Clothing, kitchen stuff... your tips please on packing the car and saving on space...
Ie we have been packing our kitchen stuff in a box with a lid for years, but the box takes up too much room. So what do we use instead?? A flexitime?
We went through a space saving exercise a couple of years ago, bit it did mean changing some of our kit to smaller more compact items - not just kitchen items.
Kitchen wise we ditched the big calor gas bottle and campinggaz double burner stove in favour of a suitcase stove and a also a single burner stove and they work marvellously and take up much less space - the knock on effect was that we didnt need to take the kitchen stand anymore and use a fold up table instead.
Every little helps, and can recommend the 10l Ortlieb folding washing up bowl which is a brilliant space saver - it was actually posted through our letter box when it was delivered! but it's very robust and should last years.
I think splitting kitchen things in to a number of smaller containers/bags, rather than one large, makes it easier to dot everything around the car in to small spaces.
Post last edited on 18/07/2018 22:35:42
------------- Aug 2017 St Martins Campsite, Scilly
Jul 2017 Trewan Hall, Cornwall
Jun 2017 Higher Kestle Farm, Cornwall
Mar 2017 Pitch Perfect camping Bath
Aug 2016 Brittany/Normandy:-
La Ferme Croas Men (near Morlaix)
Le Ranolien (Ploumanac'h)
Le Bois Courdrais (Cugen)
Chateau de Montfreville (Montfreville)
Little tips if you aren't going it already - buy 100 ml airport toiletries bottles for your fairy liquid etc, square mess tins better than round pans, if you have air beds the pump can be used to vacuum vacu-seal bags for compressed clothes storage. Also take photos of your optimum car load so you load it the same every time - maximises space and means you know where everything is !
Aside from the tent, our five self inflating mats take up the most space in the car.
We take our kitchen, food and sleeping bags in big plastic boxes which we then use as food and kitchen storage in the tent. Nested pans would be nice, but decent ones are pricey and the ones we have are perfectly fine, so the penny-pinching part of me doesnt like the idea of replacing them.
On a side note, me & my wife had a quick night away alone the other week and took very minimal stuff (tent, sleeping bags & mats, trangia, head torches and - for a touch of decadence - pillows) - it was lovely!!!
Kemurf, see you are a fellow Karsten owner, has that extra awning proved an add on too far, I can sympathise our sleeping extension has caused all sorts of problems with the car packing!
With regards to your question, take a look at your car before you start packing, are there any nooks or crannies you miss when packing, we don't have a spare wheel but there is space for one that normally has a foam packer in it, removing this allows us to put all the sleeping bags and a few other items in the recess. We have two children so we can put one of the back seats down, doing this we can stack the tent & pretty much all of the awnings securely along one side of the car.
Vacuum bags are handy for pillows, towels etc, I bought a hand pump from Amazon to use for the return journey as we don't use EHU so son't have a vacuum cleaner.
Recently we have replaced all our bulky air beds with these Multimat, its basically a lilow but is rolls up into a very small bag saving lots of room, you don't use a pump to inflate them either so more space saved, we used velcro strips from Wilco to fix 3 together to make a double mattress, worked a treat.
Hope some of these tips will come in useful.
soft stuff - tent, yes tent! clothes bedding towels all into vacumme bags, these can on the return journey be used with the air bed pump to remove the air - ok not quite as good as using a hoover but does the job.
shoes - stuff under the car seats
food - order online and get them to deliver to the site, make sure you put your mobile phone number on and instruct to call when at reception.
take pics as your filling the car so you know where and how stuff goes
put the tent in last! as its the first thing you need, you don't want to have to empty the car if its raining to get to it
Quote: Originally posted by kemurf on 18/7/2018
Clothing, kitchen stuff... your tips please on packing the car and saving on space...
Ie we have been packing our kitchen stuff in a box with a lid for years, but the box takes up too much room. So what do we use instead?? A flexitime?
I think you are looking at the wrong solution to your problem .. the first solutions should be roof box... trailer... bigger car ... only when your equipment is still too much to fit in should you consider space saving ...
Micro towels are brilliant space savers. We also split some of our equipment into smaller bags or just squeeze individual items into gaps under/beside seats. Also we pack in our soft items like pillows, blankets and sleeping bags (opened up and laid flat) first, then add heavy stuff on top. This way, all the soft stuff gets compressed and creates space without fiddling with vacuum bags and pumps. Just give it a good 'fluff up' while setting up.
Although, to be totally honest, we are thinking of getting a two bar and trailer for next year . . .
A day of all things motorhome and campervan. The show is held both in the main indoor arena and across the grounds. Catering, hot drinks and food options are available. Easy access to the site and free parking included. Win one of five pairs of day tickets
Topic: space saving tips please!
