We’ve just booked a Butlin’s half-term holiday – here are the reasons we decided a Butlins break was a good fit for our family!

When it comes to booking a holiday, sometimes the amount of choice can be overwhelming. There are also a lot of other things to consider such as travel time, budget, and whether the chosen location caters to everybody’s needs.

My partner is self-employed and to be honest, other than Christmas it’s pretty rare he takes a full week off work.

He manages a fair few long weekends and random days off due to supply chain or site issues, but the cost of these days means taking a full week isn’t always an option.

However, as he’s had a good summer he’s decided to take October half-term week off. While I have no issue with taking children out of school for much-needed family time, as our little one is just starting reception we felt it wasn’t the best idea for this term.

Here are some of the criteria for our holiday:

Good Signal / Wifi – We recently had a holiday where there was no signal or wifi and it was awful from both a running my business point of view and for keeping in touch with my Dad who was poorly at the time.
Swimming Pool – Our little girl isn’t very water confident so we felt a break where she could swim every day would be beneficial.
Budget – We didn’t want to spend more than £1000.
Near Family Activities – While these didn’t have to be onsite, we knew we would need to occupy our 4-year-old.

Some of the options we considered included Center Parcs, Blue Stone Wales, Edinburgh, Forrest Holidays, Hoeseansons, Air B&B, and an all-inclusive trip to Majorca.

We also consider splitting the week in half with two nights away for just us adults at the start of the week and a family break at the end.

If you enjoy this kind of content, take a look at my UK Holidays & Days Out Hub for more inspiration

10 Reasons We’ve Chosen A Butlins Half Term Holiday

I just wanted the preface this by saying that firstly this isn’t an ad. I’ve paid for this holiday outright with my own cash.

Also, we haven’t been yet.

This holiday could be a disaster.

But here on my travel blog, I want to share all aspects of a holiday, including the planning process and I wanted to write this while everything was still fresh in my mind.

I’m a planner at heart and I really enjoy researching and planning breaks for my family.

1. Butlins is Budget Friendly

Finding a half-term holiday for £1000 which included accommodation and leftover cash for spending on food and a few treats activities wasn’t easy.

At our nearest Center Parcs, Longleat Forest, it was £1800 for Monday to Friday for just the accommodation – so that didn’t include any activities other than the Swimming Pool and outdoor play areas. As much as we love Center Parcs, we just couldn’t justify it.

Butlin’s Vs Center Parcs; Which Is Better?

Next, I looked at Blue Stone Wales. Prices were around £1100 for accommodation with an additional £115 for the golf buggy to get around and £35 per device for premium WIFI which according to recent Trip Advisor reviews doesn’t work terribly well.

It’s also over three hours drive from where we live so we’d be looking at a fair amount in fuel too.

Forest Holidays and Hoeseaons were slightly more reasonably priced but the ones we liked the look of were either too far away or were smaller sites with no facilities.

Butlins Minehead is around 45 minutes from where we live and came in at £575 for a two-bedroom apartment with kitchen facilities.

This was a mid-range accommodation so we could have opted for something cheaper but we wanted a living area to relax in at the end of the day.

Now, I have read some awful reviews online of the accomodation and I am prepared for it to be dated and maybe in need of some TLC. I’ll pack cleaning stuff just in case and we’ll make the best of it either way.

Maybe we’re just not fussy, but I’d seen these apartments in Torquay get absolutely slated online but we had no issues at all and thought they were a steal at £69 for three nights.

2. We Could Book Half Board Food

Another thing that sold Butlins?

The half-board dining plan, also known as premium dining.

Again this was the mid-range option just to give us a little more choice than the basic canteen style dining, costing £29.95 per adult per day and £7.50 per day for our daughter who is four.

For reference, if it’s something you’re considering, a child aged 6-14 years costs £15.00 per day and under 2s go free.

The thought of not having to cook or wash up for an entire week was very appealing.

The buffet-style restaurant means my always-hungry husband would be able to fill up on as much food as he likes and if my daughter doesn’t like what she’s chosen she can just pick something else.

Also, hello unlimited desserts.

Having a dining plan also takes the stress out of finding or booking somewhere to eat each day and we have a three-hour window for food each morning and evening.

Of course, for a super budget stay you can bring your own food and there is a Tesco, Wetherspoons, and McDonald’s nearby for cheap eats or stocking up on the basics.

3. Family Friendly Breaks

I’ll be honest, I’m aware Butlins doesn’t have the most upmarket reputation and one of the reasons I’ve not booked before was because I felt it would be full of stag dos and drunken fights.

Butlins seems to be combating this by having family-only breaks during the week and having themed adult weekends in between to keep everyone happy.

As our break is a half-term week, we could only book it if we were bringing a child with us.

4. No Swimming Restrictions

As I mentioned before, one of the criteria for this break was to be able to take our daughter swimming to try and improve her water confidence.

While I realize that many places needed to put restrictions in place during Covid, a weekend away we went on in March this year only allowed two pre-booked 45-minute swimming sessions during a three-night stay which was disappointing, to say the least.

Butlins currently has unlimited swimming with no need to book which was perfect for what we wanted.

5. Less Than An Hour From Home

Butlins Minehead is less than an hour from home for us and my husband found the idea of a short drive quite appealing as it’s usually him that drives when we go away.

It’ll also limit how much were spending on fuel.

6. Nearby National Trust Property

While I know Butlins in Minehead has loads to offer, I also like the idea of exploring the local area a little bit too.

As we have a National Trust Pass, we can visit nearby Dunster Castle for free while we’re there if we want to get our and about without spending any extra cash.

Our Visit To Stourhead National Trust

Lytes Cary Manor National Trust Visit

Visiting Tyntesfield National Trust

Climbing Glastonbury Tor

7 National Trust Pass Hacks

14 Things To Do Near Butlins Minehead

7. Butlins Half Term Holiday – The Free Fun Fair

Our little girl is at that age where she really loves going on rides. And from previous weekends away we know how much this can end up costing!

Having rides on site that we can visit every day without any additional cost was something we really thought she’d love!

8. Plenty To Do Onsite

There more I looked into it, the more I realized just how much there is to do on-site compared to other breaks we’ve been on recently.

While some activities do incur an extra cost, there are loads that don’t and I was amazed at the number of live shows there are as well as things like a silent cinema and photo ops with popular children’s characters such as PJ Masks and Peppa Pig.

9. It’s Right By The Beach

Okay, so I’m well aware that it will be far too cold in October to be sunbathing, but there’s nothing quite like a blustery stroll along the beach to blow away the cobwebs!

And our little one is happy to build sandcastles in literally any weather, we’ll just make sure she’s well wrapped up against the cold!

10. The Nostalgia

Many of us had Butlins holidays growing up, so there’s a certain sense of nostalgia returning as adults with our own children.

Unfortunately, my memories of Butlins are rather marred by the fact everyone got food poisoning and spent the last day and night being violently ill!

Of course, there’s no way I’d let that incident from 25-odd years ago put me off going again!

11. No Passports Needed

As I was planning this break, my husband and I had just renewed our passports and applied for the first one for our daughter, so I did look at some holidays abroad.

The cheapest I found was Majorca at £500 each for an all-inclusive hotel stay and flights which included a free child place.

However, with the current long waits for passports, we decided it would be cutting it too fine and didn’t want the stress of potentially having to cancel or find something in the U.K last minute.

Unbelievably, my husband’s passport has come back already, taking just 11 days from application to receiving the new one in the post. Mine and our daughters seem to be taking rather longer though!

I’m really looking forward to our Butlins half term holiday and will be bringing you lots of pictures of everything we get up to.