Camping - A lot of hard work?

[laughinggnome]

So we are looking at cheap holidays - newspaper deals, weekends away that sort of thing. Then I thought "Ooooh camping - just need to buy at tent and Bobs your uncle!".

But nooooo - theres airbeds and cooking stuff and crockery and cutlery and clothes and electricity hook up gizmo stuff and then clothes and then washing up bowls and duvets/ sleeping bags and apparantly - get this - Tents don`t even come with a toilet!

Sounds like a lot of hard work for a minibreak!

AIBU? Or am I missing something?

Decent HOT showers & my ghillie kettle for decent coffee on tap and I love camping. Tent must be 100% waterproof (we tend to stay on the s.wales coastline).

Remove access to a decent HOT daily shower or my coffee and I'm SO miserable!

We have £1 camping mats and a cheap 4 man/ 2 section tent and love it. It's ideal for an asd child as you can take stuff that's familiar to them (like the dog and his tiger hot water bottle). It's far less stress than a hotel would be. Although there are only 2 of us we prefer to take a friend for extra company.

I rec' Primark fleece PJ's and will prob upgrade our cheapo value sleeping bags to posh ones when I have the money. Take crocs for the shower block.

I think it's one of those things that is as much work as YOU choose to make it. If you want to rub 2 twigs together to start the fire and catch your own rabbits you can, or you could just head to the chippy ; )

Get a tent you can put up in a hurry, rather than an all singing all dancing that takes 3 hours to erect in the pouring rain. Take a good book, and choose a site that has access to a trampoline or other play facility for children and let them get on with it while you chill. If you are taking small children an onsite laundrette can sometimes be a godsend. Look after your gear and you can use it year after year.

Youth hostels can also be good on a budget - many have family rooms.

I have camped twice in France alone with my DD 2.5yr old first time and 3.5 yr second time. Weather was mixed and had some heavy downpours second time round but we loved every second! I only have a small hatchback too and managed with clever packing (and DD squashed in the back in her carseat!) to take loads both times including tent, beds, duvet, toys, books, fridge, food for 2 weeks! gazebo, camping stove, bottle of gas clothes, elec hook up etc

I have a Tesco cheapy tent (£35 4 man) which i back up tarpaulin slung over if it looks like really heavy rain - okay we look homeless but it works!

You can bag a cheap cooker from B&M, tesco or the likes (we went for top of the range-ish camping Gaz one and was about £50 and is fab - can do toast on the grill which was a must for me!)

I take a blow up bed (put some yoga/camping mats under it for insulation - and use my duvet. DD sleeps in with me and she is always too hot and thows all covers off and/or strips off!

Food wise we do a mixture of eating 'in' at the tent and eating out on campsite restaurant - if you don't want to buy a stove could just take BBQ - so long as campsite allows!

Camping is fab for getting away from it all and just reconnecting with your child/ren and I definitely recommend it. The first trip is the dearest cos of all the outlay on new stuff but once you have it each trip is cheaper obviously.

If you are unsure maybe book a site with lots to do - Haven have a fab deal on at the moment til end Jan think it's something like £6 a pitch per night and you can access all the entertainment, indoor pools and restaurant etc.

WE are a family of 7. For me, a hotel stay = stress city trying to ensure that the children do not get too loud and boisterous and disrupt the other guests. Trying to get everyone up and sorted to be eat breakfast at the set times and that they sit nicely etc in the restaurant. It also means me and DH having to be quiet in the evenings with the TV/lights on low so as not to disturb the DC who will be in the same room (certainly the younger ones) and worrying contsantly that the older ones in an inter connecting room (you can't get 7 person rooms) have escaped and are wandering through the hotel.

For me camping = all the hard work at the start and end of the holiday to pack and erect the tent and to take down the tent and unpack but in the middle it is BLISS. The kids can run free, get grubby, have adventures and make new friends. The fresh air and exercise makes them tired so they go to bed at a decent time. Me and DH can then sit in the "living area" of the tent or even outside if it's warm enough and actually finish a conversation together. WE can listen to music and enjoy a glass of wine. We have our own room so have more privacy and can even have (very quiet) "relations" ;-)

We've taken the little ones from around 3 months and it's fine if you make sure they're warm at night.

Guess it's like marmite though, you either love it or hate it

@ zest's (very quiet) "relations"

viviPru the chair is old and I can't remember exactly what it is, a gelert one but much more comfy than my friends. Next time your dog is playing on my beach let me know and I'll take you up to the army surplus store in Sarnau and show you . I'm always so jealous of people who get to stay at Fforest, it's a little bit too expensive when we could walk home.

Too much like hard work for me.

Takes ages to pack the car then put up the tent, and then repeating the whole process at the end. Far too long to be faffed for a short break, but I can't bear camping for more than 3 nights on the trot.

then you need to buy things to cook on, decent sleeping bags, we found the air mattresses to be worse than useless so bought army camp beds to sleep on so more £££.

I need to pee at least once in the night and hate hate hate having to get up in the dark, pull on wellies, jumper etc and trek to loos or find a bush out of sight.

I end up feeling grubby even if there are showers to wash at.

DS wakes up at the crack of dawn because its light.

From the amount we spent, and the times we went camping before I said no more ( twice ) I reckon we could all have stayed at the Ritz for the weekend.

Now if you had said caravanning - I am a complete caravan convert, not our own mind, a static caravan at a nice site.

You're jealous lost? You mean you get to call Poppit YOUR beach and you're the jealous one? I've got so much for you right now I can practically see my skin turning green, Incredible Hulk style. You lucky, lucky thing

Fforest was amazing - our first two nights in the leaking tipi were wretched, but things looked decidedly rosier when we were upgraded to a crogloft...

Vivi in the summer we camp at Poppit and I go to work from there (via my house for a shower), just sayin' .

If you do camping on the cheap, then it is uncomfy. I love camping, but then i have spent a fortune on camping gear, sewn in groundsheet, carpet, remote control lights, electric hookup, heater, television etc.

The plus side is i can afford to go away to somewhere we can fish, every time i am off work and take my dog.

Ive just googles bell tent OH MY GOD I LOVE THEM AND WANT ONE! they are beautiful, we were going to buy a tent and now I know which one. Has anyone used them? are they good?

You should go camping, its lovely. youl feel free, really free, there will be no time frame. Just be.

airbeds - YES but they come in handy for teen sleepovers at home.
and cooking stuff and crockery and cutlery TAKE NOT-BEST STUFF FROM YOUR KTCHEN. GET A CHEAP BRIEFCASE ONE RING BURNER TO BEGIN WITH.
and clothes NOTHING SPECIAL NEEDED
and electricity hook up NOT NEEDED
gizmo stuff YES, GIZMOS ADD TO THE FUN
then washing up bowls TAKE THE ONE FROM YOUR SINK
and duvets/ sleeping bags TAKE YOUR ORDINARY DUVET

Borrow stuff til you know whetehr or not you enjoy camping.

hate having to get up in the dark, pull on wellies, jumper etc and trek to loos or find a bush out of sight. IT'S DARK, GO BEHIND TENT. OR HAVE A LITTLE BUCKET IN YOUR TENT.

Remote control lights? A TV?

Please. let me never camp next to anyone with a TV.

Ah - that's why I avoid the EHU area

Oh just button it will you, lost

knitted you ought to check out Emma Bradshaw's blog for some hardcore bell tent action...

vivi- that link is out of service :(

We've been since the bairns were about 4m old (oldest is now 4.5) and they and we love it - while out walking in the park the other day, DD2 was asking when we could go again (when it was blowing a gale and bitter cold outside!). We squoosh all five of us into a cosy four-man which we got off ebay second hand - SIG vango), we chuck in as many blankets as we can fit in the car, and we snuggle in together and it's fab! Even in the pissing rain it's great.

Oh, and what Indie says in her list (minus the gizmos - not necessary but fun and useful if you have the spare dosh):)

Really? Works for me. Never mind. Just google Emma Bradshaw. But only if you are prepared to expose yourself to sickeningly unattainable images of perfect family bell tent heaven

Sorry Vivi, I married a local purely because I love that beach so much

On a more helpful note, Aldi often have camping kit considerably cheaper that normal if you keep an eye out for their offers. We have an Aldi camping kitchen, axe, lights and 5 SIM's which saw us comfortably round Europe. If you wait for the offers then you can get by very cheaply. (Or just go to Decathlon with someone else's credit card!)

Has he got a brother?!

And a camping table set, forgot about that.

Emma Bradshaw link works just fine for me but I am not looking any further as we couldn't be any less like them.

Vivi, he's got two...

i camped out in the back garden with ds and i hated it, i had an airbed and quilt ect wasn't cold......just very bored

Oh I love camping, and this is coming from someone who would rather stay at home than stay in a dodgy hotel if I've got the choice. I do however think that you need to do it properly to enjoy it. Properly doesn't need to be expensive so much, but you need to plan - you need to stay warm and dry. I've been camping for a couple of years, but still take my home duvet and pillows, for example.

I like quiet sites, so my set-up is bell tent, wood burner stove, storm kettle, and only go places where I can have a campfire. Even those basic places have toilets and showers. It's brilliant to get away from everyday stress, computers, deadlines. Gettting up when it's light, going to bed after finishing the wine around the fire when it's dark.

Before splashing out on kit, why not try somewhere that might not have all the things you'd want, but would give you an idea before committing? Madly expensive imo, but Jollydays seems to have everything, or the more normally priced bell at Welsummer. I do however appreciate that I'm coming from a back-to-nature point of view, so pointless advice if you're more into children's clubs etc.

Not surprising, surely McHappy? What did you think would happen if you just moved your sleeping place 50m to the outdoors? The essence of camping (IMHO) is getting away from your usual creature comforts, letting the kids run and run, and sitting round a campfire - (essential for UK camping, again, IMHO)