children

Last weekend we took our little tribe camping, we were blessed with amazing weather and we had a great time! Here are 8 reasons we take our little people camping and love it.

It is affordable.
Lets be real here. Cost matters. We live on a single income and a tight budget but that doesn’t mean we can’t have a break from our day to day, it just means we do it frugally! We decided to invest in our camping gear 3 years ago when we knew this would be our way of getting a summer holiday for the foreseeable future. Once you have done that it is hugely more affordable to pay a campsite fee than for a week abroad and there is plenty to see and do in the UK. So we’re big fans of the #staycation! (We’re also a fair skinned bunch so we’re not the sun-seeking types!)

It is easy to go for short stays.
Throw all the kit plus kids in the car and you’re off. Depending on the season plenty of sites don’t even require booking, you just pull up. Which means it is easy to do short stays over a weekend as well as longer breaks. Particularly good if getting time off work is a nightmare. We are lucky to live in an area surrounded by good sites but there are hundreds all over the UK.

There is no need to travel far.
Particularly for a weekend break. Once you are in the middle of the beautiful countryside you could be absolutely anywhere. The fact we were only a 20 minute drive from home didn’t matter at all.

On that note. The beautiful countryside.
If you have read this blog for a while you might have noticed we’re pretty big fans of being out in nature. A walk through the woods/country park/beach will always lift my mood and is my happy place. A whole weekend outside is fab. It also does the children the world of good to be out in all that fresh air, away from screens just running around like little loonies.

Camp fires and marshmallows.
It seems to me there is a primal urge in all men to build fires. Camping allows them to embrace the inner pyromaniac in useful way. Then the kids and mums get to keep warm and roast marshmallows. Everybody wins! (Have wet wipes on hand, children will get sticky.)

Early mornings.
This might not sound like a great thing at face value but hear me out! If you have little ones you are probably going to be woken up anyway and I find that we naturally tend to wake earlier when camping because of light that creeps into the tent so I vote embrace it! I love listening to the dawn chorus and this last Sunday I got up before anyone else (4.45am!), seemingly on the whole site, sat in my chair and watched the sun rise while I read my bible. Utter peace.

Lots of simple fun.
I asked Emma for the best bits of camping…
Running around, playing outside games, squirting water pistols, going for walks, reading books, spending time with family, sleeping in a tent!

Fresh Air = Sleep
We had no problems on either night with either child getting them to sleep. That quantity of fresh air combined with all the running around means they are ready for bed when you want them to be. Even better by the time you get home again and need a quiet paced afternoon to unpack they should look like this!

Love them!

This was our first camping trip in a while but the first of many as family of 4! You can read about our first camping experience with Emma as a toddler HERE.

If I haven’t sold you on camping with little people and it is simply not your thing, do go and take a look at Hurrah For Gin’s latest post for a different point of view and a few laughs!