*replace with your game of choice). After an hour or so, you creep back in the room. The kids are already asleep and you retire for the night yourself. 

Now picture this scene. It's November and you're staying in a hotel in the UK. You've had dinner and probably not gone for a walk as it's too cold. It's past the children's bedtimes and you're looking forward to child-free time, so you put the children to bed, turn out the lights and... ah. Herein lies the problem. You haven't got a balcony. And even if you had, there's no way you'd want to go and sit outside on it in the UK in winter (or, let's be honest, in the UK on many nights except unusually warm summer ones). 

So where do you go? What do you do? A couple of friends have jokingly asked just how loudly we play cards. All I can say is their children must be a whole lot more tolerant than ours if they could sit and play cards in the same room as their sleeping children! Our kids are pretty good at going to sleep, but they wouldn't be able to get to sleep if the light was on (even dimly), they could hear us talking (even quietly) and/or they basically knew we were awake and still in the same room as them. To be fair, neither would I. I need dark and I need quiet. How can I expect the kids to sleep in conditions I wouldn't be able to sleep in myself? 

I also find it really hard to sleep myself if I know the kids are still awake. If I tried to go to bed at the same time as the kids, it would not be a success. There's something about knowing they're awake that keeps me awake. I hear them sighing and fidgeting as they try to get to sleep, struggling themselves because they know we're awake in the same room. The end result is a pretty bad night's sleep all round. (Except for Lee. He can fall asleep as soon as his head hits the pillow regardless. Lucky sod.)

So what can you do? When you want your children to go to bed but you don't want to go to bed yourself, where can you go? The answer, of course, is the bathroom. Yes, I know. It's not comfortable, it's not pleasant, it's really not where you want to spend your evenings on holiday. But it is somewhere you can sit, albeit somewhat uncomfortably, and chat - yes, or play cards - with a drink until the kids are asleep and you're ready to turn in yourselves. If the bathroom's big enough, we bring in a chair from the bedroom and sometimes, if we're really lucky, a small table. We take it in turns to be the (un)lucky one who gets to sit on the toilet. If we're unlucky and there's no room for a chair, one or both of us will sit in the bath. It's not ideal but, for us, it solves a problem and works as a compromise. 

This is one reason I like going abroad on holiday - sunnier climes = balconies = much more pleasant evenings. Camping is fine, even in the UK - if we're in a tent, there's a reasonable chance the weather's also warm enough for us to sit outside in the evenings. Even if not, the children have separate 'bedrooms' from us inside the tent, which isn't brilliant but is better than the hotel room scenario. Hiring a cottage, chalet or apartment is usually our choice for this country - who needs a bathroom or a balcony when you have a whole lounge or another bedroom to relax in? But on short breaks or as a stopover on a longer journey, hotels are generally unavoidable - and locating a family room that has a separate bedroom for the children is either impossible or far too expensive. So bathroom cards it is!

Of course, now the children are getting older, a whole new world is starting to open up for us. With Finn now being at secondary school and having a phone, we felt confident enough to leave the boys in the hotel room on our recent break in London, while we sat less than 50m away in the hotel bar. It felt very liberating. We still played cards though.  

Short break in London

We made it to London. Two nights, three days and no disasters. Despite only being a short break, it was just long enough to feel like we'd got away and had a proper little holiday. If you're planning a short break in London, this brief diary of our time away might be of interest!

We'd booked to stay in a Holiday Inn Express in Limehouse. Over recent years, we've found that Holiday Inns in London are actually often cheaper than Travelodges or Premier Inns - or at least they are if booking relatively last-minute. The bonus with the HI Express is that you also get breakfast included - which, for two adults and two children, works out as pretty good value. We paid just under £70 a night - I have seen cheaper at other times, but this was the best deal I could find anywhere for when we wanted to stay, unless we chose to stay much further out. With regard to location, Limehouse is actually pretty good. The hotel is five minutes' walk from the station, which is on the DLR. Two stops and you're at Bank/Monument, which is more central than you'd think, and serves six underground lines. Alternatively, two stops takes you to Tower Gateway - perfect for visits to the Tower of London, which was the main purpose of our break. 

We arrived a little later than planned, parking near a friend's house in Eltham and getting the bus to Greenwich North station. We had debated getting the train to London, but it's just so expensive when you have to buy tickets for four. If you can find free parking on the outskirts of London, however, your transport works out pretty cheaply. Children are free on the buses and the underground; the only time we had to buy tickets for them was on the train back to Eltham. For the benefit of the uninitiated, you can also use your contactless bank cards as Oyster cards, tapping in and out of tubes, buses and even the train to/from Eltham - this makes travel a lot quicker and easier, and is cheaper than buying individual tickets or travelcards. 

From North Greenwich, we took the Emirates cable car across to Royal Docks. If you've not done this before, I thoroughly recommend it. If you have a travelcard, you're entitled to a reduced price ticket (currently £3.50 single, rather than £4.50). Alternatively, you can use your contactless card and the reduced price is added on to your travel charge for the day. Again, we had to buy tickets for the boys, but this didn't cost much (£2.30 - sadly no discount as we hadn't needed to buy them travelcards). It is a fairly short trip, but you get some good views over the Thames and east London. The area is being developed at the moment, so the views are rather industrial, but it's still a fun way to cross the river for not too much money. If you're lucky (we weren't this time), you can also get a cable car to yourself. 

View from the Emirates

We checked in to the Holiday Inn around 3pm - too early for dinner but too late to do a whole lot. We decided to go for a walk along the Thames Path instead, an area we hadn't really visited before and just minutes from the hotel. Despite the cold and the wind, it was a pleasant walk, the unusual sky setting off the river views perfectly. 

We headed down some steps near the Prospect of Whitby, a sixteenth-century pub, and onto the 'beach' at the river's edge. It was the first time I'd actually been on the Thames beach, and we had an interesting time finding bits of pottery and what genuinely looked like human bones - made all the more creepy by the gallows standing nearby (where apparently the pirate Captain Kidd, among others, was hung). 

Hangman's noose outside the Prospect of Whitby

After one bone too many, we headed back along the path. Disappointingly, some bits of the path are closed after a certain time, so for a large portion of the path we couldn't actually see the Thames! Once we were back by the river, we got some beautiful views of the Shard and Tower Bridge, and we continued along to St Katherine Docks, a little-known area of restaurants, bars and boats just behind the Tower of London. By this time it was getting late and we were getting thirsty, so we headed back to the Prospect of Whitby, which had tempted us earlier. 

The Prospect of Whitby, dating from 1520, claims to be the oldest riverside pub in London, and can be found in many a guidebook. It's full of history and tales of ghosts - and, according to Lee, good beer. It's a bit of a maze inside; we found a table in a room upstairs, where we relaxed with a drink - and then decided to stay for dinner. I thoroughly recommend it for a meal or just for a drink; it's family-friendly (but not in the traditional 'gastro-chain-pub' type way) and the surroundings make for a very pleasant afternoon or evening. Sadly, the February chill made going outside an unpleasant thought, but I'd imagine it would be lovely to relax on the terrace overlooking the river in warmer months.

We headed back to our hotel after dinner. I've got to say, it's one of the friendliest places I've stayed, especially for a chain hotel - all the staff were exceptionally friendly and helpful. We were a little more positive about going back to our hotel than we normally would be - with our children that little bit older, and with our eldest now owning a mobile phone, we felt that the time had come to progress to the hotel bar for our evening game of cards while the kids were in bed, rather than the bathroom. Luckily, our room was on the same floor as reception and the bar. We gave the boys strict instructions not to leave the room unless there was a fire (just an alarm? Clothes on and walk calmly to reception, closing the door behind you. Fire in the room? Get the hell out in your underwear...), to ignore it if anyone knocked on the door, to phone us if anyone knocked on the door twice, and otherwise not to phone us unless there was an emergency (someone's been sick? Emergency. Brother annoying you? Definitely not an emergency). With that, we wandered around the corner and spent a pleasant evening chatting, drinking and playing backgammon and cards, arriving back in our room at a perfectly reasonable night-time hour to find the boys fast asleep - bliss.

The next day was museums day, based around a 2pm appointment at Shepherd's Bush, where my eldest was meeting his friend to be the fourth person in their group for the Star Wars virtual reality experience. Museums worked well, partly because there were a few not too far away from the Shepherd's Bush area, and partly because it didn't matter how long (or not) we spent there, because we didn't have to pay. We made the mistake of going with the boys' choice and heading to the Natural History Museum first. Not that there's anything wrong with the Natural History Museum - it's great, just not at 11am on the first day of half-term. 

Natural History Museum

We had to queue to get in, and then it was heaving once we were in there. If you have children, I recommend leaving it until a random Sunday - or, even better, an inset day - preferably when the weather's good and other people will be doing something outside. If you don't have children, avoid school holidays and weekends at all costs! We made the double mistake of trying to see the dinosaurs first (the reason why the boys had wanted to visit). It was so packed that you really couldn't see anything - unfortunately, though, there is a one-way system through the exhibit, so we had to shuffle our way through the whole thing just to be able to give up and get out. The other sections we saw weren't so bad but, to be honest, we were too pissed off after the dinosaurs to really appreciate them.

Having had as much of the Natural History Museum as we could stomach, we hot-footed it over to Westfield at Shepherd's Bush, where the Star Wars experience was based. If you've not been to Westfield before and you're a Primark kind of girl (or guy), forget it. All the shops seemed to be high-end, from Debenhams or John Lewis at the most affordable to designer brands - nothing to see here. We couldn't even find anywhere to have a quick, cheap lunch, resorting to buying sandwiches from Waitrose and eating them undercover next to the car park, as it was to cold to go outside. (Note: there is a Wagamama's - and plenty of other restaurants, none of which I can remember - outside Westfield, but we were pushed for time.) Lunch eaten, we handed Finn over to his friend's parents and off we headed to Museum No. 2. 

(I can't personally recommend Star Wars - partly because I didn't do it and partly because the idea of wearing virtual reality goggles for half an hour actually makes me feel sick. But my son, his friend and his parents all loved it, and said it was brilliantly done. So if you're ten or over, don't get travel sick and like the idea of shooting a few Stormtroopers, go for it.)

Museum No. 2 was the British Museum, at the request of our youngest (leftover) son. He has currently got an obsession with the Ancient Greeks (Greece was his choice for half-term, but sadly our budget couldn't stretch), and wanted to see all the Greek artefacts. We wandered around looking at pottery, coins, statues and the like (the 'winged lion phallus' was my personal favourite) until Son No. 2 had had enough and it was time to meet Son No. 1 (kindly delivered to us at the museum). 

A wingld lion phallus. Of course.

The British Museum was much quieter than its Natural History counterpart, so a better choice for school holidays. If you've not been before, prepare to be overwhelmed - there's no hope of seeing everything in one visit. Pick a theme and come back another day to see some other stuff.

By the time we left, we were hungry and tired and it was rush hour. The queue just to get into Holburn station reminded us why rush hour was not a good time to travel by tube, so we started walking towards the next station, planning to stop for a drink anywhere that looked suitable. We came across a Wetherspoons (Penderel's Oak) and went in gratefully, desperate to have a drink and get out of the biting cold. Where I live, we have two Wetherspoons, both family-friendly - this one, not so much. We did see one other family but it was mostly people in their twenties, here for after-work drinks (or a strange Monday night out). By some miracle, we found a table, but the panicked instructions at the bar when Lee ordered two J20s with straws, that children had to leave by 7pm, meant that we didn't have long. Still, it was nice to be warm and have something to drink, and it kept us going for the journey back to Limehouse.

Turns out there aren't a whole lot of places to eat around the hotel. If we'd fancied another tube journey, there's loads in St Katherine Docks or Canary Wharf. But we plumped instead for a Chinese a couple of minutes' walk from the hotel - 'cos everyone (including the children) likes Chinese, right? Hmmm - turned out this Chinese (Shan Shui Jian) is rather 'authentic' and not your typical special fried rice/chow mein emporium. It specialises in lamb hotpot, and the menu proudly tells you all the different body parts it makes use of. Non-intestinal/spinal-cord options included tofu skin, bean curd and 'fungus'. It took me back to our visit to Hong Kong, where we'd got a surprise when we discovered that real Chinese food is not quite the same as you'd get in a UK Chinese takeaway. Still, we found a few less scary-sounding options, which were actually delicious, and Lee bravely tried a hotpot. I'd thoroughly recommend the restaurant if you like trying new stuff, but perhaps not if you are a little more conservative in your food choices!

The next morning, the kids woke us early and not so bright, and, after another filling breakfast, we headed off to the Tower of London, the main purpose of our trip to London. Having got to 40 and still not seen the Crown Jewels or visited one of the country's most iconic landmarks, I had thought it was about time. One of the reasons we'd not visited before is the price - it's not cheap. It's also not somewhere you want to go for a short visit in amongst ticking off your other London must-see boxes - you really need a full day to see everything. Given that there's actually lots to see and do there, the price doesn't work out too bad. If you book online in advance, you can save yourself quite a bit too - a family ticket for two adults and up to three children costs £53 rather than the £63 you'd pay on the door. If you're organised enough to print tickets before you head to London, or your hotel is nice enough to print them for you (as ours was), I'd recommend doing so - it means that you can head straight to the gate rather than queuing first to pick up your tickets. To be fair, the queues weren't actually too bad when we visited, but I'd imagine they'd be a lot worse on a warmer, drier, sunnier day. Something to also bear in mind is that if you book a ticket to arrive before 10.30am, you can save yourselves another £14 (£39 for a family ticket). We opted not to take the risk, as we didn't want to rush in the morning (the ticket is invalid if you arrive late). Had we known in advance just how early the kids would wake, we would have booked the cheaper ticket, no question. As it was, we deliberately took our time at breakfast and packing up our stuff just so that we would arrive after 10.30 on principle. Not really our cleverest moment. (Note: according to the website, the prices are going up in March 2018.)

You may have picked up that the weather wasn't brilliant. The previous two days had been icy cold with a biting wind - on this day, rain was added to the equation. When we had left home two days ago, it had been sunny and relatively warm - stupidly, I assumed the weather would be the same in London (it's normally warmer!) and left my hat, scarf and jumpers at home. Consequently, I spent most of our time in London shivering, wishing I'd brought warmer clothes and searching (unsuccessfully) for a cheap hat to buy. While walking towards the Tower of London, we spotted a hat lying on the ground. It was bright pink, it was soaking wet and it seemed to be mocking my own lack of a hat. I picked it up and put it on a bench for its owner to find, trying to console myself with the fact that it was pink and I wouldn't have worn it anyway. A little later, while walking around the Tower of London, we spotted another hat, left on one of the information boards inside. This one was grey, dry and completely wearable. I can't pretend I wasn't tempted but I tried to think of the owner, cold and shivering and hoping they'd be reunited with their hat; I left it where it was. A little while later, I found another abandoned hat. This one was (also) bright pink and child-sized. It's probably a good job, because otherwise I'd have had it. There's only so much hat-taunting I can take.

Hats aside, we enjoyed our time at the Tower of London, and I thoroughly recommend it. There is lots to see - the White Tower, which is the main building in the middle, the battlements walk, the Bloody Tower, where the two princes were reportedly imprisoned (and murdered?), the ravens, small exhibitions on torture instruments and the menagerie that was once at the zoo (not related), and probably lots more that I can't remember. 

Ravens at the Tower of London

There were activity sheets for the children, but the idea of completing soggy sheets of paper in the rain put us off. As it was, the amount of information presented around the tower was perfect - enough to tell you something but not so much that you got put off and didn't even try to read it. As with anywhere, we would have enjoyed our visit more had the weather been better - we didn't wander around the outside as much as we'd have liked to, preferring to dart into anywhere under cover. We were a bit concerned that eating would be a problem - we hadn't brought packed lunches, figuring that we wouldn't want to sit outside anywhere to eat them, and we worried that everyone would be trying to crowd into the one open restaurant. (Note: sadly, you're not allowed to leave and come back in, which is a pity, as there are several restaurants just outside.) A first glance into the restaurant confirmed our fear - it was heaving. However, there are actually loads of tables, and people were leaving at roughly the same rate as coming in, so it wasn't too difficult to find ourselves somewhere to sit. The food was the usual price you'd expect for captive consumers, but it was nice enough and there was a decent selection of hot and cold food (we'd probably have chosen hot if we'd known for definite that we'd have got a table - hey ho). The obvious jewel in the crown of the Tower of London is just that - the Crown Jewels. Time it wrong and you'll queue to get into the building where they're housed. Luckily, we timed it right and walked almost straight in. 

This is as close as you get to a photo of the Crown Jewels

Needless to say, they are rather impressive. Awestruck at so much gold, my youngest spent the entire time asking just how much we thought each and every piece was worth. There is a slow conveyor belt taking you past the actual crowns - this sounds awful but actually means that you get a good opportunity to look at everything without people crowding round and blocking your view. You get to go on again and again if you so wish, so there's no worries about missing anything. Unfortunately, we weren't able to take photos for security reasons. In fact, I have very few photos of the Tower of London at all, mainly because it was too cold to take my gloves off to take a photo!

The White Tower - photo taken from inside another tower!

Sadly, the Tower of London was the end of our visit to London. We left around 4.30, with the hope of missing the rush hour - we kind of succeeded. We headed back to the hotel first, where they'd kindly looked after our bags, and then got back on the DLR to Lewisham, ready for the train to Eltham. We timed it pretty well, with only a five-minute wait at Lewisham, and we avoided the worst of the crush, getting seats for most of the journey. By the time we'd walked back to our car from Eltham station, we'd missed the worst of the rush hour traffic, and the A2/M2 wasn't too bad. We took the opportunity to stop at Bluewater for dinner, eventually arriving back to a freezing house just in time for the boys' bedtime. Luckily, I have plenty of warm clothes at home, as the heating took a while to kick back in.

Well, that was our mini-holiday to London - and, despite being just a couple of days, it really did feel like a break. There's something to be said about getting away from your home for a few days, where you can't worry about work, chores or the usual stresses of life. London isn't a bad option for February, and it's not too expensive if you plan carefully. Just maybe avoid the Natural History Museum if you'd rather look at dinosaurs than the back of the person in front of you...

Priorities

Once upon a time, before children, we were fairly comfortably off. My husband and I both worked full time in teaching, him in a management position, and we brought in decent wages. Our house was smaller, meaning a relatively smaller mortgage and lower rates and bills. Our outgoings were few, and we had less time to spend the money we brought in. This meant that if we wanted or needed something, we could usually afford it, from clothes to repairs to home improvements. We went out for dinner regularly, as well as the cinema, theatre, pub, etc, and we actually had savings. It also meant we had money to spare for holidays, and we made the most of it. We weren't extravagant by many people's standards - 3 or 4 stars rather than 5 - but we did enjoy the opportunity to holiday wherever we fancied visiting rather than simply wherever we could afford.

Roll on several years and, like most families, we are in a somewhat different financial position. Along with children come increased outgoings, from basics like food and clothes to school uniform, extra-curricular activities and Christmas and birthday presents. More family members means a bigger car and a bigger house, and consequently higher mortgage payments or rent and bigger bills. For those families where both parents work full-time (or even part-time), childcare takes a huge chunk of earnings, and for those families where a parent gives up work or works part-time in order to look after the children, the income is of course much reduced. And most importantly - in relation to this blog - holidays are suddenly much more expensive. After the age of two, children have to pay for a seat on a plane (very often full-price). You need bigger rooms in hotels or bigger cottages to rent. You have to pay double the admission charge for many attractions. After the age of 12 (sometimes lower), children are counted as adults in the pricing for many holidays (and they're often charged the same as adults anyway). And if you want to travel anywhere during school holidays, expect to pay four times the price (this is no exaggeration).

So how do you manage to go on holiday, given all the financial limitations of having a family? I know some people wonder how I can afford to keep going away, or why we struggle with money for some things yet still have enough to go on holiday. The answer is pretty simple: it's all about priorities. Of course, we also do our best to holiday cheaply - we cut corners and search for bargains where we can, and I'll share some tips for this in a future blog. But even the cheapest holiday is only doable if it's a priority. Don't get me wrong - we don't put having a holiday ahead of food, bills or other essentials. You won't find me scrabbling in the bargain bin in the supermarket to pay for half a night in a hotel, or sending my children to school in shoes with holes to pay for the luggage allowance for a flight. Nor do we go without on the whole. However, for items and purchases that are non-essential, we are quite careful - and picky - with our spending. Of course, we try to save in all the usual ways - using comparison sites for insurance, using a cashback card, looking for money-off deals when we can. But it's more about what we choose to prioritise, and it's rarely material things. We have absolutely no interest in branded products; although I admit there are exceptions, I'm not convinced you always get what you pay for, and more times than not you're paying for a name and not for quality. And if I'm honest, I'm not always that bothered about quality either. I'm very happy to buy my clothes at Primark or other cheap shops, and I love picking up a bargain in a charity shop. I buy my shampoo and shower gel in the supermarket, and my make-up is Avon, not Clinique. We don't have an X-box or PlayStation, my phone is still an iPhone 5 (£15 a month pay-as-you-go) and the boys use a cheap tablet. We don't have Sky or any of those other expensive subscription services - we're quite happy with Freeview, although we have more recently started 'splashing out' on an almighty £5 a month for Netflix! We buy second-hand cars and we drive them until they die and we have no option but to replace them. We still need to redecorate most of the house after having it re-wired over two years ago. We need new patio doors, a new sofa, a new front door, a new shower and new carpets. The thing is, much as we'd like to replace these things, drive newer cars or upgrade our phones, we could only afford to do it at the expense of holidays. It's a simple choice - and the holidays win every time! Those who know me will recall that a while back we spent over a year without heating or hot water - no joke. Our boiler had had it - in fact, so had our whole central heating system. We would have had to save up and go without holidays for a VERY long time to afford to replace it, and we simply weren't willing to do that. We could get by without central heating - we had a gas fire in the lounge, we bought a couple of electric heaters and I took my hot water bottle everywhere with me. We could get by without hot water - we had an electric shower, a dishwasher and a kettle, and I don't much like baths anyway. What we couldn't get by without was holidays. After a few months without a holiday of some sort, I'm feeling antsy. I can't imagine how I'd feel going a year or more. I have no idea how anyone else manages it. I know most of my friends thought we were mad. We probably were. But it was a simple matter of priorities - we'd rather go on holiday than have a functioning boiler. 

So when it comes to holidays, it very often boils down to a matter of priorities. Of course, this is a gross oversimplification - holidays are bloody expensive, especially when children are involved, and I know not everyone can afford to go away, regardless of how much they scrimp and save on everything else. I'm well aware that there are many people who struggle to afford to pay for food, let alone holidays, and of course I'm not advocating that they - or anyone - let their children starve to pay for a holiday. I know I'm very lucky to have a secure home and enough of a regular income to cover the basic necessities and be able to choose what to do with the excess. But choice is what it often comes down to for those living relatively comfortably on a reasonable income. Many people would prefer to spend their money on clothes, Sky or an iPhone X. Me - I'd rather go on holiday than have heating or hot water. Hey, we're all different. I know I'm in a minority, but I'd happily sacrifice a whole bunch of things in exchange for a holiday. I'm not suggesting that everybody should follow my example, unless they too are holiday-obsessives - we all have our priorities for what to spend our money on, and holidays probably aren't most people's. But when people think they can't afford to go on holiday, sometimes, maybe, it's just that they don't want to enough.