Be Excellent To Each Other

1) Could anyone recommend a three person tent with a porch type thing for MrsA and I to use? Apparently, my £12.99 2 man one from LIDL isn't good enough.

2)If not, what should I be looking for in a modern day tent?

3) Could anyone recommend a campsite with electrical hookups in the Forest of Dean area?

Thanks.

Look here: http://www.decathlon.co.uk/family-tents ... ports.html

The pop up ones are awesome and fully endorsed by The BeeX Tinkers.

Is one bedroom ok? This looks great: http://www.decathlon.co.uk/seconds-fami ... 71126.html

The Boss says "no" to pop up tents a full time tent, for some reason that I don't understand, but those decathalon ones look ok.

Pop-up tents are shite. Really handy to set up initially. Fucking nightmare to stuff back into the bag on the miserable wet morning you're going home.

Bollocks it takes minutes unless you're a spacker who can't do it. (I remember seeing one bloke walking through town back to the shop with a popped up tent).

If she says no to pop up tents then she should be the one to pitch it, in the rain, while you sit in the car.

Like Bi, she thinks they're a dog to get in the bag as well. I'm disinclined to try and change this as it would be somewhat like trying to topple Nelson's Column with a fly swatter.

The latter idea is superb, though.

The trick is the way you twist the hoops together - for a more reasonable tent though your really talking a few hundred pounds (specially if you want one to stand up in) , and they can be difficult to setup.

Apart from pop-ups the easiest ones we've had to pitch are wigwams - have a look at these

http://soulpad.co.uk/

Positives - easy to pitch , loads of space inside
Negatives - very expensive

Fuck, YEAH!

The larger Quecha pop up one in last years range looked quite good, and from what I could deduce, it isn't all that pop-up (and so easier to repack), but still simplified. May be spenny though.

Edit -Found it

Make sure to take a trip to Westbury Court Gardens to see where Mrs Grim...'s family used to live, and how far she's fallen from that particular tree...

Also:
http://www.firebox.com/product/3644/VW-Camper-Van-Tent

Man, I need to get me a hammock.

Yeah, if I had a hammock... I'd hammock in the morning...

I'd hammock in the evening...

I'd have a kip.

I'd rather have a ham hock.

It might not be the best place selling the best kit but Argos has some cheap things in it's pages.

But it also has this: Tardis Tent



Also this:

and 100% this:

Fucking hell, Z. On the day I found out this was down to "That's seriously good value", I now am going to buy this.

Which is fucking cool.

Awesome. Thanks for the heads up.

They are very nice, especially if you get a small chimney stove for heating & cooking.
If you are on a budget, Go Outdoors do decent tunnel tents in the £150 range (we got a Vango 10 man tent for £130 for 2 + 1/2 of us as it gives a nice big living room area, but it helps to get a carpet & footprint that ups the price eventually)
Tbh, the tent is the cheap bit tho! You need decent pegs, a good bed (a double camp bed + 7cm self inflating mat beats an inflatable bed anytime apparently - next on my list to get), cooking stuff, camp chairs, etc.
If you want to head a bit westwards, check out the Lone Wolf campsite, can do electric hookup in the fields, or proper sh*t-in-a-bucket woods camping too. And you can have campfires. Worth looking for campsites that allow campfires, they tend to be more relaxed...

I like the look of the four man lightweight soulpads. May consider one next time I'm looking, although nervy about transport weight if it's wet.

Tent ordered. Thanks, Z.

mrsA spent a long time last night brwosing through the accessories section of that website. I draw the line at bunting.

Oh my... I want one of those tents, a lot. If Ramsea doesn't get a job soon, we could live in it! Ace.*


*Not so ace.

Tents with stoves are great, although expect a lot of guests if it's a cold wet morning and fellow campers know you've got one.

Nice tent MaliA!

Bloody well should be though for £255.

See you at Tinkers. mrsA's bought fucking bunting. Run the risk of being mistaken for a circus. I wanted ammo boxes and a map weighted down with binoculars and a hurricane lamp on a trestle table whilst a motorbike and sidecar with a machine gun in it was parked nearby.

MrsZ did the same for ours

For a bit. Well be at the boozer after pegging down our pop up tents while you're still looking for the lion tamer.

Shut up, it's going to be easy. When is this?

Dunno. Usually early September ish.

yeah, that's good, i think.

August is a safer bet weather-wise. The weather up there is sketchy at the best of times but after August it gets even wetter.

FTFY

It has arrived! All 16kg of it. Going to be a right pain to stick back in the bag when wet. Most pelased, I am.

2 camp beds and a sleeping bag are on the way! Hurrah! This is getting expensive.

No need: just 'borrow' a hay bale from some cavalrymen when they aren't looking.

Get leathered and sleep on the floor.

Zeex

Excellent news! Went to Morrisons and got 4 solar powered lights that you stick in the ground for £5, and two 12 LED lanterns for £3 each. My sleeping bag has arrived and the beds are on their way. HUrrah!

Are you not just building a house?

Cripes, where we are staying is right on the border. Swim the river and I'm in Wales!

MrsA's "Essential Camping equipment" list includes cushions, a carpet and bunting. And an electric cool box.

Stick the bunting on the guy ropes to avoid serious injuries when you stumble back to the tent late at night.

FTFY

Does Beex have a preferred product for the following:

A camping stove - if it were only me, i'd take a tranjy, but MrsA seems to want a dual ring gas burner. Yeah, I know
A table to put this on - if i were only me, I'd stick my tranjy on the ground, but MrsA seems to want a table. Yeah, I know
A cool box - if it were me, I'd just have black coffee and eat salted meats, but MrsA seems to think this is needed. Yeah, I know


We've booked to go to Low Wray soon, so that'll be super fun, and I'm quite looking forward to it.

Camping stove;


Table;


Cool box;

Not used this particular brand or model, but from experience those cans of gas do the job really well, and the rings are big enough for most kinds of pans.

On iPad until tomorrow night so hard to search but

Stove - do you need a double burner ? What do you expect to be cooking on it ?
You can get a single burner quite cheaply or there are many small burners which are great at heating up water which is probably all you'll actually need on a regular basis ?
Also normally double burners use large gas canisters which are a bit awkward to store and transport
We've gone through many cookers and often a single burner has been fine - we also had something like a campingaz party grill which can be used as a hot plate or a burner (and packs up quite well)

Tables - you can get a number of collapsible ones which include a larder or shelves - its often best to look at these to get an idea of size - check out blacks / towsure for ideas of what's around

Cool boxes really depend on what your intending to store a basic one will do for milk but you can run into hundreds of pounds for a fridge if your wanting more

These are supposed to be excellent. I have the 36L one and it did well enough to keep last year's BeexBeeQue meat chilled down to South Wales and back up to Bedford in a hot car, so I've been pleased with it.

As it turns out, we want a bigger tent. Looking at the 4m Soulpads now. This si getting expensive, quickly. The woodburner is £230 and the flue is £190 for goodness sake! I think we'll go without them, although I've convinced MrsA that winter camping is a good idea. We'll be getting some duck boards for the ground by the tent entrance and make a shelter using <stuff> for outside the front.