Mindset. Need to Reset my Mind (1 Viewer)

[Tootles]

I need to get into the right mindset here with the MH. Having caravanned for many years, the order of march is thus: Pick where your going, book in with whoever. Staying for at least three nights, because setting up a caravan is A PAIN. Already booked the next place, because I dont want to take the risk of being stuck with a bl**dy great thing behind my car with nowhere to stay. Minimum of three nights again, and so on.
So, how do peeps do things with a MH? The whole point in getting it was to introduce more flexibility into out lives. Do you book the first place your staying, then move on ad lib, not really bothering if they are full, because you can (almost) pull up anywhere? Book your next place from where you stop first, allowing you to alter course for weather etc? Dont book at all, and just follow your nose, and TomTom?
Really looking for ideas here, and what others do, the only real criteria being, as I said, much more flexibility then when tugging.
Dave.

 

[tonka]

If going abroad I book a 1 way ticket online..
Go over and you immediately have a choice of Aires or stopping places. So no reason to book and allows you to go when you want and also take advantage of early and late crossings..
Armed with the "all the aires" book you can plan and move about to suit what you feel like..
Campsites, when we do want to use them are never and issue unless it's high season and near the coast.. In Spain and in 13 years I have only ever been turned down 2 times when they were full but even then I think it was because we only wanted 1 night,,

UK.. We do more rallies and the shows (bookable).. As you say, If you get stuck you can really park anywhere (almost) and move off in a flash if you need to...

 

[Toffs-G]

Hi

Guess to a degree is a mix of all of those when we had our Elnagh and decided to set off to Lake Garda in 2010 there were just 3 places we specifically wanted to go first lake garda so booked a campsite for the time we wanted to stay there and booked a campsite for 2 nights at Fussen in Germany again specifically because we wanted to stay there and brugge for tne first 2 nights again booked although we could have gone to the Aire.

After brugge we just set off for Fussen knowing it would take us 2 days. As we got tired we just looked for a campsite near to where we were. At that time we had a snooper sat nav with the acsi database on jt and found a site 15 mins away, called them and headed straight there turned out to be a great site in Hemsbach next to a municiple lake

On other trips we have just stayed in mway services although there will be a raft of people that would advise against and we probably woukd use aires now.

Basically the freedom of an MH is do as you fancy. Apart from tbe 3 places we wanted to go specifically on that trip evrything else was free and easy. We always use tbe onboard shower etc so don't worry about the bathroom facilities at campsites.

We had planned for tbe return trip from garda tp just spend 5 days meandering back through france, sadly my dad died and we didnt get there but thats another story.

Anyway that's our take on it:thumb:

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[Reallyretired]

We don't usually do the UK much but when we do we book ahead, though often just the day before. France & Spain booking is unnecessary and one of the joys of going there, just go as the whim takes you. We also only book a one way trip as there is no reduction for a return (on the tunnel because of our dog)

 

[Tootles]

Many thanks for all of the above. we intend to get ourselves 'run in' a bit by concentrating on the UK for a few months, and as I said, its changing your mindset. Wouldn't think that there was so much to change, from van to MH, just in operating procedures alone, like shopping early or late so as to take advantage of empty car parks, things like that.

 

[GJH]

We don't go abroad and for our first few years went to places we had booked in advance - which included Fun rallies and a re-enactment group as well as formal sites.

A couple of years ago, though, we joined the C&CC to take advantage of their meets and THSs where you normally just turn up with no need to book. Circumstances meant we couldn't do as much as we wanted to this year but we did find the freedom to change our plans and just hop from place to place a couple of times. We've also joined the MCC so looking forward to even more choice in the years to come.

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[Bailey58]

We've only just done our first motorhome trip across the channel and we did, and will do again, as others have said, Aires, Stellplatz or wilding until we got to our site in Switzerland but even that we didn't book.

In the UK we made the mistake of booking 5 nights on our very first trip then spent every day retracing our steps to get back "home". oh:Now we book 2 or 3 nights allowing us time to do the local town or whatever and then move on, maybe booking the next one before we leave.

 

[Spottycatz]

We've been touring France and Spain for five weeks. Not booked anything. The camps are really quiet. Still got 8 weeks to go, not worried about pitches as so much room everywhere we go and prices are good too. :thumb:

 

[tofo]

check where we fancy going on gogle earth
then i phone the night before
arrive on site
have a look to make sure
book in

pull on pitch chuck the phone on the floor
showing spirit level
if it looks levalish
get the hook up out

table out make a brew
walk the dog
right thats it were on holiday
only book a couple of days
if we like it book another few days
or move on

:thumb::thumb::thumb:

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[hilldweller]

We don't go abroad

Come on, you can do it. Go Invade Poland.

Or follow the FUN people to Benidorm or Portugal or Morocco. There's a whole exciting world out there awaiting you.

Benidorm or Malaga going via Santander is as easy as going to Scotland and not many more miles.