Family vacations are either amazing or dreadful, and the best thing about the quasi-inevitable disaster is being able to laugh while you tell the stories ten years later. That truth is definitely reality for these 15 people, who have some pretty funny stories about what ruined what was supposed to be a magical time of family bonding.
#15. Killed the mood.
“A family we used to be friends with decided to join (without being invited or even asking us), then spent all day complaining about the hotel and how anyone would voluntarily go on a vacation like that. They proceeded to get into a huge fight and broke up in front of us. Kinda killed the mood at dinner.”
#14. Shunning the 10 year old girl.
“This year’s family beach vacation: 10 year old threw sand at my brother in law. Brother in law threw a giant fit and made a big deal about it to her mom and grandma. 10 year old was sobbing and was in a lot of trouble and was going to get spanked and grounded for the rest of the summer. I panicked and told the family that I told her to throw the sand to take some heat off of her. Commence brother in law shunning 10 year old girl until he left, entire family shunning me, and scary southern grandma yelling at me until I cried. It wasn’t a big deal that she threw sand, but it ruined the entire trip.
Vacation to visit my parents for Christmas: 7 of us got food poisoning in a house with one bathroom
Last year’s family beach vacation: my dog died with our dog sitter while we were on the other side of the country.”
#13. Dear old dad.
“My dad’s drug withdrawals.”
#12. My mother.
“My mother. Unless everything goes literally perfectly, there’s something to complain about. God I still hear about the lasagna she made for Christmas 2 years ago. It was a little runny but totally fine but because it wasn’t perfect, she ruined Christmas.”
#11. Wash, rinse, repeat.
“Every vacation we go one there’s always political chatter and a huge fight breaks out. Then everyone’s miserable for the rest of the trip. Wash rinse and repeat.”
#10. He seemed to be serious.
“An Egyptian ~50 something yo man wanted to marry my then 7 yo sister for 5 camels. No fucking joke. At first we thought it was a joke but he seamed to be serious.”
#9. An unfortunate fact of life.
“Travellers Diarrhea.”
#8. No more buffets!
“Getting strep throat three days into a week and a half vacation in Colonial Williamsburg during Christmas. Never gone to a buffet since!”
#7. Kids ruin everything.
“Bringing the kids!”
#6. An adventure.
“It didn’t ruin it, but the next day I woke up with a 105 fever and heat stroke. That was.. an adventure.”
#5. To the point.
“My family.”
#4. Clark?
“We drove all the way to Hershey, PA to discover Hershey Park was closed. We ended up in Gettysburg, PA for the third time in three years. Not exactly “ruined” but…”
#3. Half the water park.
“Some kid shat in the swimming pool and they closed down the good half of the water park. Fuck face had the audacity to ask why they were closing it down.”
#2. A nauseous noodle.
“Did a 9 day road trip, Denver to zion to grand canyon and back. Turns out, anything above 6500-7000′, my wife is a nauseous noodle of a human being.”
#1. The puke.
“I like to sleep on road trips, but I got woken up every 15mins by my dad because he didn’t want to switch seats to take care of my puking sister. It was “my responsibility” to take care of the puke.”