First time campers (Help!) Dorset, July 2019

[SuziQ10]

Hello,
New to camping, but have got a tent and would like to use it this summer.
Family of 3, DD is 4yo and I think would love the outdoor style holiday.

Any recommendations for people new to the camping experience in Dorset?
Looking for a place to camp where we will be able to access amenities, if anything goes wrong / we don't have all the equipment. Also somewhere with nice showers and toilets. Somewhere not too basic, but beautiful location.
Any ideas ?
Thank you

&
Do we need to buy sleeping bags or can we just take duvets from home?

I am not familiar with Dorset campsites, hopefully someone will be along soon.

You absolutely can take duvets, however one advantage of a sleeping bag is that it goes underneath you as well as on top. Air beds are terrible for conducting tne heat away from you into the ground, or maybe conducting the cold up leaving you sleeping on a bed of cold air. So it is worth having extra insulation.

Many people like SIMS, self inflating mats, to sleep on and they are insulating. Or a picnic blanket under your air bed and a fleece blanket on top, underneath your sheet.

Or some people poke camp beds with a foam mat or SIM on top.

Apparently the haven site in Dorset is good from camping says Facebook. I’ve only ever lodged in Dorset so not help there apart from to say lul worth cove / Durdle door is like being aboard with the clear water and views.

We take air beds and sleeping a bags. We put a sheet on the floor of the tent under the air beds to try and stop the cold and take a fleece blanket.

The Shrubbery near Lyme Regis was great when we stayed there a few years ago. It’s got a good play area and crazy golf and a social club a short distance away that welcomes campers.

www.shrubberypark.co.uk/facilities.html

West Fleet Farm, Burnbake, Norden Farm or Highlands End Holiday Park

People love Eweleaze Farm, I believe it is in the cliff top overlooking the sea and has a path down to the beach.

It allows campfires, always a bonus IMO, but might only be open in August?

www.tomsfieldcamping.co.uk/

Lovely site. I can't remember what the toilets and showers were like, which is usually a positive thing!

My favourites in dorset are
Toms field - small site, lots of good walks,
Wareham Forest - bigger site with outdoor Pool
Woodyhyde - medium site, can walk to Swanage, has steam train running on edge of site, very Railway children!
Wilksworth - medium site - outdoor pool
Ewelease can confirm only open August

There’s tons to choose from, lucky to live where we do as Dorset is our weekend escape.

The Inside Park in Blandford Forum always seems well recommended. I also like Avon Tyrell - you can camp under the trees or by the lake and it has onsite activities like archery, ropes course and raft building.

Re night times - take as many fleece blankets as you can get your hands on and we use hot water bottles too.

We've just booked here Toilets look palatial. I'd recommend staying within a short drive of a decent sized town with a good supermarket, it means you have supplies nearby if you need them.

You can take duvets but we use sleeping bags as it cuts down on stuff in the car. We do take our home pillows though. Our sleeping bags are all two season ones, so are still warm if the weather turns cooler. If you book an electric pitch (you'll need a special camping cable to plug the household plugs in) you could take a slow cooker to eat from. Watch the total amps you're pulling though, I wouldn't recommend plugging a hair dryer in!! We also BBQ. Food can get expensive if you're eating out all the time. There's lots of great camping recipe stuff on the internet, it's worth thinking beforehand so you can plan as things take much longer to cook outside, especially on a camping stove.

Things we bought during/after our first camping trip...

• eye patches (we accidentally pitched within the reach of a floodlight)
• wind break
• warm, wind proof coats (it does get cold in the evening, even in summer, especially if there's no cloud cover)
• carbon monoxide detector (safety first and all that). You should never bring a cooling/cooled BBQ inside your tent.
• a camping kitchen to stand our stove on and to put food in. I would recommend some plastic boxes for food too, just to keep it clean and dry, save some empty Christmas choc boxes if you wanted. If you're near a supermarket, you don't need to buy much, just do small top ups.
• flip flops to wear to/in the shower
• a shower bag (any sort of plastic beach bag is fine) to hang on the back of the shower door. Super easy to carry everything in and it stops your clean pants ending up on the wet floor!
• consider camping mats (5+cm thick) rather than inflatable beds. They won't go down in the night (speaking from experience). Otherwise, check them before you go with some weight on them!
• Look up the opening hours of a local fish and chip shop

Riverside Lakes in Wimborne - we stayed in one of their glamping bell tents and enjoyed it so much we have now bought our own tent

We love Acton Fields - next to Toms Field but much quieter and has the bonus of the donut man (a bakery van that visits every morning)
I prefer a duvet because I don't like the feeling of being hemmed into a sleeping bag but your ds might g

...don't know what happened there!
Was going to say your ds might prefer a sleeping bag to stay cosy.
Dorset is beautiful - we've had very happy camping trips there.