A non-caravanning holiday

Packing is another issue for me as I find it difficult, particularly in this country, knowing what to pack and what I can cram into one suitcase that will last me for a fortnight.  

In the caravan, I have oodles of space for outfits of all seasons and they're not creased up on arrival. 

No hanging around at stations and lugging suitcases around either. 

Enjoy your trip.  It sounds quite an adventure.

Good grief not even given a thought to packing, and the literature from the boat sayes no hard suitacses because of storage issues and then we have to lug our our luggage ourselves.  Now off to dig out the soft bags.

We take varied holidays. Caravan, cruises, apartment in Spain.  We are fortunate in some ways though. The cruise terminal is twenty minutes away and my brother provides a taxi service. The apartment has a load of our stuff in it so we can travel with just a cabin bag. Three weeks in the van is the holiday that takes most planning when it comes to a clothes loading allowance.

I find packing for non caravan holidays much less stressful.  Packing a suitcase or two is so much easier than preparing the caravan/car for a similar length of time away.  We can be at the airport in 30 minutes which is the same time as it takes us to collect the caravan from storage. 

Arriving back home is a doddle as well, 2 cases taken upstairs and dealt with as and when.  After caravanning we have a hall full of loose clothes, clean and dirty, dirty towels, bedding, bags of food, tins, television, shoes, boots ...... the list goes on.

Despite this we love the freedom of caravan hols but isn't it brilliant to be able to do both. 

I am the opposite. Need to get the van out of storage, get it onto the drive, check it over, make up the beds, pack everything we just might need in it. Then trundle off. Week away in June to the lakes in a B&B (getting older and don't take the van that far anymore) pack a case and drive off.

I think, if you enjoy varying types of holiday, it shows how flexible you can be.  Over the years, we've got packing for any type of holiday down to a fine art and I always make lists, including one of the stuff we've previously taken and never used.  

Fortunately, our caravan lives at home and is always ready for the off in respect of a variety of clothes, linen, tools etc., so apart from hitching up and enough food for a couple of meals, we're on the road.

When the holiday includes flights, we need to ensure that we leave sufficient time to get to the airport and add a bit in case of motorway congestion and/or accidents/holdups.

We holiday in many ways although for the last few years this has been in our motorhome or visits to our daughter who lives in New Zealand.

Our motorhome is restocked annually with bedding towels etc, and a stock of non perishable foods and drinks at the start of the season.  It is stored away from home, so when we are off on a trip I use fold-down crates to put in folded clothes, shoes, clothes on hanagers go on them carried on the back seat from to home to storage and a bag of food, together with a 10L water carrier full.  On our return I bring back the dirty things in a laundry bag the clean things the way they were transported.

Our last holiday was to New Zealand via a two stopovers in Thailand.  That took a bit of planning but since the climate was similar it was just a question of choosing, and packing around the things from the loft we were taking to NZ for our granddaughter.

Had I have realised that the Island we stayed on provided a dressing gown, flip flops and indoor slippers, I would not have packed so much for that part of our holiday.  A swimming costume and sarong would have been sufficent with a couple of outfits for dinners.

After 7 weeks away we still brought home unworn clothes and shoes.

Once the actual booking, be that the flight car to the airport or parking, car hire etc (we always pop into our local Flight Centre and allow them the priviledge of pulling it altogether ) is sorted it is about the same for getting there.  But yes it is VERY much more stressful than just jumping into the motorhome having booked a site by phone

The Enks. Good luck with the holiday! We tried a different break earlier in the year but it reminded me why we chose to get a van!

We're off on a flying /hotel holiday soon......the preparation is much easier than a caravan holiday (just throw some clothes is a bag)........but the journey is far more tedious.......early morning drive to airport, several hours of boredom at airport followed by being herded like cattle onto aircraft, 4 hours or so of being cramped and breathing everyone else's germs, another hour to collect the bags and then herded onto a bus (or in our case this time, join the queue at the car hire desk).

Good job the holiday itself makes it worth it......

Going off for a three day hotel break there were nearly as many clothes as for a month in the van. Had to accomodate several different needs, from outdoor to evening dinner I suppose - much more casual for the van though. Feels really strange just bunging  a bag in the car and going. Keep thinking something has been forgotten