Wednesday 7 May 2014

A Camping Weekend...

We are a city family - and we love everything that comes with that, we can hop on buses and trains anytime we like to visit fantastic museums, art galleries and great playgrounds or markets... but we also want to give our children a taste of the country life. For us, going camping is a great way to give our city kids a sense of the 'country' (whatever that is!) so, for a few days at least, they can run a little wild, explore and discover things for themselves.

Our lovely bell tent at Wowo by Alexis at www.somethingimade

Last weekend we headed down to East Sussex, to Wapsbourne Farm (lovingly nick-named Wowo) and pitched our bell-tent (am still in love with this tent) for a couple of days of free-range living.

We'd never been to Wowo before - it's a popular site and for most weekends you have to book in advance (taking a punt on the weather)... I can see why though, it was a perfect site for us; really family friendly, close to London so we didn't have to trek miles, small enough for the children to be able to explore it themselves and most importantly for us they allow campfires. There were streams and woods full of wild garlic and bluebells, lots of rope swings hung from tall trees, ducks and chickens roaming around and so many well thought out little details from the comunal freezers to laminated maps and directions that could be borrowed from the well stocked shop.... they even had the papers on Sunday.

... and luckily for us the weather was great (although VERY cold at night, next time we camp this early in the year I'm going to be investing in some serious sleeping bag kit).

Here are some pics from our weekend...

Camping at Wowo in East Sussex by Alexis at www.somethingimade

Camp days start early... but honestly there is something so good about being up early when the sun is out and you have a steaming cup of tea in your hand...

Our lovely bell tent at Wowo by Alexis at www.somethingimade

We went with our friends and their children - this was our set up. Wowo have pre made fire pits all ready with benches. We backed onto a little stream with woodland behind it, perfect for our adventurous small people.

Camping at Wowo in East Sussex by Alexis at www.somethingimade

And we were right next to this great swing, which was just one of many to be found around the site.

Camping at Wowo in East Sussex by Alexis at www.somethingimade

The girls were thrilled when their new friends showed them this swing... I only found out about it as I asked Coco why she'd changed into her jeans (an almost unheard of occurance for this skirt/dress obsessed girl) and she told me it was so she could have them rolled up in case she got wet on the swing! I'm so glad I followed her up to see her try this swing all on her own...

Camping at Wowo in East Sussex by Alexis at www.somethingimade

Camping at Wowo in East Sussex by Alexis at www.somethingimade

Camping at Wowo in East Sussex by Alexis at www.somethingimade

 Henry on another swing that the girls found when they were off exploring on their bikes.

Camping at Wowo in East Sussex by Alexis at www.somethingimade

A make-shift bridge over the stream where we were camped lead to woodland carpeted in wild garlic - which the girls proceeded to collect...

Camping at Wowo in East Sussex by Alexis at www.somethingimade

Coco setting up her flower stall at Wowo camp site in East Sussex by Alexis at www.somethingimade

... and then they made a little flower stall...

Camping at Wowo in East Sussex by Alexis at www.somethingimade

and did a roaring trade for a while... before we had to tell them not to pick the wild flowers; although we did get them to harvest some wild garlic leaves for our tortilla.

... and then they made a little flower stall...

The site is a walk away from Sheffield Park, a huge National Trust property which we visited for tea... but mainly we just hung around the campsite, relaxing, having yet another cup of tea/glass of wine and cooking on the campfire.







Not that you even have to do your own cooking (well... you kind of do really - but this free soup was delicious).

Camping at Wowo in East Sussex by Alexis at www.somethingimade
 Henry getting adventurous... just before getting his first experience of stinging nettles.

Camping at Wowo in East Sussex by Alexis at www.somethingimade

Camping at Wowo in East Sussex by Alexis at www.somethingimade

Early mornings and late nights... with a lot of fresh air and adventure in between.

When I told Henry we were going food shopping today he said "ok, but then can we go camping after".

And if I haven't raved about it all enough, I think the proof of how much we loved this site is that when we got back last night we went straight online and booked for another weekend there later in the summer... I'm hoping that we are going to get a lot of use from our bell tent this year.

4 comments:

  1. Oooh I love a good camp too. It gives the kids a rare chance to be free. We've been to Wowo and I agree it's a good site. We're trying Forgewood this year. I've heard good things about it. (See you at Blogtacular this weekend?)

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  2. I agree that Wowo stands head above other camp sites for family wild adventures. The kids meet new friends and enjoy the activities. The area offers do much to visit to do. PS there the dads on our last trip discovered a micro brewery in Sheffield park. The camp fires were well stock on rare beer finds

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  3. We totally LOVE Wowo too - it's the perfect place :)

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  4. I love your bell tent. The one thing that I'm worried about for our upcoming Europe camping trip is that our tent is just nowhere near as photogenic as a beautiful bell tent.

    I really, really want to persuade you to come to the Just So Festival this year. I think you'd love it!

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