Camping for Newbies

If you're a single person, hitchhiking, travelling light, the equipment you're going to need is entirely different to that required by parents taking a couple of kids camping by car. The thing is though that you should still be organised and take the right gear. If you are travelling light you can still benefit from reading this, even though I am going to concentrate on camping by car, my own that is. Allow camping for newbies to help you.
I first went camping, with a friend, when I was 15 years old. Between us we bought an army surplus 3 man tent and pitched up 200 miles from home, travelling by train. We were away for a week and I seem to remember living on chips and burgers. The only cooking equipment we had was a little spirit stove. The only thing we used the stove for was making tea or coffee. We weren't organised at all, but at least we had a little money and the local town wasn't very far. We spent the week fishing, the weather was good and we had a brilliant time. However, we were lucky, subsequently, and still even now, I see people getting themselves into a terrible mess. You try to help, but their holiday is already on a downer. Don't allow this to happen to you.

What follows may need to be adjusted according to your own needs. I can only base this on my own experience and that of people who've become friends from lots of camping holidays. I have done the travelling light bit, but I'm going to base this on what I've found I like the best. That is two people camping with their kids.

Well I suppose we'd best start out by telling you about my own past experience. I've gone from the ex army three man tent to the inflatable 'Igloo' tent to frame tents of various sorts and sizes, to what we use now.
We can forget the first one mentioned, and leave it for the army. The second tent, the 'Igloo', seemed a brilliant idea. Just arrive on site, blow it up and hey presto!!.... Forget it. When the winds blowing, and the rains coming down, and it springs a leak (in the blow up bit that keeps it up) you end up with the damn thing on your face. No, that doesn't do it for me.
We had a long period with frame tents, we had three in total. They were okay but.. although you can tour with them, they are such a pain. Turn up on a site late and the last thing you want is to start practicing an engineering degree to put the damn things together!
Eight years ago, as much as I love camping, I decided to ditch all these previous ideas and accept the advice I'd been given probably two years earlier by another camper, and bought the tent we've got now.
Think about it. We're going camping right? We want the freedom to move. So what are we going to do with the tent? We're going to sleep in it and cook meals for a day or two and then move on. We're going to look at the local area and the wildlife, relax and maybe go fishing with the kids. We'll use the tent as a tent.
The tent we use now is the Eureka Sunrise 9. We could have got the larger 11 foot square model but didn't believe that we needed it. Subsequently proved correct. The best price I've found for this tent is featured below. One tip. Regardless of which tent you eventually buy. Make a point of treating the seams every year. Look after the kit, it'll look after you.

I love this. I've found the perfect piece of kit, and nothing will change my mind. When we get back from a trip the tent goes into the garage. The cooking equipment doesn't! It goes into the house. I've never seen such an adaptable piece of kit as our Cobb. If you've never seen a program called 'The Hairy Bikers' on TV, it's also possible that you don't know what a Cobb is. It looks like a largish slow cooker, but it fries, bakes, stews, barbeques, you can make bread in it. It goes on and on. Whether you become a camper or not, check out the Cobb (details below). You can either use their recommended fuel which is based on coconut husk or you can use barbeque briquettes ( 6-8) and get a couple of hours cooking time, which is plenty of time to roast a joint plus the veg, or you can do a full barbeque. Read more about camping with the Cobb,

Videos of the Cobb in action, with recipes

I'm only looking at the important bits here, not the cutlery and boring stuff like that. Get yourself kitted out with Alpine sleeping bags. You won't overheat but you will be snug as a bug in the proverbial rug. I tend not to camp in the depths of winter. The bags I'm recommending do the job for me but if you are going to camp out in the mountains, in winter, look at the range of minus freezing tolerant Alpine bags that will do the job for you. Details below.

I could rattle on about this for hours, but a friend of mine showed me an ebook he'd bought that covers the subject completely. I got my experience by making horrible and uncomfortable mistakes. I wish I'd had this little book. Thank goodness I hadn't got the kids while I was making a hash of it. Have a look at it here.

How to get completely organised for your first family camping trip

Camping with your family is a rewarding and relaxing experience as long as you approach it in the right way. It's also a very cheap holiday. You're away from work and because the kids have so much to do, and places to explore, you'll come back relaxed and fulfilled. Give it a go!