General camping advice needed please!

[navyeyelasH]

Ok so I have a few questions, I've been camping before a few times but just for the one night. We are going for 4/5 days this time and I have a few questions:

How do you make sure food stays chilled? We have 2 cooler boxes and plan to use 1 for food and 1 for drinks. The one with the food in we are going to use like a sort of wore rack inside to keep the food stuffs out of the water so that nothing gets soggy. But what about the ice blocks, they are going to melt and I can't fathom how we keep them frozen? Am I missing something? I was thinking dry ice, but it seems extreme and I'm not even sure you can buy it?

My other question is about tables. We normally just cook on a BBQ or go to a pub / chippy but we have got hold of one of these cokker things (I know all the technical terms don't I!) it looks like thisI know we can't put it on the grass so we need some sort of table device. Does anyone have any suggestion for something cheap and safe?

Also one last thing, as we only have one ring we figure we can get away with just taking one saucepan/frying pan. Is this a bad idea? We were thinking of just doing one pot meals, like pasta and sauce, fry up, stir fry etc. Is this just not going to work? We are flying by the seat of our pants a bit me thinks? We will still have BBQ though .

Oh and we are a big group of adults, 12 of us in total and only one little one boy, aged 3 who is not a fussy eater. Maybe more little ones joining but they will sort themselves out.

Also is there anything else you randomly think we should be aware of?

Thanks everyone x

Cool box question-are you going to a site or in a field? If your boxes are electric you can put them in the car when you go for trips to keep them cool. Ice packs can often be refrozen at sites, so check that out.

A bit of slate or similar flat sotne would be ok for cooker i would think, rather htan going to the expense of buying a cooker stand.

if you know what meals you're cooking the and you are sure that one pan will be enough, then you'll manage.

Freeze a big bottle of water before you go. Also take semi skimmed milk frozen for use later in the holiday. This helps to bring the temp of the cool box right down

Cous cous instead of pasta , you can make it in a bowl while you are heating up the sauce on a hot ring

We are going to a site, this oneit was recommended by friends as we normally go the Gower but fancy a bit of a change. It hadn't occurred to me that sites might re-freeze these blocks, is there normally a charge?

I will have to get in contact with the site and find out what the deal is. I don't like the idea of those plug in ones, mainly because we are a bit green and try not to use the car so once we get to the site we don't intend to use the car.

ps. Thanks for the help flowerfairy. martainbishop good idea, so these item will be frozen to keep box nice and cool but then they can also be used at later date so not 2dead weight" like those blue box thingys. Excellent, I love that, such good thinking!