'Wild camping' in a motorhome or van
Comments
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Peedee, take my final "final" word for it, as a frequent visitor to the area, TWs photo shot was out of date, the toilet block vanished along with the road in recent years and storms! The road has been replaced but not the facilities.
I find it weird that I put details on here and two people who haven't visited the area for quite some time start debating it!
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There you go then, 15 years and the memory playing tricks😄
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Brue, I was not debating the validity of your post at all but responding to PD. We have friends who live in Strete and last time we visited the road was impassable so I was not aware the central toilets were no more.
Do you want a final, final, final word?😄
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I dont think it is a question of standards, the question is how many chancers are their that would take advantage of the situation and IMO i think "financial significance" is irrelevant,
I was thinking more along the lines of e.g. 100 campers paying £30+ per night for a pitch with full facilities being available and some chancer in his £90K MH walking thru the barrier and paying nothing = a lot of unhappy campers
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Thing is jv there shouldn't be any "attacks" either way. That's breaking guidelines, is not debate and only leads to yet another closed thread. Always the same posters involved with petty bickering, no wonder any new posters don't stay for long.
JK
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If you decide to go down the PVC route JV, let us know. 👍 We might be able to help in choosing the sort of model to ensure you get it right in terms of parking up, emptying the waste tanks, etc.....at least in the UK.
😇😁
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We have seen, in other countries, installations where, to fill MH tanks, you needed to put either money, tokens or a credit card into the water dispensing machine, but dumping of grey waste was free, not sure about black waste.
Surely a system similar to this would not be too difficult to install in an aire type area, possibly behind a barrier outside a larger site? Entry to facilities, if not included in the aire fee could require a key, card or fob from reception.
In some countries, paid for or even free fill and dump facilities are provided at fuel stations and Mway services, and in rural areas at larger supermarkets. Have seen this in Norway and Sweden. These facilities are well signposted and supermarkets seem to do well out of providing these as people also shop there.
Lots of MHs in Scandinavia, wild camping is permitted over large areas, but I have not heard of waste being dumped antisocially.
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As noted on a UK club site facility block not long ago before covid, "please do not allow entry to those who say they have forgotten the code"
And as the warden explained they were fed up with those not on site expecting to use your facilities that you have paid to use,
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I find it weird that I put details on here and two people who haven't visited the area for quite some time start debating it!
Bru I was only ponting out that to the best of my memory there wasn't a toilet block there i 2006 either. The images on Google street view are dated 2011.
peedee
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I agree it is a problem at some sites, have seen it at Stonehaven where there are frequently MHs parked for days along the seafront. People just walk onto the site quite blatantly, and the wardens would not have time to watch and challenge them all. Probably a bigger problem at sites near a beach or a town.
There will always be those too mean,.or thick skinned enough, to wish to avoid paying their way, but I do think that if facilities were provided at a reasonable price in remote areas, there would be far fewer problems with antisocial waste dumping. Even more provision of public toilets would be a good thing in such places, what can motorists do when there is no provision?! Tourist areas cannot expect to attract the money if they do not provide sufficient facilities.
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I agree about toilets , in this area the LAs have closed many as to expensive to maintain ,because of mostly "low lifes activity" when attendants were removed ,as a cost cutting exersize, and we ate now in the position of having less rather than more
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Just because somebody has chosen to spend a lot of money on their MH does not mean that they should have to spend a load of money using a site that provides facilities they don't need or want; quite the reverse.
My own van carries enough fresh water for two people for 5-7 days and plenty of space for grey and black waste, and the on board systems don't need EHU. All we need is a place to park, and occasionally the ability to dump waste and refill with fresh water. In this respect the CAMC does not serve its MH member well if at all.
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It's been interesting reading many (not all by any means!
) of the comments posted.The problem with threads like this is that the some of the people the criticism is aimed at (in this case some MH owners) immediately get very defensive and take umbrage about the mistaken idea that they are all tarred with the same brush. (The same thing happens when some ... er ... "canine quadruped" owners are targeted.)
But just to give one example witnessed this week. In Perranporth, at the top of Droskyn Point is a parking bay opposite a large council controlled car parking area. There are signs saying "no overnight parking allowed" and yet this week, both early in the morning and again in the evening there are several camper type vans, presumably surfers, parked there. (They may, of course, move off overnight for all I know.) But there is never any evidence of litter or any other detritus left there.
On the other hand, along the lane where we park to walk the dogs on Penhale Dunes in the morning there has been a newish, smart looking MH parked up for tye last 3 days.This morning it has left and two bin liners of rubbish have been "bagged up" and left. On the other side of the hedge is something rather more unpleasant even than that.
Just one example of thoughtlessness which leads to the sort of comments made in this thread. 
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Before old age caught up with me I was an ardent "Wild Camper". Never did I leave any trace of having been there. Likewise others were acting responsibly. We never parked near villages or built up areas. Never flushed out out tanks. We could stay 2/3 days as self sufficient. Mind you there was not the general litter that is seen today. Perhaps the comments are targeted at the wrong people. It had nothing to do with freebies it was just the way we liked to do it. Each to its own.
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Incidentally, for those who so often complain about rip off parking charges in Cornwall, now's the time to come because all council owned car parks are free until May 17th. A very forward looking scheme by the county council to encourage folk back to towns and high streets and a stark contrast to our area of Wiltshire which, at the turn of the year, increased car parking charges!
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Surely your last sentence should read "in this respect the CAMC does not serve its MH member wanting that sort of facility well if at all" LLM?
Unless things have changed considerably over the past 18 months it always seemed to me that it served the majority of its MH members very well, judging by the increased numbers of MHs we used to see on sites.
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In this respect the CAMC does not serve its MH member well if at all.
what all of it's MH members?
Also you're talking as if people with a MH have to join the club. As been stated surely before joining (and especially re-joining) people will look at what's on offer (or what they got in the first year of membership) and decide is what the club offers for them? If all I wanted was a no facilities MH pitch, if that important to the way I toured then I would certainly ask if this was available before I joined. OK perhaps there are a small minority who don't but when why re-join in spades? And that is the proof that the club serves it's MH members well, by the amount that renew each year.
But as I see many MH on sites, and I assume they have not wandered in by accident, then it is serving it's MH members very well indeed.
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And just because somebody has spent a lot of money on purchasing a caravan does not mean they should subsidise MH owners by giving them free use of facilities. Many in the caravan fraternity use their own facilities whilst on site, but they still have to pay full pitch fee
Not used a club site for some time, but i guess not all facilities are controlled by key or fob obtained when you rent a pitch so as noted by others they are open to anyone who cares to wander onto the site and this would be free loaders parked on a pitch you want to be made available outside the barrier which you would like to have MH dumping facilities etc, which would have to be provided at a cost, managed, at a cost.
Maybe in the distant future these facilities will be made available if the club sees a revenue stream for providing these facilities, today they are provided by way of Special MH dumping tanks, filling facilities and yes you have to pay the pitch fee, i believe the club still do one night pitch hire, so as you indicate you are probably self sufficient for 5-7 days, but then why do you think the club or any other facility should allow you to replenish/dump FOC.
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just an area to park for the night and the use of the MHSP for a reasonable sum
Yes the club does that already!
Also there are plenty of CL's for even more reasonable sums that will cater for that as you have alluded to upthread (and posted that you have stayed on).
But as you're not a member and have said you're probably not going to be one why push for something you will not use?
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I think I may have mentioned this before , but anyway.....
In Sweden, in particular, many sites provide what they call "Quick Stop" pitches. These are in a small, separate area, have EHU and access to facilities, but cannot be taken till after 8pm and must be vacated by 9am. A one night stay only obviously.
These are mainly used by MHs, TTDA would appreciate such pitches, but are available to caravans. With long distances to travel to reach other countries, many MHs and caravans cover long distances each day, or just sight see as they go, and do not want to arrive early afternoon and leave mid morning, or pay the full fee for 12/13 hours on site. It seems a very popular offering.
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and probably the cost is the same as a basic CL?
the issue is why would (or should) the club who is currently selling, and more importantly filling, its pitches at a more higher rate offer or convert such pitches to be sold at a reduced rate? Isn't that loss of income for the club?
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Not necessarily, more pitches can be fitted in than when more space is required for awnings etc., so may well work out as the same income.
These pitches are not bookable a long way ahead, you just turn up at 8pm. If the area is full, you may be offered a space elsewhere.
If I remember correctly, the cost was about 1/2- 2/3 of the full site fee.
The advantage of these places, as opposed to many CLs, is that they are close to the main routes so no big detours required.
I am not suggesting that it needs to be CAMC who provides these pitches, any site with good "passing trade" could do so.
If it was not good business, sites would not provide this option. It could be a good business model for sites on routes such as the NC500.
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Well just for the record, I am a member of the club even though i seldom use club sites, my choice, something i see you are not.
I own a caravan not a MH, i often visit sites in the UK normally for nothing less than 2 weeks per visit and as like last year 1 site for 1 month, so i like to think that i pay my way for the facilities i use .
Like many others on this forum I have witnessed 1st hand the horrors of wild campers, I live by the coast, but i am not saying all wild campers are guilty of these horrors, but what is very evident is that these horrors are becoming more of the norm, and again as stated by others on this forum the problem is likely to get worse simply because more people have bought or indeed rent MH's and a lot of these people have probably never camped or been on a club site so they dont know how to conduct themselves in a way that is not offensive for others.
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The spacing is a red herring, the 6 meter rule between outfits would still apply.
So why should the club have potentially free pitches when it can sell them at a full(er) price?
It might be a good business idea over there but if it is such a good business idea why aren't there more of them over here?
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Can anyone explain why in what seems like every other country in Europe, there is no requirement for this 6m spacing ? Are vans and MHs in UK more combustable? Or are the users more careless?
While we would not want to use an aire or site where vans are tightly packed, we have felt perfectly comfortable on sites elsewhere, where spacing was more like 3m.
As regards why there are no similar facilities here, I think UK has a long way to go to catch up on what is offered elsewhere where MHs have been popular for much longer.
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" have also used the CDPs you refered to in Norway, I found many were colocated with garages for which there was no charge for the token when buying fuel"
now this seems to be a very good facility, a bit like using the air line in UK garages, except there is normally a nominal charge, and as most garages have toilet facilities probably not a lot of expense to link the facilities together, and of course it would encourage people to pull in and top up with fuel, and maybe buy goodies from the shop.
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,some it seems are more susceptible to doing it
