we will never hliday if we don;t have a tent so....

[BlueDragonfly]

what do i need to know?

what do i HAVE to have? Our tent will be mahoosive 8 sleeper and neither DP nor I have ever put up a tent before.(that big for plenty of space for all our stuff!! and that way we can have enough space if it rains the whole time)

Any cheap recommendadtions? We will be going with the DSs 5, 3 and 11 weeks#. ironically DS3 is the easiest as he is still in his moses basket!

I have HORRIBLE memories of trailer tent holidays waiting hours for the tent to go up, trekking ages to the freezing cold shower and eating beans and toast over and over again.

can you recommend any sites? web and camping lol! when i am looking for sites what do i need to look for?

I sugest that you go and chat with the people at your local camping sotre. Explain the size of the smily, that you need something swift and simple to put up with and have X amount in your budget. Hopefully they can guide you to the perfect tent!

Just got back from pitching ours at a camp. Left DH and kids there as I have to go to work but looking at the weather forecast for tomorrow maybe I am lucky to be working over the bank holiday

Definately blow up mattresses with a pump which you can charge up before you go and they just zoom up, none of this puffing and panting with those fott pump thingys.

We have built up our stock of edquipment over the years, so have some really good bits and pices and gadgerts, but perhpas foldaway table and chair set (quite reasonably priced) cokker and gas would be for starters,

Im sure once in the camping shop you will find loads of other stuff but you can get by with the basics for your first trip.

for sites try www.ukcampsites.co.uk I need to check that is the correct address and comke back in a mo.

god look at all my typos !!

it www.ukcampsite.co.uk and recommend it as you get proper reviews from people who have been recently. also type in your county and it brings all the sites up around you. it has loads of info and even achat forum thingy.

wehad a chat with the people in millets who were very helpful and suggested a few tents. i don't know anywhere else to buy a tent! (decathlon were utter rubbish - i don't want a pop up one!)

incidentally ours is a 6 berth and huge. if you go to a camping shop they will have the tents up on display, so you can get a reall feel of what its like, i.e sleeping quarters, headroom,, living area and storage, plus home many blinking guide ropes you need to put up in order to trip over after lol

FC i read it fine i have a broken finger so my typing is worse than normal!

will look at that site now, ty

hang on I will try to find mine, but lordy knows how you get it to link on here!...

if you go to that www.ukcampsite.co.uk and click on tent reviews, they will have all the different makes and customer reviews.

Mine (and certainly not saying its the one for you is a Gelert Lokon Vario 6.

Dont take much notice of the price, most of these tents with a bit of surfing around you can get for much less. For instance the one we have there is saying retail of 360 quid, but i can assure you we paid no more than 22o for it.

anyway, see how you get along, and i will be glad to help out with anything else

forevercleaning - we've just tried out our Vario 5! Had a practice 'put up' in the garden. It didn't seem too bad to put up although for some reason the tension straps had been fastened across the outside of the tent instead of underneath. It's a fab tent isn't it!

we have nowhere to practise putting it up. thats going to be a problem isn't it?>!

whizz, i am so impressed with ours, we bought it last year and put it up on the garden, but today is the first time 'in camp' so to speak,

Am delighted about the headroom as dh is 6 foot 3, and the living area is really quite vast.

The only downside is that we found we had to tweak it about a bit to close the fron door, and have to admit dh managed a small 'rip' in it, but it can be fixed, and if we use it 6 or 7 times this summer it has been good, and will probably replace it next year. (sounds a bit snotty that but just mean that for 200 quid half a dozen holidays has paid for itself when compared to b&B etc.)

blue - have you got someone elses garden to put it up in for a trial run? Not essential to do this, but it just helps . Plenty of people were reading their instructions at the camp today lol as the tent billowed about in the wind!

no!!

How do you keep things secure?
Is there a way to stop the DCs zip opening? am trying to cover all my "just looking" questions now rather than discover that we are inept campers with DCs who have escaped into the wilderness!

(would rather just be an inept camper)

no, thats fine, you peg the front door closed when you are all in it at bed time. mine has 2 sleeping compartments both sippable. and we put a double and single blow up mattress in each side and all very cosy. I sleep one side with dcs and dh the other with the little one. then you can keep an eye on them all, and avoid hanky panky at the same time, bloody marvellous!

I hope you don't mind me hijacking....
We are planning our first camping trip ever and i have no idea which tent to buy, or what else we will need. It will be me and the dc (ds age 6 and dd age 3) but I live in hope that one day dh might join us!

I don't want to spend a fortune just in case it is a complete disater but nor do I want to get something so small that we will be cramped and miserable.

My brother and his 2 dc will be at the same site too, so maybe we could share some stuff?? (he is new to all this too!)

forevercleaning - i was googling beofre we bought it & found that could be a problem. It suggests not tightening the tension straps until after you have zipped the door to avoid it from desorting. Also make sure that the front guy ropes are pulling forwards not to the side

tiggerish - Perhaps a 4 man tent for you and dc then it will be fine for when dh decides to come along.

You can get tents at really reasonable prices now, a four men for well under a hundred.

You could just get one stove and gas and all cook together with your brother.

whizz - glad you told me about the front ropes, i believe that i put mine to the side and thats maybe why i had the problem with the doot and tore the bit along the bottom. I have just spoken to my DH and they have survived the night in quite severe weather conditions, so Gelert vario is up for the job! (I have just finished a night shift and now heading down to the camp, in my wellies to have a full english brekkie waiting for me!)