The end of the 2021 Touring Season
The Puck is now emptied, covered, and garaged for the winter and marks the end of touring for 2021.
This year, I managed 66 nights in the van. A bit better than 2020, where I managed 34 nights, but not almost half of what I achieved in 2019 with 105 nights away!
I really wanted to revisit some of my favourite sites this year, sites which I'd really missed with all the restrictions last year. I started this year with a great trip to Morvich in April, where I met up with another Puck owner to enjoy a few fantastic days in Kintail.
I ended up making three separate trips to Morvich this year, one of my favourite sites. I also had a great trip in May to Nairn, a site where I ended touring in March 2020 when a lockdown was announced in Scotland.
I visited River Breamish in Northumberland twice, a site I really enjoy:
I made a few trips to Melrose, and revisited Kinlochewe, Garlieston, Oban, Dingwall, and Yellowcraig, I only visited two new places to me, Crofton Hall CL in Cumbria, and Clachan C&MC Site near Killin.
All the sites I visited this year were busy, mostly almost full. I had booked most of the trips during the 2020 winter period and I took advantage of offers run by the C&MC on discounted vouchers for future trips. I estimate I must have spent £700 on night, taking advantage of a 20% saving and also the UK VAT cut on holidays at home.
With restrictions still in place on most sites in the first half of 2021, the toilet blocks were generally queued out in the mornings and evenings, and during these times I took my own facilities comprising and excellent hot water system with shower, and a top of the range porta potti, both which I used in the awning. These proved to be brilliant and made for a very relaxed experience, letting others fight over toilet blocks!
With foreign travel being almost banned last year, and the explosion in staycations, sales of caravans and motorhomes went through the roof. This led to a massive increase in both the number of vans on the road, but also bookings on sites. I really struggled this year to find sites at short notice, where once I would arrive without prior bookings and always find space. I'm just hoping this year was just a blip. The sheer volume of scrappy 'hobbled together' campervans overnighting in public carparks and forests, ironically together with £100k motorhomes is blighting many communities, especially those near honey pots. The NC500 has also become more or less 'no-go' thanks to the legions of 'tick list' tourists.
One up side, however, is my own selfish hope that the market will be flooded in 2022 with vans bought in 2020/2021 by folk who believed Scotland was a rain free, sunset paradise with no midges, clegs, horizontal rain, tremendous touring infrastructure and a lovely welcoming population!!
So, here's hoping for a quieter 2022, the opening up of foreign travel, a return to some touring normality, and a market full of dirt cheap caravans!
Some memorable pictures from this year.
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