Year round sites/storage

[philsoflo]

Hi, we’re new to caravan forums though less new to caravanning. We bought a caravan 4 years ago shortly after our daughter was born, thinking (hoping!) it would provide relatively affordable holiday options but due to a number of factors for most of the time the caravan just sits in storage at a cost of £450 per annum (ouch!) We have been a few places, mostly short trips to Haven Holiday Parks as there’s plenty for our child to do and without such facilities it can (can?) be difficult entertaining a toddler without the home entertainment luxuries of home. Fast forward to now, our daughter starts school in September (Primary to us “big school” to her) so taking even Haven breaks becomes instantly cost prohibitive, having done a quick check it’s 3x to 4x more expensive in the school holidays and doubtless packed out too. Given this, and the fact we only used the caravan for 3 days last year (working out around £200 a day with storage, extra fuel costs and pitch fees, not to mention the having to re-learn how to set everything up again, leading to nervousness, anxiety and boisterous arguments…)

So, we need a site offering a year round pitch. It needs to be coastal, south of here (Nottingham) although North Wales is certainly an option we’d consider and ideally accessible all year round, with a playground at least but possibly more. We’ve already had a look at some, obviously, but as with all things we’re sure there’s a vast font of year-round site knowledge across a range of relevant forums, and we wanted to ask the experts, those of you with real life experience.

Please excuse the instant brain-picking, we’re in a bit of a quandary.

Any ideas anyone? Please help!

 

[Parksy]

Hi Phil, welcome to the forum.
Coastal seasonal pitches can be expensive and I'm sorry that I have no suggestions or information that I can offer so hopefully other forum members will know more.
Have you counsidered rallying if you're a member of either of the two main clubs?
Caravan rallies are widely perceived to be miserable affairs stuck in a muddy farmers field in the middle of nowhere with bossy stewards but my own experience has been vastly different.
Some (but not all) rallies have normal facilities such as electric hook up and showers etc and many do not but children usually enjoy them because they make friends with other children, they play happily together in a safe environment and they are an extremely cost effective way of getting the most from your tourer.
A lot depends on which rallying association you use, many are very child friendly and most of those run by the C&CC have no pre-booking requirement and as members you can attend pretty much any rally in the UK.
The C&CC also host Temporary Holiday Sites (THS), some on ordinary full facility holiday parks at reduced prices and some in locations not normally open to touring caravans such as stately homes etc.

 

[philsoflo]

Thank you for your help. Yes, I'm aware seasonal pitches, especially with those on sites with extensive facilities are expensive. Overall I've seen arrange of year round sites, some with unlimited access, some limited to 150 days a year and some closed for winter etc The thing is that at the moment we're not using the caravan at all, so the daily cost per trip is enormous and we're in a quandary, either try to sell the caravan (we don't to, we do like it and we'd doubtless take a huge hit on it) or placing it somewhere we'd use it. We hope that once it's settled somewhere it'll be far easier to plan trips to it than it is collecting and towing it somewhere new. A 3 hour car journey takes 6 hours with the van because we have to fetch it, hitch it up, drive slower, se it up at the other end etc. It's also a bit unnerving as we use it so seldom remembering how to do everything takes a while. IN short leaving it somewhere permanently seems the only way we'll get to use it. Come on folks, someone must have experience of year round sites/pitches and/or storage! Thank you.

 

[Sproket]

Google is your friend. .... try it

 

[philsoflo]

Thank you, but naturally we've searched through lots of those places. We were hoping for personal recommendations by forum members, rather than just going blind or from three line reviews, as in all endeavours it seems that folks keen enough to engage in forums relating to an activity are always the most thorough and best qualified to answer any queries. Especially in a matter such as this, that involves time, no little effort and a relatively large amount of money and commitment we'd feel far more confident hearing from someone who's actually done it as opposed to saying 'That looks ok' and jumping in with both feet. I hope this is understandable.

 

[Sproket]

Unfortunately you will find that the better site's cost a fortune, and the little golden gem's won't be put on a open forum due to a number of factors, the other one's that are about more likely than not have a waiting list of people waiting for a pitch for there own van for a upcoming season, one of the other factors of late is all of the trouble abroad, I have seen recently a few caravan establishments advertising on TV maybe hoping for some extra trade .... could this be a coincidence ?
So I'm afraid it's back to Google, you can always go and view a site without actually staying there, yes there is the hassle of driving there and back and not staying, but many thousands of caravanners do that very same thing by using such as the uk campsite web search and Google itself, not trying to be negative but there are lot's of people like yourselves in the same [strike]boat[/strike] who would love a season pitch to save all of the hassle of towing and setting up and then come the extra expense ....

Just as an example found on Google .....This one is only £1995..... with electric billed as a extra.... you have to get a lot of night's in for that sort of money @ £55 per week / or £221 per month whether you go or not, then there's the fuel to and from the site every time you go, it all adds up unless it quite local ....

Good luck with your search ....

 

[Mel]

We have our van on a seasonal pitch which is 15 minutes from Colwyn Bay and 2 and a half hours from us in Derbyshire. Place is called Plas Farm. Lovely 5 star site. Small play area and a wooded walk with a little stream. They do store and pitch. it isn't cheap However we have gone early on Saturday, been there by mid morning and then come back on Sunday by bed time. It is open March to October.
Mel

 

[Jules_ht]

I don't really see how you equate the expense of Haven Holidays and the difficulties you have had with using your van (i.e. not being able to entertain the little one), with needing a seasonal pitch.

If you're not using your van and are not happy about how much it's costing, why would you want to significantly raise the underlying cost of ownership? Aren't you still going to have the same problems with the van, just on a more expensive basis?

For what it's worth our little girl (same age, 4 last month) loves our van. We've got a little 19" TV, sky dish, and take the sky box from home, so we have CBeebies for the morning (and films etc in the evening), but it's never on for that long. We take the balance bike, scooter, a kite, bat and ball, fairy wings, etc.

We value cheap and secure storage, then going to cheap sites that are not far away (i.e. an hour max away). We go to a farm North of Weston (we're in Bristol), we hop over the bridge to Monmouthshire. We do things like tiny family friendly festivals which often don't cost more than a decent site. We avoid the sites rammed with facilities like restaurants, bars, gyms, and look for places with horses and chickens wandering around the place.

Were I in your position I would look at what you need to do to provide additional entertainment in the van/make it something you actually enjoy, and then also what are the options for sites in the local vicinity. This enables weekends away to be cheap, convenient, and successful. Maybe you'll fall in love with it, instead of considering it a poorer option.

 

[philsoflo]

Thanks all for your help.

Sproket - I appreciate your point. I suspect I grossly underestimated the proportion of caravan users who a) are looking for the same thing and b) who frequent forums such as this one.

Mel - We'll be contacting the site you mention, it looks great.

Jules_ht - You can calculate costs in several ways. Last year, as we only had 3 nights away, it worked out at £200 per night, breaking down as £450 storage and £150 fuel and Haven fees. Whatever option we choose won't be more expensive on a per night basis. Then - does anyone enjoy towing their caravan more than not towing it? - there's the additional time (most of have time limitations which means their is a cost to every extra hour spent collecting, towing and setting up) and how off-putting these factors are, at least to us. Personal experience suggests that while family friendly festivals may have relatively cheap admission the costs of food and drink on site when you're there are can be extravagant, sure, you needn't join in, but there comes a point at which this fiscally (self-) imposed exclusion affects your overall enjoyment of an event. You paint an idyllic picture - it's significantly more difficult to get anywhere so nice from Nottingham for sure - and I'm no great fan of the crass, plastic, soul-less commerciality of Haven and the like, but it's hard to argue with the facilities and prices. Especially once your child has been. Any additional entertainment within the caravan isn't going to compare to being a disco with a hundred or more other children, or having endless access to water slides, or children's entertainers. And that's just in summer. At other times, if it's dark at 6pm, however much entertainment we create in the caravan is going to fall a long way short of the facilities we have at home.
Hopefully paying so much for a year round site with beyond basic facilities will encourage, even force, us to actually use the caravan, hopefully for dozens of nights a year. Naturally we fear getting bored of one place, another reason why we need somewhere good!

Thanks again to everyone who's replied so far.