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Quote: Originally posted by 664DaveS on 29/1/2025

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We have been caravanning for many years in UK and EU. Towing is ok and once set up,we can use our car to run about.
We have travelled extensively in Australia in hired Campervans (6M vans) and Canada in a bigger motorhome. Both those countries are more geared to Motorhomes.
We are in our 70s now and have been looking at a small motorhome around 6m length. They are a lot of money and we would still need a car. We would sell the caravan and the SUV towcar. We also have a Mini which we could keep.
At the moment We manage fine. We changed our van for a smaller lighter one which we tow with a Hyundai Tucson hybrid( it replaced a bigger diesel SUV). Economy is very good, luckily the price was just under the £40k threshold so we don't have to pay higher road tax!( It's not now on latest model)
There certainly seems to be more motorhomes about now. They are pretty expensive , but then so are new caravans!
It's really down to personal choice.
If we did go the MH route we would consider getting an electric car to replace the Mini as we don't do a huge mileage. We have our own driveway so could get a charger fitted.

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Quote: Originally posted by George-Mildred on 29/1/2025

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Alot will depend on how you like to holiday. Do you want to go to one place and explore from there or move on every day or so?

It has taken us a while and some adjusting going from caravan to motorhome but wouldn't go back now, we are getting used to finding places near where we want to go and then moving on. We do take a car with us sometimes - depends what we are planning. To that some would say have a caravan and car but it is far easier to tow a small car behind a bigger motorhome than vice versa.

If you are planning on Europe a lot more, then a motorhome is ideal as you have the Aires etc. to make use of.

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Quote: Originally posted by Colin21 on 29/1/2025

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Now that we are in our 70s we tend to go to one place and explore the area with our car, which is why we have a caravan. If we wanted to tour, stopping one or two nights then moving on, we would definitely opt for a motorhome if we could afford one. It does depend very much on what you want to do with it.

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Quote: Originally posted by Monty15 on 31/1/2025

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Do you want, quick getaways, short stays, moving on every other day or so 'touring', or do you want a 'fixed' base to explore an area from and stay for a week or two?

If you want to tour on short stays, then campers and MHs suit best. Campers are a bit basic (all too literally, a 'tin tent' in many respects), MHs have a bit of luxury about them.

Caravans and MH's are great as longer stay units, as all/most of the comforts of home. Downside of a MH is, if only transport, then there are loads of places that you really can't get such a large vehicle, such as car parks with height/width restrictions, narrow single track roads, steep winding hills etc., so bikes, buses, taxis etc. may be needed, or off site options may be restricted. Caravan gives you a solo tow car which is pretty unrestricted where you can get it. Of course, the restrictions are in proportion to the size of the MH, they vary from a panel van to a virtual truck, so that needs consideration.

Purchase and running costs may feature in your decision process. Campers and MHs are motor vehicles in their own right so attract quite high ownership and running costs, if used as an everyday vehicle then you suffer the high fuel consumption all the time and the annual fuel bill can be rather high! A caravan on the other hand only imposes high fuel consumption (expect mpg to roughly halve over solo car) when towing, and caravan can cost very little when unused.

Can't agree with George and Mildred, if you prep your caravan in advance (as you would need to do with a Camper or MH!), you can be away in 30 mins on you departure day, basically just removing security locks, hitching up, lights check etc., and I do that all on my own. My caravan's in storage away from home, and I can do that with no trouble. Ok, I've got a 45min journey to storage yard, but I'd probably have that with a MH too!

Caravans don't lend themselves to short stays and moving on every other day type touring particularly, but I've broken long journeys with an overnight stop on a camp site, it's doable, but a little bit less convenient than Camper/MH perhaps.

There are a number of Pros and Cons to each option, they are not simple straightforward alternatives, you need to think hard about potential use, purchase cost, running costs, limitations of vehicle type, level of comfort you require, not all on board facilities like toilet and shower which appear to give independence from site facilities are quite as user friendly, indeed even usable, as their mere presence would imply! Many on MHs and even some caravans are far too compact for comfortable/practical use!

When I moved up from a tent some 8 years back, I looked at every option, spent about a year looking at different options at shows and dealer forecourts, changing my mind quite a lot on what I thought I could live with and use in the way I wanted, ended up with a largish caravan, which most certainly was not on my options when I started out! Absolutely made the right decision, it's given me exactly the camping lifestyle I wanted, and I picked the perfect caravan for me first time. Time and effort of thinking about potential use and examining the options paid dividends.

If continental travel is your aim, ferry fares can be pretty steep for a caravan, but you offset that against ownership/running costs of the alternatives in working your overall budgeting - swings and roundabouts!

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Quote: Originally posted by MrWez on 31/1/2025

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We used to have a trailer tent, it gave us a lot of space but we came close to divorce everytime we put the thing up or took the thing down.

When the chance to move up to a caravan or a motorhome came up we went the motorhome route for the following reasons:

1. I HATE towing. I know how to tow, I consider myself quite good at it as I used to instruct it when I was in the RAF but I hate it. A caravan was out of the question.

2. A camper van was just too small, we had two teenagers, a boy and a girl and they needed their own personal space also we wanted to be able to camp off grid so needed an on-board kitchen, bathroom with loo and shower which wasn't an option in most of the campers we saw.

As an aside, a local dealer told us he gets so many couples coming in, already sold on the VW camper lifestyle regardless of the fact they've got 3 kids and 2 big dogs. He tries to persuade them a motorhome is better suited to their needs but they're so adamant the VW camper is the solution for them. A few months later they're back wanting to trade in for a motorhome, a cold, wet night squashed into the camper with the grumpy kids, wet dogs and no loo having persuaded them where he failed in the first place.


You need to ask yourself what type of camping you want to do. We tour usually spending a couple of nights before moving on. When we go to the continent we often stay just one night before moving on, we use aires and France Passion sites which are set up for motorhomes (they don't always have toilets/shower blocks - in fact most don't). When the kids came with us we had to go to one place and stay there (I hated it). I'm much happier with touring.

A motorhome is a big investment so you have to be prepared to use it. A lot of people buy one thinking that when a nice weekend comes along they'll just jump into it and roar off to the sunset. Invariably when the time comes they've got something else planned so they never go, never use it.

We plan ahead and will go usually regardless of the weather (snow and named storms excepted). We've got our year planned out ahead for the next year, we usually try to do one weekend a month Nov-Mar and more than twice a month Apr-Oct. CAMC and C&CC rallies/events are a good excuse to get out for a weekend.

Our motorhome is our main leisure activity (well, that and gardening). It gets used a lot.

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