Just bought a touring caravan any advice most welcome :)

[fruitandnutlover]

After a year or two of thinking about it we have eventually bitten the bullet and purchased our first touring caravan.

As we are completely new to this I would love some advice from other families.

DH and I have a 9 yr old ds, 7 yr old dd and our little dog Archie.

We live in Essex and hope to have weekends in and around Essex, Suffolk, Norfolk, Cambridgeshire, London and Hertfordshire and hopefully a few weeks away each year a bit further afield.

Our there any other caravanning families out there? Has it been a good investment? Do you use your van much? Any good sites to recommend etc?

Any advice would be much appreciated - Thanks

Ps Would you recommend an awning? We don't have one as yet but I think it would be a good idea to give us extra space.

currently on our first trip of the year and settling back in nicely!
first tip would be to move this to camping section to get more replies!

we go on all sorts of trips from local to France 16 nights! We use main awning if there for 3 nights plus. never used porch awning

love the freedom, both to visit lots of places ,and for the kids when they make new friends and play outside for hours.

what type of site do you like? We do bigger sites at start and end of season as if weather ropey then usually other things to do

are you comfortable with towing and kit and stuff?

been touring for 11 years and love it! We have 7 breaks a year,all year round, including the bank hols.Have done France several times.We've visited loads of different places-one's that we wouldn't have been to if we didn't have our 'van.Holidays tend to be a lot cheaper than in statics or cottages.We did 9 nights in Somerset at Easter for £170.00.
Do a towing course if you're a bit wary.
Have a look at www.ukcampsite.co.uk-loads of advice on there.
Do get an awning-we use ours a lot.In the summer, especially, we sit in ours to eat etc and we have an annexe for my son to sleep in.It's also handy for wet shoes and coats etc. Don't get tons of stuff to start with-get the basics and add to it as you go along.We bought cheap duvets and pillows to keep in there so we didn't have to keep taking the stuff off the beds at home!
Use electric hook up on sites-we run our heating constantly on it!We always look at reviews online for sites.We have a large twin wheel caravan,but never use the shower in it as it's too much water so we use the one's on site.That's my main priority!We're members of the Camping and Caravanning club because I know the sites will be lovely.

We have a tourer but we don't tour it.

Bit old for that I think.

It's permanently situated on a site, so when the sun shines and the fancy takes us we pack a bag and go.

I love it. It's just a great escape. You won't regret it and if you don't want to cart it everywhere with you after a couple of years just do what we do.

This is my fourth van and in between I've had a cottage in Yorkshire, a villa in Florida and a chalet in France but this is just so easy and worry free like the villa, cottage and chalet weren't.

We love our tourer, we've taken it (and the dog) as far a field as France and done many trips in the UK. Have brought a roll out awning which is great - we only put the sides on if the weather is likely to be bad or if it's needed for people to sleep in.

We bought a caravan a couple of years ago and it's the best thing we have ever done! I think we all prefer it to going abroad now. It's just lovely to get away from it all. We especially like the little sites on farms because the girls love seeing the animals. Like another poster said though, it's great to go on a big site if the weather isn't great. Chatsworth house site (caravan club) is great if you ever go near the peak district. Hope you enjoy it :-)