Bank Holiday camping sounds a great idea… until you realise that everyone else in your city has probably had a similar idea and the roads are going to be chock-a-block! Adding to my nervousness was the fact that my poor little car hasn’t been on a long drive for many months – not since an unfortunate spate of breakdowns!
Consequently, I ventured out on our Bank Holiday adventure with some trepidation. I left early to beat the rush and little car behaved herself beautifully…the most stressful part of the journey was the responsibility of choosing where to pitch!
It’s quite a responsibility picking the pitch!! We were camping at Britchcombe Farm, I arrived first and they had four fields for me to choose between. I decided to prioritise evening sun and a nice view of the sunset over proximity to the showers.
We like a campsite without too many rules, and Britchcombe Farm has one main rule which is ‘7 paces’ – you can make fires in the existing burnt patches, but your tents must be 7 paces from the fire. Now when you combine that rule with the number of tents we like to take with us and my preference that all of them were on the flat, it added an extra complication to being the first to arrive!
I felt super proud of myself for getting the kitchen tent up by myself and the fire lit using just one match and no firelighters ( – shame there was no one there to witness it!). I settled down for a cup of tea… and one of our favourite activities – watching other people setup camp! Eventually my friends arrived and we got the other tents up and dinner eaten. I felt pleased with myself for the view of the spectacular skies from our pitch.
It wasn’t until the morning I realised the folly of my pitching decision! We were handy for the water tap…but that meant that each morning we heard everyone else fetch their water for breakfast. It was interesting to eavesdrop on their conversations (apparently silk pyjamas are just the thing for camping!?!), but we’d have preferred a lie in! You live and learn!!
I’ve been given my instructions of which pitch to nab next time…and there will be a next time as it’s a lovely site. The beautiful weather helped, but we enjoyed hearing a cuckoo calling and a red kite circulating overhead. There are footpaths from the campsite allowing you to explore the ridgeway. The only downside is that a road runs between the camping fields. It’s not a busy road, but what traffic there is can be pretty fast.
The ancient chalk white horse is no distance at all from the site. We went for a walk to see it, although it’s actually not that easy to make it out close up – we got a better view on our drive to the pretty pub named after it!
I’m sure we’ll be back again to this site – check out how it scored here.
L
relaxing in Bank Holiday sun at Britchcombe
Embrace your inner goat 