StuartO replied on 02/03/2019 12:44
Posted on 02/03/2019 12:44
It’s a while now since the Club was renamed, to reflect that there are lots of motorhomers among Members - but apart from the name change, what has and does the Club plan to do to cater effectively for motorhomers?
Well there has been a programme of improving motorhome servicepoints, to provide drive-over grey water drains, but at the club Site I most recently stayed at there was no lighting at this service point (unlike the others) so using it after dark (and it was dark at 4.30pm that day) was a matter of struggling with a torch. But I haven’t noticed anything else specifically for motorhomers and in response a suggestion that the Club should develop overnight parking stops for motorhome like the Aires on the continent, I read somewhere that the Club’s only response was to wonder whether a discussion about whether this was a more appropriate thing for the Government rather than the Clubs to be considering.
CAMC is of course a commercial operator of full scale caravan sites and jolly good they are too but these cater primarily for people who want to stay for quite a number of days, like caravanners do, while lots of motorhomers (certainly on the Continent) make lots of use of more basic overnight parking, to stay for one or two nights only and then move on. Some motorhomers do use their vehicles like caravans and stay on a Site for a while but lots more enjoys their holidays by keeping moving along.
For holidaying in this mode motorhomers don’t need a toilet block, resident staff and manicured grass around them every night; on most nights they don’t need much more than parking, a supply of drinking water, a drain for grey water and somewhere to empty the chemical toilet. CAMC should be just as capable of building good Night Halt locations as it is at building full scale caravan sites - and operating them profitably. There are lots of Aires on the continent which charge good money (and use barrier entry operated with credit cards etc) as well as the free ones provided (as a tourist facility and an attraction) by many local authorities.
There may be an argument for local authorities to build Aires as tourist attractions etc but there is also, quite separately, an argument for CAMC showing initiative in building a network of Aires in UK as a service to it’s Motorhome Members. I think a network of CAMC Motorhome Nightstops would compliment the network of Club Sites and serve to promote them too - for example each Night Halt could easily display advertising material about nearby Club Sites. And motorhomers who use Aires also tend to use full scale caravan sites periodically as well, for example to have a ‘laundry day”.
Isn’t someone on the Club’s staff or committees already thinking about this avenue of development - and if so can we hear something about their ideas?
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StuartO
Motorhomer