We decided to get an older model camera and found a Nikon refurbished P 500 (from ebay for just over £80 from Nikon themselves with a full 2 year warranty).
It's 12.1 megapixel, has a hinged LCD for shooting at odd angles. Lots of settings to play with.
The biggest thing I was looking for was optical zoom, digital zoon isnt worth a crap.
The P 500 has a 36x true optical zoom, which is more than 90% of other cameras even brand new models. And was much better than the old Olympus D-SLR it was replaceing with a 200mm lens.
The lens is equivalent to a 22.5mm to 810mm super telephoto 35mm format lens.
It can also shoot video at 1080p @ 30fps and isnt limited to a specific time like some canons etc... It also does slowmo video @ 120fps in 720p. You can take a still image whilst recording video and it has a micro HDMI socket to plug directly into your tv.
It takes SD cards upto 64gb, but I'm using a 8gb Eye-Fi card because I can't be bothered to keep digging out the USB lead. I have a bettery charger and spare batteries.
I know it's not new but it has the same warranty as a new one and for just over £80 it has features that even £200+ cameras dont have.
Here's some specs -
Nikon | Imaging Products | Product Archive - COOLPIX P500