Summer Holiday Seaside Adventure - Part 2

As luck would have it the weather brightened up beautifully for day 3 of our holiday so we went out and ate the most beautiful fish and chips for lunch at The Coastguard Cafe.  

This is supposed to be the best fish and chips on the island and they were delicious.  There is something special about eating fish and chips by the sea.

It would have been rude not have an ice cream for dessert so we went off in search of some new flavours: Gin and Pink Grapefruit sorbet for me, Banoffee Pie for my husband and the kids devoured a Kinder Bueno flavour and some kind of Chocolate/Marshmallow concoction.

Feeling like we'd gained about half a stone in just a few hours we decided to try out a bit of crabbing in the creek that afternoon.  We purchased the equipment we needed from the shop next to the ice cream parlour and waited for the tide to come in.  I don't know the first thing about crabbing so I just sat with the dogs and observed.  

My husband is a pretty good fisherman but it turns out that this doesn't equate to being good at crabbing so nobody caught anything but they all had fun trying.  

It was a very pleasant way to pass the afternoon and the dogs even dipped their paws into the water

Summer Holiday Seaside Adventure - Part 1

We had a week's holiday with the kids and dogs scheduled for the first week of summer holidays and we couldn't decide whether to go back to one of the sites we had been to and liked before (see my previous post on being creatures of habit) or to find somewhere new and exciting to explore.

After much deliberation and campsite research (OK, a LOT of research) we settled on Hayling Island.  We found a campsite which we thought would suit us all called Fishery Creek.  It seemed to be close enough to all the seaside action but quiet enough to get away from it all and have a good night's sleep. 

As luck would have it we arrived on a very hot Saturday afternoon to a very pretty campsite and a lovely pitch overlooking the creek.  We had booked to stay for 5 nights and so we needed to set up a bit of a base camp.  While we were doing that, the kids found and unpacked Twister to keep them amused for a while.

When we were all settled in we decided to go for an explore to see how far away everything was.  It turned out that pretty much everything was on our doorstep thanks to a footpath running along the side of the creek which acted as a shortcut.  It took no longer than 5 mins to walk to the nearest shops, take-aways etc and a further 3 mins to walk to the actual seafront.  There is a lovely ice cream parlour which we stopped off at on the way to the seafront called Pepperelli's.  They must have had about 50 flavours of ice cream and sorbet there so we were spoilt for choice.  I opted for Champagne and Strawberry, my husband opted for Millionaire Shortbread and the kids went for Cookies and Cream and Chocolate Ripple.  Yum yum.

We walked all the way to Funland (approx 25 mins walk from the seafront area nearest our campsite) to see what it was like. The kids had been there before a few times but my husband and I had never actually been there or indeed anywhere on Hayling Island.  We were quite impressed with the variety of rides on offer and decided to come back and explore it properly later on in the week.

On the way back we found a lovely pub called The Olive Leaf which was approximately 15 mins walk from the campsite where we could all have a cold refreshing drink (including the dogs).  They had a lovely bar/restaurant area inside but we opted to sit outside in the shade in their small garden area.  The place had a lovely friendly feel to it and we had a feeling we would be coming back.

The weather was too hot to be out exploring though so we headed back to base to relax and have a BBQ.  We played games, ate far too much food and laughed all afternoon.

The kids went to bed quite early after a busy day but we stayed up watching the sunset and chatting away.  It's beautiful evenings like this that make you truly fall in love with the camping life.

In true British fashion, the weather didn't quite hold up the next day so we decided to re-visit that lovely pub The Olive Leaf for lunch.  We were all pretty jealous of my step-son's burger:

Having said that all the food was delicious and we all finished our plates.  The lovely thing about this place is that they do pretty much everything on the menu in a smaller portion for the kids as opposed to having an actual kids menu where sometimes we find the portion sizes can be a bit small for a 7 and 9 year old.  Also they are very dog friendly with their own pub dog - a lovely Boxer.

As the weather was pretty chilly and windy we were hoping that Funland would be quite quiet (and we needed to walk off our lunch) so after going back to the campsite to change into some warmer clothes and jackets, we headed off along the promenade to enjoy ourselves for the evening.

It was really quiet, there were no queues for anything and the kids loved it. If you arrive after 5pm you can purchase a wristband which costs £7 per person and you can go an as many rides as you like, as many times as you like until 8pm.  You can also bring the dogs along too - although beware of them eating enough fish and chips off the floor to keep them going for a week!

The kids had a great time but we were all getting a bit tired so we called it a day at around 7pm and walked back to the campsite to relax and have an early night.

Creatures of Habit

We have become a little guilty of re-visiting campsites - we've been to the Chertsey Camping and Caravanning Club Site three times, the Chichester Camping and Caravanning Club Site twice and now we have been to the Morn Hill Caravan Club site three times.

Morn Hill seems to be our default place to go for a one night stay in the Cali.  There are several reasons for this I think:

• In our experience so far the Caravan Club sites don't seem to have the two-night minimum stay rule at the weekend (unlike the Camping and Caravanning Club sites)
• It's not too far from home, this is especially important in Friday afternoon rush hour traffic
• It's relatively inexpensive in comparison to some other places in the area
• The site is open and airy with lots of lovely grass

When we arrived the site was full - this was the first time I've seen that sign outside (thank goodness we booked) and so instead of being able to choose a pitch we were shown which pitch was ours and this time it was in the lower section of the site.  We hadn't actually stayed in that part before so it was like a new adventure (sort of) ! 

The fish and chip van was parked up there as well and I remember seeing the sign for it during our last visit but had totally forgotten and it would have been perfect for our dinner that night (and avoided a detour to the supermarket) but we decided to be a bit healthier and eat the food we had brought with us.

As it was nice and warm we also managed to sit outside for a while and say hello to a few other people around us. The dogs enjoyed a bit of fresh air too.

I love how quickly we can be parked up and ready for the night especially in these summer months.  If there's no rain forecast we don't bother with the Cali topper and we also find nowadays that we don't need to roll the awning out for a one night stay, unless by some miracle the sun is beating down on us and we need to shelter from it (a rarity in the UK!) 

We did make a pact though that we need to explore new campsites and places to stop for the night - there is too much to explore for us to continue being creatures of habit like this!

New Forest - Camping Unplugged

We were invited to the New Forest to join some of our friends (who are tent campers) for a weekend at White Meadow Camping which is a Camping Unplugged site near to a place called Lepe on the south coast.  There were 12 adults and 8 kids in total. We had never been to a Camping Unplugged site before and so we were not sure what to expect.  

We arrived in the Cali at an open field where there were lots of tents pitched up in groups around the various edges of the field.  We checked at reception to find out where our group was located (most of them had arrived already) and drove over in their direction.  There is no electric hook-up at these sites (hence the "unplugged" aspect) but for a weekend electric hook-up is not essential whether you are in a camper van or a tent.  Music is not really allowed unless it is a live acoustic instrument but you are allowed to have  a camp fire which is a nice touch.

Our group had organised themselves in a sort of semi-circle with the camp fire in the middle and we used the Cali to complete the circle and got to setting up while the kids played in the woods collecting sticks for toasting marshmallows on later, making new friends and playing with old friends.

We put our new flagpole up (with our new smiley face flag as well as the VW windsock) as a marker for our area and also as the toilets were quite a walk away at the opposite end of the field we thought it would help to guide the kids (and us) back in the right direction.

The weather wasn't quite as chilly as I was expecting for the New Forest.  Some of my previous posts mention my concern about how cold it can be but I think as we were so close to the south coast it helped.  It also very much helped to have the camp fire to keep us all warm.

I must confess I was a bit of a lightweight on the first night and went to bed early after a long day at work and lots of driving (it took us over 2 hours to get there in Friday afternoon traffic) but we were up and cooking bacon rolls for breakfast the next morning while the kids were all running around and playing.

We had a surprise birthday celebration for one of our friends and then we all bundled into our cars and headed off to Lepe Country Park to see the sea.  We caught a lift as we didn't fancy packing up the Cali for such a short drive - it's less than 10 minutes to drive but can be quite a long walk especially for the little ones.

Unfortunately dogs are not allowed on the beach so after a brief stroll around the country park (which seemed nice) and after the kids had a bit of a run-around in the very large playground there we headed back to the campsite.

We had a lovely afternoon BBQ-ing lots of food, eating, drinking and playing games.  Later that evening we all settled around the camp fire to toast some marshmallows and relax.

There was lots of rain forecast for the next morning so we decided to start packing up in the evening much to our friends' amusements as we probably had the smallest set up there!

When we woke up in the morning the rain was pouring down as expected so we set off for home early in our pyjamas.

I'm not sure that this particularly style of camping was for us.  The toilets and showers were portacabins / portaloos and there was a fairly decent washing up area but I wouldn't say it was the cleanest site I've been to.  The lights and hot water were all switched off at night at 9pm and turned back on at 8am which I found slightly annoying as I had to remember to take a torch to the bathroom but these were just minor niggles in the general scheme of things.

The important part was that it was a lot of fun for the kids and we managed to relax and enjoy ourselves too.

The Italian Adventure - Part 3: The Way Home

After spending a wonderful weekend in Lake Como for a beautiful wedding it was time to start the journey home.  We had two nights to break up the journey on the way back but we had learned a few things from the journey down that helped us out on the way back:

• It is much wiser to input your final destination into the sat nav (even if you are not intending to drive there in one blast) and then find suitable stopover points along the way thus avoiding going off route too much
• Electric hook-up when stopping for one night isn't compulsory when you're doing so much driving as the batteries have plenty of time to charge up to easily get you through the night
• If in doubt stop off at one of the service stations to stock up on your essentials just in case you don't find a supermarket near to where you are staying, or worse, they are closed.
• Wine tends to be cheaper than beer in France and Italy if you are fond of an alcoholic beverage as we are.
• Spend a few moments taking in your surroundings and enjoy the adventure

For the journey home we decided to power through Switzerland and get through as much of France as we could before stopping but sometimes things don't go entirely to plan.  We encountered some of the heaviest rain we had ever seen as soon as we crossed the border from Italy into Switzerland.

Then we came across a wall of traffic while trying to enter a tunnel (even though the diversion we attempted fully backfired on us as they had closed all the entrances onto the motorway that we tried).

About an hour later we arrived at the tunnel entrance and we were on our way again.  We couldn't figure out why but they were only allowing a few cars through at a time - we think this might have been because our sat nav had directed us through the new San Gotthard tunnel which is over 35 miles long!

Several hours of driving later including a service station stop to pick up some much needed  (and wonderfully local) wine we arrived at Les Portes d'Alsace Campsite which was approximately one mile from Saverne.  We found the site as it was listed on the Camping and Caravanning Club and Caravan Club websites but unfortunately there was no discount to be had and we paid around 24 Euros for our pitch with electric hook-up included.



Much to my surprise, this campsite didn't seem to have a restaurant or bar onsite (or maybe we were too tired to notice?) so we cracked open a bottle of the local wine we had purchased and settled in for the evening.



The campsite did seem to have a nice swimming pool though.



If only we hadn't been so tired and time-constrained otherwise I would have loved to spend more time exploring Saverne.  Still, we have noted it down as a place to re-visit in the future.

The next day after catching up on some much needed sleep we drove all the way to Calais and stayed at a lovely campsite called La Bien Assise.  We had our apprehensions as this site was so close to the port but we needn't have worried, it was part of the Les Castels group just as the lovely campsite we had stayed in as our first stop on the way down.

We did manage to get a discount here as we only have a small 'camping car' and we were only staying for one night.  They gave us a nice pitch with electric hook-up included for less than 20 Euros.



We met lots of nice people here who were either starting their adventures or going home and it was an especially important night for us as England were playing Iceland in Euro 2016 so to find a bar with a TV showing the football was very welcome (it was just a shame about the result!)



The campsite was very close to the Eurotunnel terminal and we took advantage of that by going shopping at the Carrefour Hypermarket before our crossing and picking up some bargains (and lots of wine!)

We really enjoyed our adventures through France, Switzerland and Italy and we are really looking forward to another visit in a couple of months time for another wedding but our destination will be Lake Garda for that adventure...

The Italian Adventure - Part 2: Switzerland

On the way to Switzerland the roads were fairly clear, the sky was blue and the temperature reached a sizzling 36 degrees celsius.  

Going through the border was extremely uneventful, we purchased our Swiss Vignette sticker for 40 Euros, nobody checked our passports and after a few hours we arrived at Lake Lucerne.

We found a campsite called TCS Camping Luzern - Horw which had access to the Lake and they also gave you free passes to a swimming area in the lake which I regret to say we didn't use, despite the heat!  

The campsite itself was nice and clean with good facilities, the toilet and shower block had music playing 24/7 and we had electric hook-up included.

It wasn't as spacious as the one in France and was nearly double the price but that is something we learned about Switzerland - it is expensive!  There is a sort of shopping centre which has a Coop supermarket approximately 10 minutes walk from the campsite and you can get the bus into Lucerne from just outside the campsite if you fancy it.

We picked up some supplies for dinner from the Lidl but we didn't need much (we also restrained ourselves due to the astronomical Swiss prices) and then afterwards we decided to try out some of the German beers available at the campsite bar. The nice thing about campsites outside the UK is that they all seem to have a bar and serve food.  

We enjoyed sitting outside the Cali and eating dinner while taking in the beautiful backdrop of the mountains and after dinner we went for an evening stroll alongside the lake.

We woke early and went for a run the following morning which we found quite challenging due to the altitude but it's all good exercise and preparation for another day of driving.

We couldn't have asked for a more beautiful location to stay in and we wished we could have spent a few more days here taking in the beautiful views and exploring the area.  However, our bank accounts probably thanked us for not staying longer!

It was time for us to drive on to Lake Como for the wedding and two nights staying in a hotel (what's a hotel when you have a Cali?) but we did get treated to some beautiful views on the way:

The Italian Adventure - Part 1: France

We were invited to a friend's wedding in Lake Como, Italy so we decided to drive there in the Cali.  After some deliberation we decided not to pre-book any campsites along the way and we didn't even really properly plan our route. We booked the Eurotunnel and we had a hotel booked in Lake Como but that was it.  We knew we wanted to stop somewhere near Champagne in France and then somewhere near Lake Lucerne in Switzerland on the way down so that was a good enough plan for the time being.

We couldn't take the dogs with us so they had their own holiday being looked after in the UK and before we knew it we were dropping them off and setting off for Folkestone.  I hadn't been on the Eurotunnel before so I was quite excited (I'm a bit geeky like that!)  We arrived a bit too early and hoped to get on an earlier train but they were all full so we parked up, had a coffee inside the terminal and did some shopping.  

Getting on the train was pretty uneventful and not the most glamorous affair but we had some sandwiches in the fridge for lunch and the time passed very quickly.  You don't lose any phone signal for the crossing so you can continue to surf the net and use social media for the duration.  My only tip would be to make sure you go to the bathroom before getting on the train because it can be a long walk!

The weather in France was gorgeous, the French toll roads were a pleasure to drive on and the VW Sat Nav seems to work better in France than it does in the UK! After several hours of driving we were tired and hungry so we found an Intermarché and bought some bread, cheese and wine for dinner.  We arrived with only 20 minutes before closing time at 7pm which was lucky and then we set off for the nearest campsite.  

The campsite was called Camping La Forge de Sainte Marie and it is part of the Les Castels group of campsites in France.  It is also a Camping and Caravanning Club and Caravan Club listed site so if you are a member of either you should be able to get a discount here.

What a find this campsite was...it had an onsite bar/restaurant with a terrace overlooking a lake, onsite swimming pool and excellent facilities.   

It was probably a little more than what we needed for a one night stop over but at less than 20 Euros per night for a secluded pitch with electricity in a beautiful part of France you can't really go wrong.

When we arrived the reception was closed as it was after 7pm so they checked us in at the bar, we filled out a form and they gave us a couple of pitches to choose from.  It had been very wet in that part of France so we picked the one that seemed the driest, locked the Cali and went to the bar/restaurant for a cold (and well deserved) couple of beers in the sunshine.

The food menu looked so good that we decided to eat  there too, we didn't want too much as it was quite late (even though the steaks looked very edible) so we settled for a salad each and they were not disappointing.

Suitably fed and watered (or beer-ed), we headed back to our pitch and cleaned some of the thousands of flies we seemed to have acquired on the windscreen/bonnet and enjoy the evening.

We went for a run the next morning in the beautiful countryside to prepare us for a day of driving, paid at reception for our pitch and soon it was time to hit the road again...destination: Lake Lucerne, Switzerland.