Hi Suzanne and I are doing our first trip abroad next year to Brittnay.Got a quote from campimg cheques to ask how they work ect,31st may till 15th june, 15 nites at "L' Atlantique campsite and Plymouth to Roscoff and return ferries for the 2 of us £569 which i think is brilliant and they will pre book the site for you.
Floydfan i fully understand were your coming from but mybe you smaller sites could do the same as the big boys like make your own web site maybe or something.
In trying to organise this trip next year we have done nothing but surf the net trying to get details of whats the best to do and the big names like camping cheque ,c&cc,cc ect always come up.If you had your own web site people,like us would have a far chance of finding you.Or maybe the ukcampsite could do a small site bit with a map of were you all are
Post last edited on 29/10/2008 17:35:43
------------- Gary and Suzanne
Don't forget to leave a review of the French and other European campsites you have visited!
Quote: Originally posted by David Klyne on 29/10/2008
The best option is to use some of each but don't be a slave.
David
That's exactly what we do. We base our various destinations on areas, not Camping Cheques, or ACSI sites. If there happens to be a CC or ACSI site where we want to go, we'll have a look. If we like the site, fine, we stay. If we don't, then we'll move on and find another site.
We have been to some CC or ACSI sites before now, which sounded lovely, but were nowhere near anything. For us, with a motorhome, we take our bicycles with us, and cycle loads each holiday, but do draw the line somewhere! We like to leave the van on site and don't use it to drive everywhere.
We have met some people though, as David describes, who are a 'slave' to CC and/or ACSI. They base their destinations on the sites, which is the exact opposite to how we do it.
We have found also that on some CC sites in particular, that they get packed! That was the case at Le Boucanet in September. Very disappointed in that site, we remembered it as being really nice from 5 years ago, but when we looked round this time, people were packed on there, and that is not what I want from a site. The beach may be nice and beautiful there, but to be packed in so close to your neighbours is not my idea of a nice site. So we left. We had also recommended it to some people we met at the previous site. They went to have a look, but were also very disappointed and ended up staying just the 1 night.
But I know that a lot of people like this site, so each to their own, it wouldn't do for everyone to like the same, would it?
We have not tried either of these schemes before, but intend to get the ACSI card for next year.
We are crossing Dover/Dunkirk March 24th, heading south through France, fancy taking a look at Monaco and Andorra, then down into Spain travelling clockwise round the coast, taking in Portugal too, and a few side trips inland. Then back up the Atlantic coast for our 16th June crossing back to UK.
So 12 weeks in total, maybe 9 in Spain/Portugal and 3 in France.
We thought we would also get some Camping Cheques, but are not sure how many to buy. We do not want to be too tied to CC sites by "having" to use the CCs up, could any of you expert CC users suggest how many CCs it would be sensible to buy?
The Caravan Club has them available still at 2008 prices, but if we get those we will only have 2009 in which to use them.
Hi Suzanne and I are doing our first trip abroad next year to Brittnay.Got a quote from campimg cheques to ask how they work ect,31st may till 15th june, 15 nites at "L' Atlantique campsite and Plymouth to Roscoff and return ferries for the 2 of us £569 which i think is brilliant and they will pre book the site for you.
Floydfan i fully understand were your coming from but mybe you smaller sites could do the same as the big boys like make your own web site maybe or something.
In trying to organise this trip next year we have done nothing but surf the net trying to get details of whats the best to do and the big names like camping cheque ,c&cc,cc ect always come up.If you had your own web site people,like us would have a far chance of finding you.Or maybe the ukcampsite could do a small site bit with a map of were you all are
Quote: Originally posted by jennifernn on 29/10/2008
We do not want to be too tied to CC sites by "having" to use the CCs up, could any of you expert CC users suggest how many CCs it would be sensible to buy?
The Caravan Club has them available still at 2008 prices, but if we get those we will only have 2009 in which to use them.
Whilst I don't claim to be an 'expert user', we don't use CC sites all the time, but there are a few we like and if we go anywhere in that area, we make sure we have enough for where we know we are going. Then we usually get a few CCs more than that, because we tend to meet up with friends who use CCs for about 75% of the time and so odds on we'll meet them on a CC site. We usually go to France for about 6 weeks at a time, and take about 15 or so CCs with us. Saying that,we always go twice a year, and make sure that the oldest cheques from the previous year get used first of course, and so we have never been left with any we couldn't use.
BUT, of course if you were to buy them this year, as you rightly point out, they will then only be valid next year.
It's very difficult to guess, but because we don't want to be a 'slave' to them we deliberately don't take lots of them, as we feel we would then spend all our time looking for CC sites, and it would dictate where we went, rather than deciding on an area and then looking for sites.
There are plenty of ACSI sites, and of course the good thing about that is that you don't pay up front, the only outlay is the book/card, altogether a better system.
Thanks Ina. I will take a look at the CC website and see what sites are open in the areas we will be in before deciding. As you say, it is a fair outlay up front, so that has also to be taken into account.
We want to have as much choice as possible as we realise many sites will not be open the first few weeks we are there. Other than the ACSI book, the CC book and the C Club Europe site book, do you recommend any other site books?
For French sites take a print out from the campsite search on this website. Use the 'advanced search' facility, select 'open all year' and a list comes up, listing sites, and indicating the area of France. If there are any that take your fancy then you can get more details.
We also use the green Michelin campsite guide - but I know others have mentioned a book produced by Motorpresse and sold only in France, which lists all the 11,000 odd campsites in France. This might be worth buying whilst you're there.
Don't forget to leave a review of the French and other European campsites you have visited!
We have the Caravan Club book which also lists a huge number of sites and gives a one sentence critique. We bought the 2007 one in 2008 for half price - things don't change that much in a year. That and the Michelin guide seem to cover the ground pretty well between them.
Am personally undecided about the cheques as we prefer small quiet sites that are off the beaten track (proper Britophobic when on holiday.) As they tend to be cheaper to start with, they tend not to accept the various reductions. But next year will be our first summer as retired teachers, so we might buy a few just for the pure JOY of saving some money by going off-season. But we are actually pondering Ireland - expensive ferries (even though the terminal is 10 minutes from our house) and rain are causing us to pause for thought on that one.
Alan - one thing you'll find when you're able to go outside peak season is that many sites have no Brits on at all. Although Camping Cheques appear to be well-used by several of us on this forum, there don't actually seem to be that many others and you hardly every meet them on site! When we holiday (May/June and end August/September) we like the fact that there are many Dutch caravanners, some French, some German, occasional Danes and Swedes, and perhaps the odd Brit on some sites! It's not at all like high-season caravanning. We've been on some sites where we've been the only outfit of any nationality on one section of the site! However, we do find it nice to have a bar we can wander to at night, a restaurant for the occasional meal out without driving, and a nice pool complex - quite often completely empty of people in low season!
Never been to Ireland - OH goes with his work and we've thought about it, but we like our sunshine too much at the moment!
Quote: Originally posted by jennifernn on 30/10/2008
Thanks Ina. I will take a look at the CC website and see what sites are open in the areas we will be in before deciding. As you say, it is a fair outlay up front, so that has also to be taken into account.
We want to have as much choice as possible as we realise many sites will not be open the first few weeks we are there. Other than the ACSI book, the CC book and the C Club Europe site book, do you recommend any other site books?
The only other books I have sometimes bought in the past, are the Michelin green guide, as Val mentioned above, and the Alan Rogers guide. The Alan Rogers guides started off as being the ones to have as the sites in there had been inspected and an honest opinion was described. But I must say, and I am not the only one, that recently the reports in there seem very 'watered down', Alan Rogers himself is no longer with us, so whether it is due to the fact that it is now run by others, I don't know.
The main ones we use are CC Europe, 'the bible' as a lot of people describe it, don't think you can go wrong with that.
Like Ina, I was very surprised by our most recent Alan Rogers guide. Initially (and we bought one of the first ones to be produced) they really did tell it 'warts and all'. In the most recent addition I've noticed that it seems less 'independent' than it did - and more related to the larger commercial sites - with some of the municipal sites no longer featuring. It's very hard now, to find a bad review - and some of the site inspections and comments bear no resemblance to our impressions of some of the sites inspected.
They still insist on their website that inspections are independent, and that no-one can pay to be in the guide, but........ ???
Don't forget to leave a review of the French and other European campsites you have visited!
Like Ina, I was very surprised by our most recent Alan Rogers guide. Initially (and we bought one of the first ones to be produced) they really did tell it 'warts and all'. In the most recent addition I've noticed that it seems less 'independent' than it did - and more related to the larger commercial sites - with some of the municipal sites no longer featuring. It's very hard now, to find a bad review - and some of the site inspections and comments bear no resemblance to our impressions of some of the sites inspected.
They still insist on their website that inspections are independent, and that no-one can pay to be in the guide, but........ ???
Yes, that is our experience too. Some of the sites' descriptions are nothing like the reality IMHO, and I too have wondered whether the inspections are still quite as independent as they should be.........
the caravan club european sites book contains members comments - warts an all - & there are forms in the back of it for sending in comments . It is interesting that nobody posting here seems to have used the camping & caravanning clubs freedom of camping vouchers which like the acsi ones are not prepaid - has anybody found them to be useful. useless or whatever.Several Individuals that I have spokent o on french sites seem to like them
Agree totally about the Alan Rogers guide. It used to be the one you looked at for something special, sites a bit different and with honest reviews. It also covered far more smaller or more out of the way sites than it does now. It used to be much more selective but its hard to tell it from any other standard guide now.
Quote: Originally posted by georgegarside on 31/10/2008
It is interesting that nobody posting here seems to have used the camping & caravanning clubs freedom of camping vouchers which like the acsi ones are not prepaid - has anybody found them to be useful. useless or whatever.Several Individuals that I have spokent o on french sites seem to like them
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Topic: camping cheques - worth taking?
