Tenerife works well with children, but it works a lot better when the trip is actually built around them rather than adapted from a couples' itinerary at the last minute. A few things we've learned from planning family trips over and over.
The south coast, Costa Adeje, Los Cristianos and the calmer stretches around them, is the easiest base for families. It's a shorter transfer from the airport, the water in the bays is calmer, and there's the highest concentration of villas with pools that are actually fenced or shallow enough for younger children. A villa beats a hotel room for most of the families we work with: space to spread out, a kitchen for the meals a hotel restaurant won't do at half past five, and nobody complaining about noise through a shared wall.
The biggest mistake we see in itineraries built without help is trying to do too much. One outing a day, not two. Pool afternoons aren't wasted time. They're the reason the rest of the week works. Save the longer excursions, a day up to Teide or out on a boat, for once everyone's had a few days to settle in.
This is where the Holiday Pantry earns its keep with families specifically: cereal, snacks and meals kids will actually eat, waiting in the fridge on arrival, so day one doesn't turn into a stressed supermarket run with jet-lagged children in tow.
Loro Parque and Siam Park cover the big theme-park days if that's what your children want, but some of the best family days on the island cost nothing: the natural pools along the north coast, whale and dolphin boat trips from the south-west that keep even restless kids interested, and enough beach time that nobody's counting down to the next activity.
Tell us the ages, the nap schedule if there still is one, and what wore your kids out in a good way on the last trip that worked. That's most of what we need to build the rest.
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