For our next UK break

Another benefit of a UK break was driving our own car with already fitted car seats. I still have vague hazy memories of perspiring heavily, trying to fit two unfamiliar child seats in the 40°C heat of a pitch-black Spanish car park, while rental cars driven by confused tourists careered past.

And since we were in our own car on British roads, the day didn’t start with Victoria screaming ‘WE’RE ON THE WRONG SIDE OF THE ROAD’, every morning as a Spaniard in a van accelerated towards us.

We could also tour friends and relatives’ houses picking up cakes and being offered a variety of delicious meals, crucially saving money under the guise of seeing people.

Better still, I didn’t even panic when Thomas crashed into me, sending the coffee I was holding flying across the room before it came to rest on the living room sofa. We hadn’t left a deposit and we weren’t going to be charged over a visible stain.

With all that in mind, could the UK mini-break in a relative’s empty house be our future holiday blueprint even when the world’s open for business?