Pixie Toadstool Posted March 13, 2008 Share Posted March 13, 2008 My son wants to come back on his own from France next month. He is a very independent 15 year old and I am quite happy that he is up to the journey etc. However, I can't find any way of getting him back as all routes seem to put a lower age limit of 16 to travel alone.Does anyone have any ideas or experience or is anyone I know out there travelling back to the UK on about 11th April, so that he can be accompanied?Thanks in anticipation!Pix Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cooperlola Posted March 13, 2008 Share Posted March 13, 2008 How times do change! I did this regularly from the age of 10 onwards, as did my mother before me. Hopefully somebody on here is doing the trip and will help. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pixie Toadstool Posted March 13, 2008 Author Share Posted March 13, 2008 It seems he CAN fly - with BA from CDG Paris to Heathrow and we have Tesco Clubcard vouchers which would pay for this. So there is at least one possibility. I suppose it's easier to fall off a boat than an aeroplane - do you think that's how they'd justify it? [blink]I know Cooperlola - we could do most things when we were young and generally learned how to be streetwise at a very young age!Pix Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cooperlola Posted March 13, 2008 Share Posted March 13, 2008 You might try posting on "covoiturage"http://covoiturage.fr/to see if anybody is doing the trip. But of course, you don't know the people involved. But then again, I guess you could say the same about forum posters...Given how grown up teenagers seem to be now, it's amazing what they're not "allowed" to do, isn't it? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rose Posted March 13, 2008 Share Posted March 13, 2008 Flybe allow this but not sure if the routes are any good [:)] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pixie Toadstool Posted March 14, 2008 Author Share Posted March 14, 2008 Thanks Rose! I have now booked him with Flybe from Rennes but it costs about £85 single all in!! Would have been nice to get him on the ferry to Portsmouth for £20-30 or whatever which is so close to the main line station! I am happier about him navigating the trains in the UK than in France which is why I chose this route as opposed to getting him to CDG from Basse Normandie (which would actually have been much cheaper with the Tesco vouchers!).Interesting that this idea is being mirrored in the other thread about Scarlett - who was also 15. When I think what I got up to when I was 15 and my dad never knew!! Maybe he should have wrapped me up in cotton wool - I certainly put myself in great danger but somehow my guardian angel must have protected me! I hope I have taught my son to use his intuition - something I very much believe in. If it doesn't feel right then it probably isn't!! Pix Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rose Posted March 14, 2008 Share Posted March 14, 2008 Hi Pixie - glad to have been of service. Your thoughts echoed my own... I have 2 step children and their mum takes them to airport in the UK and we collect them here... they're 15 and 13 and it did cross my mind that maybe our actions could be seen in another light. However, they will be making their 5th trip out alone soon and they are very happy and confident about it. I can remember going to school on my own on the bus whilst still at Junior school at 10 years old and letting myself in after school with my sister when I was only around 6 years old as my mum worked (sister is 3 years older). I guess I would have concerns about leaving a 15 year old alone in the circumstances Scarlett was left in... but it does make you think doesn't it. Having said this I left home at 16 and shared a big house with some work colleagues and it was never considered unusual... but then I married 2 years later and that was also considered normal... but if our 15 year old announced such a thing now I would be horrified! Funny old world isn't it! [8-)] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Russethouse Posted March 14, 2008 Share Posted March 14, 2008 I honestly don't see how putting children on a plane when you know they will be met at their destination equates with being left in the care of a strange adult of the opposite sex in a strange country ...........Parents are forever mentally weighing the odds - what you are sugesting has very goods of success, leaving a child in a strange country in a area with a drink and drug culture, with what was essentially a strange man, does not.[8-)] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pixie Toadstool Posted March 14, 2008 Author Share Posted March 14, 2008 When I was 15 I went to school in Twickenham which was one of the centres of a drink and drugs culture then (anyone heard of Eel Pie Island?). I went to a very good school (at the time the best girls grammar in the area) but girls were pushing drugs there anyway. You could stay on and hang around in town after school and your parents would think you were at your friends whereas my friend and I were smoking pot at a local squat in the vicinity. Taking the bus home later my father would have had no idea what I had been up to. I went to parties with boys who drank and drove and went round roundabouts on 2 wheels, throwing us all over the place. I drank neat gin at a party and threw up all the way home. I collapsed on New Year's Eve on the way to meet my father picking me up because I was so Pi$$€d. I woke up one night at an orgy [+o(] (I was 16) and realised that things were going too far (luckily I wasn't participating in it but had fallen asleep because I was so stoned!). So I dragged myself up by my bootstraps for a while at least! Amazingly I survived!!My point is that these things can happen on your doorstep - not just on the other side of the world. Parents must keep their eyes and ears open to check their children aren't falling into bad ways. I could go on and on about the things I got up to in the early 70s but I won't because some of it is very shocking and yet here I am now - an apparently respectable middle class 50 year old with a degree, a family and the ability to earn plenty of money if I so wished. So what went right I wonder? Perhaps the morals that I was brought up with - I think they won out in the end plus (as I said) that good old guardian angel!Pix Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cooperlola Posted March 14, 2008 Share Posted March 14, 2008 Where did we go wrong, Pix?[:D] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pixie Toadstool Posted March 14, 2008 Author Share Posted March 14, 2008 [quote user="cooperlola"]Where did we go wrong, Pix?[:D][/quote][;-)] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Russethouse Posted March 14, 2008 Share Posted March 14, 2008 [quote user="Pixie Toadstool"]When I was 15 I went to school in Twickenham which was one of the centres of a drink and drugs culture then (anyone heard of Eel Pie Island?). I went to a very good school (at the time the best girls grammar in the area) but girls were pushing drugs there anyway. You could stay on and hang around in town after school and your parents would think you were at your friends whereas my friend and I were smoking pot at a local squat in the vicinity. Taking the bus home later my father would have had no idea what I had been up to. I went to parties with boys who drank and drove and went round roundabouts on 2 wheels, throwing us all over the place. I drank neat gin at a party and threw up all the way home. I collapsed on New Year's Eve on the way to meet my father picking me up because I was so Pi$$€d. I woke up one night at an orgy [+o(] (I was 16) and realised that things were going too far (luckily I wasn't participating in it but had fallen asleep because I was so stoned!). So I dragged myself up by my bootstraps for a while at least! Amazingly I survived!!My point is that these things can happen on your doorstep - not just on the other side of the world. Parents must keep their eyes and ears open to check their children aren't falling into bad ways. I could go on and on about the things I got up to in the early 70s but I won't because some of it is very shocking and yet here I am now - an apparently respectable middle class 50 year old with a degree, a family and the ability to earn plenty of money if I so wished. So what went right I wonder? Perhaps the morals that I was brought up with - I think they won out in the end plus (as I said) that good old guardian angel!Pix[/quote]As you say Pixie, your parents knew nothing about it - at least you knew if they found out there would be a problem and or they wouldn't be happy.Thank goodness my mother still doesnt know what I got up to, or where I went, luckily she is also still in blissful ignorance about my brother (even worse !) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Belle Posted March 21, 2008 Share Posted March 21, 2008 Rose can you tell me please what air-line your step children use, I ask because ryanair say that a child must be 14 to travel alone, and sixteen to accompany another child, I do know that BA allow children, but they charge to look after them, is this how yours travel. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rose Posted March 21, 2008 Share Posted March 21, 2008 Hi Belle - we use FlyBe... not sure if the routes are any good for you but our kids find it easy and there hasn't ever been a problem... good luck! [:D]Their website is www.flybe.com Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Belle Posted March 21, 2008 Share Posted March 21, 2008 thank you rose I will take a look Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PaulT Posted March 24, 2008 Share Posted March 24, 2008 [quote user="Pixie Toadstool"]When I was 15 I went to school in Twickenham which was one of the centres of a drink and drugs culture then (anyone heard of Eel Pie Island?). I went to a very good school (at the time the best girls grammar in the area) but girls were pushing drugs there anyway. You could stay on and hang around in town after school and your parents would think you were at your friends whereas my friend and I were smoking pot at a local squat in the vicinity. Taking the bus home later my father would have had no idea what I had been up to. I went to parties with boys who drank and drove and went round roundabouts on 2 wheels, throwing us all over the place. I drank neat gin at a party and threw up all the way home. I collapsed on New Year's Eve on the way to meet my father picking me up because I was so Pi$$€d. I woke up one night at an orgy [+o(] (I was 16) and realised that things were going too far (luckily I wasn't participating in it but had fallen asleep because I was so stoned!). So I dragged myself up by my bootstraps for a while at least! Amazingly I survived!!Pix[/quote]That's the problem with kids nowadays. All they can think of is their Playstations and skateboards. They do not know how to really enjoy themselves [:D]Paul Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Please sign in to comment
You will be able to leave a comment after signing in
Sign In Now