Royal Vale - What's that all about then? (1 Viewer)

RogerThat

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Soooo......

I recently spent some time at the Royal Vale site in Cheshire - This one http://www.royalvale.co.uk

Now, I'm still pretty new to this motorhoming malarky but I'm getting seasoned pretty quick (this was my 28th site in 14 months) and I've spent my time trying out a range of large CC sites, small CL sites, large C&CC sites, small CS sites and various privately owned sites (which are members of neither club). I've been doing this to try and work out which I prefer best, anyway, I digress...

So, Royal Vale... What's that all about then?

There's something unusual about this site that I can't quite put my finger on.

I'll give you a few examples :)

There are 52 pitches on this site, of the 52 available some 46 were occupied and during my three day stay there was only three motorhomes there (including my own). The rest were all caravans. This might be common, but in all my trips thus far this imbalance was so unusual it stood out. A lot.

Of the 43 caravans on site, I counted 19 caravans that hadn't moved for a long time. I mean, a really long time. My signs of this static-ness were grass growing around them (and not around others), waste water pipes of the white-kitchen-type variety were all conveniently exactly the correct length to reach the grey drains, many had large awnings up (again with grass growing up around them), many also had a load of random stuff shoved underneath (various surplus caravan items, timber, bricks, other odd stuff).

Most of the seemingly-static caravans had wheel clamps fitted. Is theft of caravans from campsites, which are behind barriers, common place?

There were a lot of empty caravans, nobody came or went to a hell of a lot of them in the time I was there and the blinds all stayed down, permanently.

There were a lot of transit vans parked outside some of the more static-looking caravans. The transits were all 65 or 66 plated. Again, this stood out because there were so many, it looked like a car park for a Ford commercial vehicle dealership at one point.

Lots of blokes exiting caravans at all hours (literally, all hours of the day and night) and all wearing full on hi-vis clothing, top and bottom. As if on their way to work.

The site is adult only. Co-incidence?

The site was deserted, despite being packed. There was no-one around, at all! Normally on sites you see the usual morning activity as people set about their daily routines, it didn't happen here. It just felt very strange.

The site itself looked lovely, it was immaculately well kept, incredibly clean. The pitches were of good size, many had a solid concrete base as a hardstanding and a gravel base along side it for your awning. The pitches were all plumbed in for fresh and grey water too (super-pitch?). There was a large shower block and huge kitchen area with washing machines and tumble driers, again immaculately clean areas. Zero recycling on site, just a bunch of over-flowing trade sized wheelie bins hidden away in a corner of the site. Strangely enough too, no 'local information hut', no visitor books, etc, despite these dedicated buildings.

Not quite sure where I'm heading with this post, but there was just something really odd about this site. Very, very odd. I can't put my finger on it at all! If I stayed there a week or two I could probably suss it out. Dunno, maybe I'm just being paranoid. But it was unlike any other site I've ever been to and I've been to a few over-priced 'luxury' sites too (Castlerigg, anyone?)

As my old nan would say, it was all fur coat and no knickers.

Random unrelated note, they don't allow rotary clothes lines on site - never heard of this rule before!

Anyone else ever been to this site before? Did you notice anything unusual about it?!
 

Hollyberry

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Seasonal pitches? I don't know the site but on some owners can leave a caravan on its pitch for whole season, with its awning.
 
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Hi-Vis... could be builders working on a big project. Is there anything being built locally?? new roads/motorway junction?? they normally operate 24/7 and labouring you need to go where the work is and if it's a long way from home perhaps they 'site' a caravan for the length of the job and go home weekends or every other. Usually though they have a dedicated site on the 'job' so maybe I'm wrong

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Building a bypass near manchester airport and a science park not that far from Royal V ale.
 
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RogerThat

RogerThat

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Seasonal pitches? I don't know the site but on some owners can leave a caravan on its pitch for whole season, with its awning.

Ahhhhhhh.... you might be on to something here. I've never heard of a 'seasonal pitch' before, I guess this is a Caravanning thing rather than for motorhomes? Which would kind of defeat the object really :)

In terms of local building works, the place is way out in the country side, not sure of what's going on locally.
 

Badknee

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Massive shopping complex in Northwich, m/way widening for nearly twenty miles M6 Knutsford/Sandbatch.

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trevorf

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There is a large road building project nearby (New motorway link between M6 junction 19 and the M56 near Manchester airport). My guess is its housing many of the workers :)
 

Badknee

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Seasonal pitches are very common, if someone likes an area they may not want to tug their caravan there every weekend. We liked our site so much we sold our tourer and bought a static.
 

hilldweller

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I've never heard of a 'seasonal pitch' before.

Very common in places like Benidorm. Caravans are virtually built into the pitches surrounded by gardens/bbqs/storage. Often the whole pitch beautifully carpeted. All plumbed in.

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RogerThat

RogerThat

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Are seasonal pitches something you can only do on a non-club site?

I ask, as I've never come across these before!

How much does one cost?
 

magicsurfbus

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They've borrowed their name from Vale Royal, a borough council which got its name from an old abbey.

As others have said, four major construction projects underway in the immediate area, if you include an underground gas storage site using the old brine/salt caverns, as well as the two M-way schemes and the shopping complex.
 

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