Some things change, some don't!
Having virtually given up on caravan holidays mainly because it's little effort to get on a plane and go somewhere that can more or less guarantee the weather and a change of culture too if desired, I suddenly found myself delighted I had for many years only half heartedly attempted to sell my 18 year old caravan which has probably had no more than 10 weeks use in the last 10 years. I do love the caravan , I love the intimacy in my little den. We enjoy evenings sat having home prepared food and drinks...eating out can bring complications such as who drives plus then there's the usual disappointment that the food was no better than cooked yourself. In terms of facilities, we have everything I can possibly think of and can't think what the latest innovation is that might tempt me to buy a new one. I can guarantee there isn't one. A motor mover might be nice but it wouldn't be worth the cost of fitting one on a van so old.I'll just have to get some more reversing practice in, after all you need it on the road on rare occasions..or at least they used to be...traffic has increased considerably and drivers are less forward thinking it seems to me nowadays.
Anyway, we got to Borrowdale and back home without any issues, it was a bit like riding a bike if I'm honest.
I had wondered what the situation would be in terms of the breakdown between caravans and motorhomes and to be honest I was staggered just how much the balance has changed. Hardly a caravan to be seen and everywhere you looked there were some really impressive and expensive looking motorhomes.
Two issues I felt didn't quite look right was that some of the biggest and best pitches where taken by small motorhomes and someone pitching up with a caravan and awning might have to struggle to find a suitable pitch to fit them on.I don't know if there are measures in place to make sure it doesn't happen, we were lucky and had an excellent pitch but it was the last one that was suitable to be honest so the luck of the draw. The other issue was "no shows". It's an age old discussion on should it be allowed to book as many sites as possible over the course of a year then decide if you want to go nearer the time depending on weather, the possibility of now being able to go abroad etc etc. The one thing that is certain though is it's not fair on other members or the site wardens if people simply don't show up. The site full sign was placed outside the camp on many evenings and yet there were several, as many as five and perhaps more without looking too hard, were empty. The implication for the warden is that they have to work later than they should have to, and it's more evident at weekends, because they still don't know if everyone will turn up. Surely it's not too much to ask those who are likely to be late to ring ahead is it? And as for members booking sites maybe a strict cancel up to 14 days in advance free of charge but after that pay a forfeit. We left the site a day early because of a storm warning and forfeited our prepaid night without complaint.Anyway, having made that trip we have now planned a second longer, more complex one that has us touring Scotland..somewhere I have wanted to do for many years and possibly the reason I hung on to the van. Covid for all it's misery has at least opened the opportunity to do this trip as there are few alternatives other than a staycation.The campsites are largely full. I booked mine in advance but have tweaked the plan as time has progressed. I have to say it's a bit nerve wracking when you see a day become available at the site you want and yet before you can book it you have to delete the day you already have booked elsewhere. Probably unlikely but you could find yourself without a booking at all if someone got there ahead of you. Perhaps the answer is to do the changes at 3am when it's unlikely there is anyone else looking!! Again, perhaps if the sites were not booked by those who are unlikely to take up the booking it would also help too.
Anyway, I'm looking forward to reaquainting myself with a couple of sites and discovering some new ones too. The one thing I can say is that I confidently expect that the Club sites will be as good as they ever have been. I'll post some reviews!
Comments
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Glad to hear you had a good trip, Dave.
Just a few things spring to mind. Apart from there being no differential in pitch sizes either on paper or in cost, there's no knowing what pitches were available when the small campers arrived, and the larger ones may have been all that were available.
No shows are dealt with by the club and sanctions imposed if necessary so you need have no concerns there. Arrivals are only accepted until 8pm (much to the disgust of a few) so there shouldn't be a need for wardens to work beyond that time.
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Welcome back, Dave. Enjoy revisiting Club sites, but bear in mind that there's another world of other sites out there when are run in different ways. Have a look at the Small Private Sites list in the UK section on here if you would like some variety.
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I agree with Tinwheeler, your comments seem odd unless you went to the trouble of asking the small motorhomes which pitches were available when they arrived
Also did you ask the wardens if they were expecting later arrivals? Lots of the sites are not selling all pitches at the moment due to COVID restrictions
Lastly you complain about empty pitches but then say you left a day early so maybe someone was like you on the night your pitch was booked but left empty presuming someone had not turned up
It is not a perfect world or system but I think the thing is not to let things worry you which you pretty much have no control over
Enjoy Scotland and most importantly stay safe and protect others around you
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Hope you enjoyed your recent time away, and choose to get more use out of your outfit😁
To be honest, I wouldn’t look too deeply, or speculate around things like size of pitches, or why some pitches might be empty. There are all sorts of ponderables to consider, the Club tends to be on top of most things regarding usage, so the visitor’s main aim is simply to have a good time and enjoy oneself.
We have a small motorhome, but love a pitch as big as we can get if we have the choice. Thankfully the Club gives us this option. Size of outfit is a personal choice, if we found the Club shoving us into a tiny corner every visit, then we wouldn’t stay Members for very long😁
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We were once shoehorned onto a pitch at Shrewsbury, mainly because we had a relatively small caravan. It's a AS site, one of Morris's. Never been back, never intend to.
Borrowdale site is a peculiar one. We were there in 2019. Wouldn't want a pitch under trees so we would compromise on size, but that would be a choice we made. We were like you Dave, lucky. Great site for us as walkers.
Agree with previous "don't worry about things you can't control" posts. As you are obviously not adverse to using your own facilities try some CLs. There are many nowadays that have hardstandings and even full service ones. There is a "Sticky" in the C.L. section on this forum detailing those that offer full serviced or enhanced pitches. Opens up more sites for your visiting.
Hope you enjoy the newly refound bug.
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Interesting replies especially those advising to try CL's. My current caravan is 18 years old( bought new) but I have had others and have been a club member for 43 years!!!!!
As far as late arrivals and the wardens are concerned, yes I guess they could say 8pm is a deadline but at Borrowdale the wardens choose to try and do their best for everyone and yes, the no showers were just that. Expected but didn't arrive.The wardens didn't stand down but waited unnecessarily.
As for pitch size and suitability, I did ask the question on this forum before we left. If you book a pitch with an awning can you be assured you will get one? Of course the pitches vary tremendously at Borrowdale and some are certainly not really suitable for an awning. On the other hand I have booked non awning pitch at Bunree in the hope of getting a loch side pitch which nearly all the non awning ones are. At the price I'll be disappointed if one isn't available, especially as I have no use for the facilities! That said that's one advantage a motor home has that I can see is you can be sat behind the wheel ready to pounce the minute a pitch you fancy becomes available. Bit slower in a caravan!
Anyway, nice to read the responses .Cheers everyone.
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Hi folks.
Thank you for your posts, but I closed the thread a little while back to do some cleaning....... in fact quite a lot of cleaning. 🙂
Please avoid critical comments about individuals (and comments about such comments!!), and off topic posts that are of little or no reference to the original post. Please be kind and considerate to other posters. I always do my best to consider, that when I write things down, I can't always get the mood or emotion of my post over to folk as easily as I can when speaking to someone in person - I have to be doubly careful - it's easy to offend.
I'll open the thread back up now but please consider the Community Guidelines and be considerate to others so as to avoid having the thread closed permanently. I hope you are all happy with that, but if not, please contact the Community Manager directly rather than discuss it here, which, of course, is against Community Guidelines. 😉
Have a good Saturday evening, everyone. It could be worse.... it could be Eurovision again. 😃😃
David
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As far as choice of pitches is concerned I’m sure the site staff manage this accordingly when needed. They will know the size of vans arriving and length of pitches available on a daily basis. Some times those of us will longer outfits will have to sacrifice that much loved ‘choose pitch on arrival from those that are free’ for an ‘allocated’’ one, particularly at busy times or we are arriving late in the day. Of course the less desirable pitches are the last to go but as long as we have a pitch on which we fit then the rest may just be sour grapes! Oh, the early bird doesn’t always catch the worm mind, some folk pay the extra day and leave when they want. This happened to us at Bunree a few years back, they pulled off and we pulled straight on at 5pm on to possibly the best pitch on site. Just roll with the times, enjoy the bank holiday folk, the weather for once is excellent.
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I think everyone has there own idea of a good pitch. I tend to try an avoid trees, fairly close to a CDP, but not right next door, as flat as possible, and check to make sure the pitch isn't going to be on the route that leads to somewhere, to avoid it being a short cut.
After saying that, because we usually book full serviced pitches these days, and because when we go for our short 3-4 day visits, we are not able to leave home until after midday, it usually means hobson's choice when we eventually arrive at site.
Talking of wardens and management, Mickysf, a couple of weeks back we went up to Bridlington. Two days before (I think it was) we had a phone call from the wardens asking us what time we were expecting to arrive as they were expecting a very large arrival contingent. They also offered us the chance to pay over the phone, to quicken up the process and to avoid contact (Covid). On arrival, the process was very quick an smooth.
David
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I guess that’s the management I’m referring to, David. When needs are an absolute must you can expect the likes. And that was on a large rather modern site where the vast majority of pitches are relatively large. Maybe a sign of the times and this management may need to be adopted more often in these C times. Only ever really come across it in the regularly on site like Borrowdale and Lower Wensleydale.
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Also Berwick Seaview. A benefit when we had a caravan as pitches we prefer were available to us. With a shorter MH and fairly full site they were not, although still empty. We found a perfectly adequate pitch however and I totally understand the reasons on a fairly cramped site with some smaller than average pitches.
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I have been allocated a pitch three times on CMHC sites, once opposite a large shed and the toilet block. I didn't mind as I was only staying for one night, but if you are allocated an undesirable pitch due to weather conditions or overcrowding and are staying for longer then you can always ask that you can move once another pitch become available.
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I think a other problem that sites have, is that some don't have an especially long access road, which means if there is a glut of units arriving at the same time, the access road queue could very well spill over onto a road, which could cause problems. I'm totally OK with someone ringing me up to estimate arrival times..... the problem is, there are whole and of 'unknowns' that occur once you hit the road which could effect the arrival time. The best anyone can aim for is an estimate. However, if I said I would arrive between 3 & 4pm and I got delayed, I would ring to let them know..
David
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I bought my van from a couple who had just bought it and then split up. I don't really care about it but I love birdwayching and the van has allowed me years of trips.
The more detail you start to consider about caravannig the more it puts me off. I just get the van and go birding. Not bothered about the technical but the sites are always great.
when it breaks I will give up.
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What a great down to earth approach 👏🏻👏🏻
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Fingers crossed that the caravan with give you plenty of years of service. I remember a few years ago going to Glenfield Caravan Park at the end of August 2017, just north of Leeds and seeing so many Red Kites
http://www.glenfieldcaravanpark.co.uk
.....and a few weeks ago, our visit to Grafham Water CAMC site, which has it's own resident owl. We didn't see it, but certainly heard it at night!! 😃😃
David
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We started (we sort of) the year we got married. We started with a small ridge tent, eventually upgraded via various tents to a trailer tent, and then a caravan. We've travelled all over Europe, wher we tend to favour Province Italy and the Mosel/ Black Forest areas of Germany. I have to say, we haven't been over to Europe since 2016, but will probably wait a little until Brexit and Covid are a little further down the line.
We love the UK too, and have taken the caravan all over - and it means we can get some shorter Sunday lunch to Thursday breaks in. Went to Bridlington CAMC site the other week and Grafham Water the week after lockdown was lifted. Off to Green Acres, just N of Carlisle, very soon. An opportunity to nip over to the Scottish borders. Haven't taken the van to the Outer Hebrides (where our daughter and son-in-law lives.... we usually rent a cottage), and have never taken the van accross to Ireland - but never say never.... 😃
David
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