Your Ultimate Self-Catering Packing List

Many people shy away from self-catering holidays because they worry about how much work must be done on holiday. There doesn’t need to be much work done at all to enjoy a good value self-catering holiday. A little bit of savvy packing should help make life easy and keep costs down. Here’s your ultimate self-catering packing list to make sure you have the essentials.

It might not be as glamorous as staying in a 5* All-Inclusive resort, but the reality is, if you want to explore the area you are in, self-catering is the better option. To have the freedom to be out and about and use your apartment as a base without feeling the need to be back for meal restrictions. It doesn’t have to mean that you are cooking 3 meals a day and cleaning up instead of relaxing. We do tend to eat a few breakfasts in the room and keep bits in for light lunches and snacks as the kids seem to be forever hungry!

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Dishwashing equipment

A few glasses/cups and cereal bowls are probably the extent of the washing up I end up doing. I like to be prepared. Popping to the local supermarket will probably mean buying a full bottle of washing-up liquid and a full pack of sponges not at the best price. Planning, I pack a small 100ml refillable bottle with washing-up liquid, take a couple of small low-cost washing-up sponges and a couple of tea towels. costs me less than £1 to buy the sponges with everything else I already have at home. Saves me time and money.

Wipes

Another thing I cannot live without on holiday is anti-bacterial surface wipes. Again, it is inexpensive from a Supermarket at home but a resort mini market price will undoubtedly cost lots more. 1 pack of wipes is normally enough to ensure the work surfaces are wiped down before and after preparing snacks and is also great for getting rid of sticky fingers!

Plastic cups

In my experience, there just are never enough cups for us all. I just find that no matter where we go and how big the apartment is, there just aren’t enough cups for 5. So I pop a few small Ikea plastic cups in my case to make sure, they take up hardly any space and certainly no weight and means one less argument at the apartment.

Food and drink

OK, So like I said I’m not cooking a meal in my room… It’s a very rare occurrence if I do. But there will always be someone hungry so we do tend to make sure we have a few snacks in. I always pack a packet of biscuits and some cereal bars, again, they don’t take up much space and weight but are handy to have. When you arrive and everyone’s famished, a small snack can put you on until you have a chance to find the nearest mini-market.

As for drinks, I cannot cope without coffee in the morning. A small jar of instant coffee is enough for me but for the hubby who has milk and sugar we tend to take a few sugar sachets we’ve picked up and then we only need milk when we go out and buy a box of cereal. To make it less boring than just flavoured water in the room, I also usually take a small squeezy squash packet with us to flavour up drinks a little bit and make sure everyone stays hydrated.

Clothes washing

Travelling with kids will always end up in dirty clothes. It’s just one of those laws of the universe and there’s no getting away from it. It’s always handy to make sure I’ve got some travel washing liquid handy. Either pegs or a small retractable washing line with pegs is also useful. Not only helps with washing clothes but also drying swimwear instead of hanging things over the balcony railings.

That’s my small but essential Self-Catering packing list. Nothing too expensive, nothing that takes up much weight. But all to make life a little bit easier and help you have more time to enjoy your break. If you’re still on the fence as to what board to stay on, check out my post discussing All-Inclusive or Self-Catering

Thanks for reading!

Becky x