With three families and five teenagers to Tuscany

They have known each other since they were very little: Aylin, Alexandra, Alessandro, Marc and Navid. And the 13 and 14 year olds had long wanted to go on vacation together. Together with parents, grandparents and godfathers, the time had come during the autumn holidays. Destination: the InToscana in beautiful Terricciola. – Family vacation in Tuscany

Super cool – autumn holidays (almost) without parents

But what the parents had come up with for their kids was completely different than usual when families of friends go on holiday together: the parents had their own apartment with two bedrooms for the five youngsters - one for the girls and one for the boys - rented, in which the five of them could do as much as they wanted.

“It was super cool without parents,” says 13-year-old Aylin, “and we felt a bit like adults.”

Of course, so much freedom also comes with tasks. Of course, the five friends were also responsible for keeping their holiday apartment tidy. “It didn’t work out so well at the beginning,” admits Alessandro (13), “but as the week went on we got better and better. We then simply made a plan of who was responsible for what.”

The friends, who are also a clique back home in Munich, also made their own breakfast. “And then a mishap happened to me,” says Aylin. When making tea, the thermos was too close to the stove, so it got scorched a bit. “That’s why we didn’t cook ourselves, we let our parents cook, but we ate together in our apartment or in the loggia.”

There have to be a few rules

One of the rules on this family vacation was to do something for school every day. “Of course they didn’t think it was that great,” says Alessandro’s mother Elisa.

She also took on the unpleasant task of collecting the cell phones at around 21 p.m. “I had to endure a lot of evil looks,” she says. “But actually it wasn’t that bad,” says 14-year-old Navid, “so we did a lot together and didn’t always just get stuck on our smartphones.”

The teenagers particularly liked the fact that they were free to decide whether they wanted to go on excursions with their parents or whether they would rather stay at InToscana. “Sometimes we split up,” says Aylin, “for example, two of us went to the sea, to Pisa or to Lucca and the others used the fitness equipment or went to the village.”

Alessandro particularly fondly remembers the trip to Florence - with his godfather and Navid: "We were in a great restaurant that had very special desserts, like lavender or chamomile ice cream!"

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And how were the parents on this family vacation?

“By giving a little responsibility to the kids,” says Elisa, “we also had a little more freedom for ourselves.” It worked very well and the apartment could have looked a lot worse after that week, but the five of them handled it really well.

Despina and Leo, Aylin and Marc's parents, also found this family vacation simply wonderful. “Even though the children lived alone, we had the opportunity to see each other quite often,” says Despina. “And because everyone was able to do what they wanted to do, there were lots of conversations with the children about what they had experienced.” In addition, you would have had a lot more time for yourself and your friends - without one of the children always interfering.

Highlight Halloween

One of the highlights of the autumn holidays, which flew by for everyone, was definitely the Halloween party in the tiny medieval borgo in the neighboring village of Rivalto with a disco and outdoor dance floor, fire play, street food, cabaret directly at the table and a relaxed dinner in the venerable vault Halloween decorations right next to the dance floor. “The waiters and waitresses were dressed as monks and nuns,” says Elisa with a smile. “We were all dressed up in scary make-up and everything was beautifully decorated there – there was even a scary forest,” remembers Alessandro and Navid regrets that it unfortunately started to rain at some point and the outdoor event had to be stopped.

But for Aylin, the whole week was a single highlight: “The fact that I was able to be with my clique for a whole week was so cool. And whenever we laughed together, that was a very special highlight of this family vacation for me!”