Holiday would be fab but simple trips to the park will do for now

ON your marks, get set, go.

As lockdown starts to lift, have you got your diary?

On Monday, parks opened. Early July, some self-catering accommodation in Scotland will open and on July 15, hotels will unlock their doors.

To top all the excitement, we can also (probably) travel to some European destinations for a summer holiday.

The reality is that not everyone can afford to be excited – because not everyone has fallen into the categories of being furloughed, continuing to work or relying on savings.

But those who can certainly did – crashing the Eurotunnel booking website while travel agents reported their busiest Saturday ever.

Already, many of the Scottish hotels you’d assume might be offering bargain basement deals to get their cash flow restarted, have bumped up prices because of demand.

As tempting as it is to get away – even if it’s a few miles outside Dundee – after three months-plus of being confined to our homes, what will the reality be?

For anyone choosing to stay in a self-catering cottage before July 15, there will be no family dinners in an on-site or local restaurant – not even an ice cream or coffee in a nearby cafe.

At best you’ll get pizza delivered while watching a 10-year-old rerun of My Family, telling your teenager/ husband/wife/wee one to get off the ipad/phone /console and relax... which you could have done at home.

Come July 15, we’ll be paying over the odds to go to a hotel with a pool and soft play area the kids would love… but can’t use.

It’s great and essential that we support the hotel and leisure industry if we can – and I am in the camp that wouldn’t mind (putting it mildly) a change of scene.

But I had a word with myself and decided to calm down. Wait it out until a splash in the pool is on the cards and the “holiday” feels like one.

And now our parks are open, it’s got to help in adding a bit of variety for the kids.

Except, as soon as they opened, so did the heavens, with rainy forecasts every day.

It didn’t matter. My boys – and every other kid I’ve seen on a road trip of Dundee parks so far this week – ran to the swings, seesaws and chutes that have been under lock and key like it was opening time at Disneyland.

Our sandwiches got soggy and our clothes wet through.

As we sat in the comfort of a warm car drying off afterwards, I said to the boys: “It’s a shame about the weather. Maybe it will be sunny one day soon.”

“Are you kidding?” the eldest said. “Did you see that climbing frame? That was one of the best days of my life.”