I rarely camp in the UK and have always been horrified of the costs compared to my favoured variety of a French Municipal...

“Jobsworth” tried to tell us we would have had an email. Explained we had been away for 7 weeks at that point and frequently had no signal whatsoever. What really annoyed Neil was the site was half empty, they could have let us in but Herr Commandant said in what to us sounded patronising that they were attempting to train members into the later arrival time 😡
So we’re on a CS just two miles up the road, rang and arrived five minutes later. Couldn’t be friendlier.
We won’t be renewing our membership of the C&MC,only joined during COVID to increase options for sites, next year if all stays as it is we’ll be abroad again.
Just as an aside, later arrival times are a real pain. If like us you’re touring you have to leave the site you’re on by 11am. Most sites earliest arrival is 1, we’ve had one that was 2 pm. That’s a long time between sites if you’re only moving 40-50 miles. We’ve had to sit in lay-bys making ourselves a coffee just to kill time. Much prefer the continental system of just avoiding the lunch time, arrive when you like.

I hope you make it clear to C&MC why you will not be renewing.... I would have been livid...

Me too. Last year (in our brief motorhome phase) we stayed at the Exeter Racecourse CNC site, which we loved, however we were told we must park with our rear, driver's side corner to the pitch marker to ensure our side door didn't open facing another unit's side door (or awning), however our van (a Chausson) was continental style and had the door on the "wrong" side. When i suggested to the Warden that we, therefore, needed to park the other way round to ensure the door didn't face the next unit, we were told that a rule was a rule and we must conform... idiotic.

Even worse was that we went with family members (in another van) and would have liked our two doors to face each other, but weren't allowed to and we ended up facing another stranger's door and then had to walk all the way round the van to get to talk to our family.

Utter madness...

CMC not CNC. Doh!

Don’t worry Hugh, I will be explaining to the C&MC exactly how their jobsworth wardens have lost them a member.

What was really annoying about the Ilfracombe site is it’s a “no facilities” site so they haven’t even got to clean the toilets. What exactly do they do for the two hours between members leaving and arriving? Maybe they cut the grass with scissors to ensure regulation length 😲
Rant over, ‘nuff said.

Talking about campervans. Keith Nesbitt is on his last campsite of his 63 day French tour so I thought I would look at the details and found it catered for self service campervans.

"The automatic motorhome area is simple ...You enter, you settle!
The self-service camper area is:..."

http://camping-sainteclaire.com/en/

This is the future

Screenshot 2022-07-01 225500.png - Bild entfernt (keine Rechte)

Steve

We stayed at the Wolverley C&CC site earlier this year as it is near one section of our family. We arrived after 1pm and were shown a pitch on the grass. We swiveled the van round so the door and awning faced the evening sun. When the warden came back later with another camper I got into trouble for facing the wrong way. He said he had asked which side our awning was on and placed us on the pitch the right way apparently.
Shame he didn't say so to me at the time.
As the awning was up by then, he rather ungraciously came back and said we could stay put.

The following day we went off-site to a farm shop arriving back at about 12pm. The single driveway was full of caravans and motorhomes who had all arrived before the witching hour and we couldn't get to our van, having to wait in the queue until the jobsworth let the new arrivals through at 1pm.
I think the clubs must especially seek out difficult wardens.

BTW, CMC formal policy is not to insist vans pitch A-frame out. As we all have continental vans we are allowed to park A-frame to the peg and the same applied to our VW California (sliding door on the driver's side) when we had one. There is a note to this effect somewhere on the CMC site. Am not sure about C&CC policy regarding this issue.

Alan