SURVIVING THE SUMMER: Well, we're back. Holiday safely over, all members of family home in more or less one piece, and another few discoveries for the bank of experience as to what makes a reasonably successful family break, writes Caroline Murphy.

Sun helps of course, and this year we had bucketfuls of that. Courtesy of the wonderful low air fare trend, we managed to get much further south in France than we would have been prepared to drive before, so it was pretty well sun and swimming all the way.

A buzzing camp-site does the business too. There was a great pool complex, with some good sports competitions for the younger ones. And for the older kids - well, we had been told that where we were going was something of a mecca for teenagers, and so it turned out. Plenty of action every evening with shows, discos and pool tables, but the bracelets indicated age, and so, if you kept away from the small groups hanging around with cans, there was safe, drink-free fun until the small hours.

An all-singing, all-dancing cash card wouldn't have been a bad addition either, but on that one we had to compromise. The supermarkets helped our cause mightily, but the well-stocked shop on the site did its best to persuade us that, never mind the cost, convenience was all that mattered. French convenience translates as €1.60 for a tin of beans and more than €9 for a Romantica.

As it turned out, what we didn't need on our holidays, believe it or not, was all our luggage. We had packed so carefully. You know the way - military precision interspersed with screaming fish-wife and Fawlty Towers.

The law was declared that all towels would be shared out between us, with each person carrying a case for clothes and one piece of hand luggage packed with all the bits and pieces that would normally get chucked into the car. The only extra was the tennis bag. This, of course, was for ease of checking and tracking, and so the bags got counted into the taxi, out of the taxi, on to the luggage belt, and off at Gerona, in Spain.

But when we got there, there was one missing. Mine.

The bag had been mishandled at check-in at Dublin Airport, it seemed. It could have gone anywhere, it might have gone nowhere. It might turn up. It mightn't. No one knew. Consternation. At least it wasn't anyone else's bag. I don't think I could have coped with that - along with all the attendant angst and gnashing of teeth as to how on earth one could survive a fortnight without "all my clothes!".

Anyway, there would have been no point making the rules if I didn't get to break one or two, and so, while I had been declaring that under no circumstances could anyone consider going beyond their alotted bag, I had dumped a few bits of my own stuff onto the unsuspecting youngest. It wasn't much - a dress, a few bits of underwear and one T-shirt, but when you are coming from nothing . . .

In retrospect, I can now declare that every single time you come home from holiday saying, "Why did I bother (with all that luggage), I didn't need half of it", you are right - you don't need it.

I could have gone wild and said hang the expense, let's buy all round and hope for the insurance to fly. But I hit lucky with two tops and a short, comfortable skirt in a sports shop on the way to the campsite, found a nicer bikini than my own in the supermarket on day two, and few market T-shirts on day three.

Normally, as soon as you pick the things out of your case that you feel comfortable in when the heat comes you just wear them to death. In and out of the sink, and on and off you. Too much like work to do anything different.

But could you have packed just those few bits? Well, that's another story. You could have I suppose, if you'd known which few things you would need, but that is always a mystery which is revealed only when you arrive and get the feel of the destination. And so you continue to travel heavy, wear light, and yet somehow come home finding that everything needs to be washed.

And that is where we are now, surrounded by piles, heaps and mountains of dirty clothes. They're the ones which make you wish you had never gone. And of course it's raining outside, so drying is a problem.

But guess what? Dragged into the kitchen yesterday, taking its turn in the piles process, there was one suitcase whose contents, whether worn or unworn, were not contaminated by damp towels and sun cream. Which suitcase? Mine, of course. What can I say? It never went away you know. Oh happy days. I'm with Michael O'Leary on this one - next year, it's hand luggage all the way.

Caroline Murphy is a broadcaster and mother of six