Campervan packing hints and tips please!

[WhoahThereCrazyHorse]

First campervan holiday next week, travelling around Scotland. VW Canpervan with 3m awning, can I have people’s top tips please!!! We are campers but this feels a bit different.

Can I ask where in Scotland you are going? We are thinking of driving our campervan there but all everyone tells us is we will be eaten alive by midges! We've also found campsite seem quite expensive. Is that normal or are we looking in the wrong places?

As for packing tips..... We are still refining our packing abilities. You need to be ruthless and pack light. We have found a small suitcase to be a bit better than a holdall, it can sit underneath the bed when it is folded out so easy to get to in the morning. Also pack outfits rather than just a heap of clothes.

Vacuum bags for bedding and microfibre towels. Use tea-towels to stop the rattles. If you’re hiring, unpack quickly and leave cases or holdalls in your car.

5 of us usually travel for 6 weeks in the summer in our VW T2 (it's small!!). Sleeping bags and blankets, stored in large IKEA blanket storage bags with zips. Plastic storage boxes with lids for kitchen things, food and everything else. These can stack easily in the van and also outside under the awning at night, we don't have an awning so ours need to stay watertight in the rain.

For clothes we have big Northface bags with drawstring PE size bags to separate everyone's pants, socks and tshirts. Bin bag for dirty clothes.

We also carry a small 2 man tent to put up and store our stuff if we go out in the van for the day and if all 5 of us are in the same place for more than one night we will often sleep in it too so we also bring a few self inflating mattresses.

Have a wonderful time!

• Put heavy items as low as possible
• Try to place things you don't use very regularly in the places which are annoying to get to (in the back of lockers, under bed etc).
• Try and put heavy items over the axles as much as possible, and try not to put ALL the heavy items towards the back/ front. You want the weight spread over each axle as evenly as possible
• Store tins/ heavy things which could roll as low as possible, and put them in bags or boxes to stop them rolling
• Try not to carry many extras for plates/ mugs/ glasses, and put the extras in secure boxes so they can't rattle around.

Proper plates feel better to eat off than any alternative, only take the minimum and put a sheet of kitchen roll between each plate/bowl to stop rattles and stop them sliding over each other.

Use kitchen towels to pack around glassware and pans to stop rattles and prevent breakage.

Packing cubes (Amazon Basics range) for clothes, and a couple of spares for dirty clothes.

Read up on the latest news for holiday travel in Scotland and the various blogs, forums and groups. Be aware of the actions the Police have taken the last few weekends on busy lochside roads to deal with overcrowding of parked vehicles and camping. I would aim to avoid the tourist Hot Spots (Trossachs) and stay off the busiest tourist routes (NC500).

Plan ahead when you are in remote areas as you may not be able to find a supermarket.

We packed into boxes, these stacked better in the van and then worked as extra surfaces in the awning for putting stuff on.

@chocolatepudandchocolatesauce, we are in Scotland right now (though not in a camper van!) and we have barely seen any midges so far.
I had bought special spray and nets too!

@bigTillyMint thanks, that's good to know. We found a website that does midge watch and it is showing the worst are in the west, so may stick to the north and east :)

Thank you everyone, some great tips to bear in mind.

Chocolatepud we are going north east, Moray Firth and Cairngorm national park. I get eaten alive by midges whenever there are any around, so I’m apprehensive about that element. So much so that I started a separate thread which had an unfortunate autocorrect so talks about ‘midgets’ 😱

@chocolatepudandchocolatesauce, eek! We are off west tomorrow!
Have you got a link to the site?!

midge website

Looks like we may go via Edinburgh outskirts, Falkirk, Aberdeen. I'd like to go to John O'Groats...... So some places in between I guess too.

Just back from Arran/loch Lomond
Never saw a Midgie, Got three small bites on my elbow, only one bitten out of six of us.
If you are going on any ferrys to the islands book now