The Princess is in her room, spoon-feeding Gilbert jam, when the Maid enters with a postcard for her. The Princess can't read, so the Maid reads it out. It's from Great-Auntie, who is on holiday at the beach. The Princess loves the idea of the Great-Auntie's activities (building sandcastles, sunbathing, riding a donkey, sightseeing, and having ice cream every day) and wants to go on holiday too.
She enters the living room, where everybody is doing chores, and asks the King if they can go on holiday, but unfortunately, they can't as it's Spring Cleaning Day. So, she puts all her toys (and the pets) away in her closet for spring cleaning, and changes into her bathing suit, sunhat, and sunglasses. She then reasons that she's finished her spring cleaning first, and will therefore go on holiday with her inflatable toy crocodile Desmond.
She takes him out, but unfortunately the other toys and pets fall out of the closet. The narrator asks if she's going to be with Great-Auntie but the Princess says that she's going to "her very own seaside" instead. She packs a suitcase and heads out into the garden with the pets.
Outside, the Princess decides to sunbathe, since she isn't allowed to swim solo. She messily applies sun cream, then sunbathes for about three seconds. Then, she decides to go "sightseeing" in her own backyard, but has seen it all before. So, she decides to ride on Desmond in lieu of a donkey, but she accidentally knocks his valve open, and when she tries to reinflate him, she does it too much and he goes flying into a tree.
While the grown-ups continue to clean (and the Prime Minister tries to make it more fun by dressing in his Elvis costume), the Princess builds some sandcastles, but finds it boring. She then hears laughter coming from the castle and comes in to find the adults polishing their floor by tying the cloths to their feet and sliding along. The King invites her to join, but the Princess refuses since she's on holiday, yet she seems a little doubtful.
In the kitchen, the Chef and Maid are juggling packets of flour and putting them away. The Chef gives the Princess a picnic lunch, so she goes outside to eat it on a lilo. However, she throws away her sandwiches, cheese, and grapes and only eats the ice cream. The lilo deflates, with the Princess on it, sending her flying, and she grumpily declares that she doesn't want to be on holiday anymore, since the people who are working are having more fun than her. Great-Auntie then arrives home early, since she was lonely.
Back in the castle, the adults have formed a human pyramid to dust a spider web, but they fall over. Then, they go out and decide to be on holiday themselves. So, everybody has fun playing outside.
This episode provides examples of
- Accessory-Wearing Cartoon Animal: Puss wears a bandanna and sunglasses at one point.
- Beach Episode: Played with. Great-Auntie is at the beach, but offscreen, and the Princess wants to go to the beach but goes on a fake beach trip in the yard instead. It's also a completely kid-friendly version of the Beach Episode trope, as the characters involved are an old lady and a little girl.
- Cartoon Cheese: A block of Swiss cheese is in the Princess's lunch.
- Department of Redundancy Department: When the Princess is playing with Gilbert, she says, "Some jam and some jam".
- Gone Horribly Right: The Princesses succeeds in reinflating Desmond but does it too much.
- Incredibly Lame Fun: Subverted. The Princess initially seems to enjoy her "sightseeing" of looking at mundane things in the garden, but then grows bored of it.
- A Lizard Named "Liz": The donkey Great-Auntie rode was named Jenny. A jenny is the name for a female donkey. Perhaps this is why Great-Auntie thought "Doris" would have been a better name.
- Not So Above It All:
- The narrator is usually the voice of reason, but he still says, "Poor Desmond", when Desmond crashes into the tree, even though he's an inanimate toy.
- The Queen may be one of the more sensible adults, but she still joins in on the floor-sliding.
- The Maid is also one of the more sensible adults, and yet she plays with the sacks of flour.
- Obviously Not Fine: The Princess claims to be having fun... despite looking and sounding clearly bored.
- Ow, My Body Part!: When the Prime Minister is at the bottom of the human pyramid, he says, "Oh, my back!".
- Pun: The Princess says, "Buzz off!" to a fly.
- Shout-Out: Some of this episode's score is set to the tune of "Oh, I Do Like to Be Beside the Seaside".
- Slapstick:
- The King and Queen end up bumping into each other and falling down.
- The Princess ends up zipping along on the deflating lilo.
- When the adults form a human pyramid, they all fall over, including the Queen and Maid.
- Voiceover Letter: Not initially, but a few sentences in, the letter from Great-Auntie starts to change from being heard in "reality" with the Maid's voice, to being heard in Great-Auntie's voice.
