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Quote: Originally posted by bish04 on 13/8/2008

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Come on you lot cheer up.( It's summertime.) I think the summer blues have arrived. I know the weather gets us all down but we should just stop be typical british stop moaning this is what our country is all about RAIN, WIND ETC.

Just stop and think about what we used to do when we were kids the rain never stopped me from doing anything. Bet your kids are the same, mine are, put their waterproofs and wellies on and they love it out and about it's great to see their faces jumping in puddles getting muddy.

When the weather gets too bad we have great family time playing board games and make up games so the kids can use their brains instead of all these computer brain dead games.

Some of us only have a main holiday once a year and we know the british weather is not very good so i think we should just make the most of it and have FUN. Isn't that what camping is all about?

   

   Jo <IMG style="WIDTH: 21px; HEIGHT: 26px" alt=26 src="forum_images/smiley4.gif" >

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hi Bish i'm all for some FUN&GAMES but when your trudgeing through water and muck to do your dish's/shower/wash or even toilet that aint fun

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 When the weather is that bad i would pack up and come home i agree it no fun. We seem to have better weather in winter months. The seasons are def changing. Hope you have better weather next time or mybe we should all go abroad.

  Jo

We have just returned from Loire and Trinite in Southern Brittany. Love France but will not be going back. Holiday cost jsut over 2000 with spending and it was not value for money. Love our FC but as others have said when it is your main holiday it just isn't fun in the rain. We r off to the Isle of Wight on Saturday and am dreading it as we spent 2 nights in the car last year due to high winds. Looking out of the window now the weathrer doesn't look good.

Best of luck to anyone setiing off.

I can understand how people feel. Camping for me is not my main holiday though it has been in the past when the kids were young. I do get to have lots of camping trips and love them. I enjoy hotels, lodges and holidays abroad and camping in the tent when not wishing to tow

Hi

Just been forced home from northumberland due to mud. Our TT was dry inside but the site was flooded when we got there as were all the sites in the area. Got the car stuck when we were trying to out the TT on the field. If we hadn't just drivcen 300 miles then we would have gone home then. After 2 solid days and nights of rain then the mud was awful and it smelled like putrid horse poo any tiny hole in the ground sheet had mud oozing through it. Our son was in the under bed tent and I heaved yesterday morning when I woke him up it was that bad. We took the dog with us too and he had to be carried in and out of the tent to the roadway he is a labrador and OH and I have got big muscles now from weight lifting him. Had booked for 11 nights and managed 6 i am really disappointed that our main holiday was cut short. It hasn't put me off the area but will be phoning ahead to see if site is dry.

Was also a bit put out that play area was closed as was the dog walk and we were still charged £29 a night.

Bloody weather!!!!

Ali

The not happy camper.

I've abandoned the tent and gone home, yup. It was four(?) years ago down in the Scottish Borders...Hubby and I were just getting the TT set up when the heavens opened and within minutes we were ankle deep in water, given that we were pitched across a run-off point. The canvas got saturated both sides almost immediately and so of course the whole living area in the awning started to leak like a sieve. (The cabin area, fortunately, was already pegged down and stayed dry.) We pegged the whole thing out securely, looked at the small river running through the tent and the waterfall coming through the roof, tied the trailer body to a tree for stability and went home, fortunately only 25 miles away.

We did come back the next day when the rain stopped and spent a couple of days sleeping in the cabin and eating out a lot! The TT stood up to its soaking and dried out just fine, but I was sponging mud off it for the next few trips, lol. Thing is, we were determined to get away for a few days as Hubby's sister had just died and he wanted to get his mind off things once the funeral was over. It was certainly a good trip for that. I doubt I would have stayed for any other reason, but it turned out to be one of these trips that's strangely enjoyable...after the event, of course!

The OH and I spent the last weekend (3 nights) in Anglesey in the Rapido Recordmatic.  We were charged tent rates and then proceded to erect a caravan and because we didn't need hookup chose our pitch behind a hedge while overlooking the sea.  Although it was very wet and windy we were snug and dry and the 'van' hardly moved other than sinking a few centimeters each night at the end we were sleeping.     Soon corrected the following mornings. 

Our "wooden tent" was envied by many!  No problem packing away either.

Well, we returned a day early from the Llyn Pennisula earlier this month, managing to break a pole and bend another putting the TT away in the gales!!!  Does anyone know where to get spares - we have a 1980ish conway royale? 

With 3 children under 5 when the weather takes a turn for the worst and the tent leaks the fun disappears!!  Our 3 month old baby spent most of her holiday under the table for safe keeping as the mattress were all up at the back to dry out!!

Incidentally - we are fairly new at family camping.  As mentioned above we have an old conway trailer tent.  It was fabsealed last year and withstood most of the weather but this year the bedrooms got quite wet.  Could this have happened if we hadn't put it up quite right?  Or should the waterproofing have kept it out?  How do you know when your tent has had it?!!!

We are going camping in our other tent in a few days and are praying for ok weather - clouds. a few showers are fine!!!  A bit of rain I can deal with, but wet clothes and bedding is slightly different!   And whilst I agree that the kids enjoy it regardless it's hard to keep 3 year old twins amused all day with board games!!!

Next year we have booked a villa in spain and are driving to keep the costs down!!!  But we need to make camping work as it is really all we can afford - and we do love it when all goes well.

Yes, it is not much fun when the weather lets you down, just spent four wet weeks in Ireland. Stuck it out thinking the weather would change, but it didn't! Only thing that kept us there was the cost of getting there and the ferry supplement that we would have had to pay to come home early. Have always promised ourselves (from early tent days) that we would go to a BandB if things got bad, but never have, survived gales, floods, moved the tt in the rain because we were on a flooded ptich. Are we mad? Probably, but we remember the good times with sunshine and sitting outside till quite late. Those days will come again surely? Hope so we are off again  in September to the West Country.

Strangely, after four damp weeks outside I find it difficult to stay indoors now we are back, Anything but tackle the ironing! Oh and I can't sleep without the patter (drumming) of the rain on the canvas roof!

Quote: Originally posted by kiminwales1 on 23/8/2008

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  As mentioned above we have an old conway trailer tent.  It was fabsealed last year and withstood most of the weather but this year the bedrooms got quite wet.  Could this have happened if we hadn't put it up quite right?  Or should the waterproofing have kept it out?  How do you know when your tent has had it?!!!

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Was water actually dripping through the canvas? Or was it just wet to the touch inside, and the bedding feeling a bit damp? This latter is normal in very wet weather...it's condensation. Even canvas tents can suffer from it, especially ones that have been waterproofed as they then stary acting more like synthetic tents. Try to ventilate the cabin as much as possible, even at night. The top section of the inner door can be left open for a few inches and the skirt round the drawbar pegged so that there's a small gap. Also, don't dry things up there! Do it in the awning, with the door rolled up if possible. Wet towels and jackets are better off in the car. One forum member actually got mould on the underside of her TT roof due to the huge amount of condensation in the wet weather this year, so one other suggestion is to take the central cabin roof liner down during the day, to increase ventilation and give the canvas some help to dry out.

My Camargue is even older than your Royale and though the canvas does get wet inside in very rainy weather, it does not leak even though it's not been waterproofed at all. You will know when your canvas is getting too old to be worthwile...it will start to split along areas that are pitched under tension and get most affected by UV, like along the roof poles. But Conways of your (and my) era were built to last  30 years of use, given good care. Don't give up on your's yet.

Poles? Try Ebay (there seem to be an increasing number of old TTs being broken for spares these days) or TVS, who hold all the old Conway stock and can also manufacture spares in some cases.

 

PS. The other way your bedding will get wet is if the wind is knocking the wet canvas into the bed boards/bedding, or the bedding is being pushed into the canvas. You need to pitch the cabin so that there's at least a 6" gap all the way  round the back and sides of the bed boards. I get inside the cabin, push the canvas out to the right distance and Hubby pegs this. Start at the two essential back corners, then do the front ones...they can be snug against the front of the beds as the awning will protect the front canvas, but they do need to be away from the sides.

And of course use the waist guylines...that's what they are for, to keep the canvas clear of the beds. My Hubby took these down on one side one day to get something out our close-pitched car, forgot to put them up again and that side of the cabin was saturated later when we got back, even dripping into the undertent. I had to put the inner in the campsite tumbledryer, and wrap plastic sheeting round the mattress till we could dry it out.