The good, The bad and the Haven-ly

We've just got back from a week's holiday in Weymouth. I'll probably flesh out the details in another post, but there were some good bits: LMD won the fancy dress competition in a borrowed nurses uniform by virtue of being the cutest one there (everyone was wearing hop-bought clothes. What is the world coming to?). I thought she'd lost when an even littler girl appeared dressed as a bumble bee - but she hung onto mummy the whole time, and wouldn't talk or look at the audience, whereas LMD went up on her own, yelled her age down the microphone, and roundly told off anyone who tried to steal her moment of fame:-) LMB also got to win one of the paltry prizes of "a foil mask" by winning hide and seek on the last day. Admittedly I found the hiding place - but she stayed there quiet and still, so the victory was hers.

There was some bad - we had booked a chalet/apartment thing bcause I hate caravans, and my kids are not just like a herd of elephants but more of the full safari at 6am, and there is no escaping that in a caravan, whereas a cottage offers rooms to be sent to, and doors to be shut on! When we arrived and realised there were only two cottages, right on the very furthest corner of an enormous site we weren't delighted, but c'est la vie. We let ourselves in, and looked around - there was a bit of a smell, but it was slight. I shut all the windows, which were wide open, pushed the kids beds up against the wall from where they had been left in the middle of the room, unpacked, explored the facilities, went for a swim in a disgusting pool wth no changing facilities, but a long muddy walk from anywhere, put the kids to bed and decided to make the ost of it.

The next morning, in the cold light of day, we decided to take photo's of the the cobwebs, mould and dead insects that had obviously not been cleaned for several weeks. Then I went into the gils bedroom - where had pushed the bed back against the all to ensure LMD did not fall out, it was sopping wet. With daylight streaming in, I could see that the whole of the back wall was dripping with damp. The smell was awful no the window had been shut for several hours. next door in Mstr A's and Nanny A's room it was even worse - damp rot and mould on the walls. Nanny A could hardly breathe at all - having only left hospital following a severe chest infection a few weeks ago I was not happy.

We went to reception at 9am, and refused the accomodation. I was expecting a bit of an argument, as it is high season, and they obviously would not be able to offer an alternative cottage as there were only the two! However, i barely had to say what the problem was before they were agreeing with me that it was not acceptable. I feel that they knew that it was uninhabitable before they even put us there! I gave them until lunch time to sort it out. Went back, packed everything up again. Tried to explain to the kids what was going on. Went back at 11.30. They offered us a two bed caravan. i refused. They offered a 3 bed caravan on the next door site until Tuesday. I refused. i suggested they give us a full refund and we'd find somewhere else, and that i expected whatever happened to be sorted out by midday, as we had already lost a day of our holiday. they decided the 3 bed caravan was actually available all week. so off we went, and spent the rest of the week in a caravan after all. Unsurprisingly, come Tuesday, the cottage was occupied again - I expect they told whoever was suposed to be coming into the caravan that they had been given an upgrade!

So, we had very little sleep all week:-(

And now I have to write a letter of compliant again! bah!