You arrive at the campsite at 5pm, it's chucking it down, kids and better half are hangry. What do you do?

bad weather doesn't exist, only bad gear.
any recommendations for good value rain gear? Don’t want to spend a fortune on branded stuff particularly for the kids where they’ll grow out of it in 10 minutes. We do have ski stuff for all of us.
 
any recommendations for good value rain gear? Don’t want to spend a fortune on branded stuff particularly for the kids where they’ll grow out of it in 10 minutes. We do have ski stuff for all of us.
As well as decathlon, try Trespass and Regatta.
 
any recommendations for good value rain gear? Don’t want to spend a fortune on branded stuff particularly for the kids where they’ll grow out of it in 10 minutes. We do have ski stuff for all of us.
I was advised at Snow and Rock that Gore Tex jackets for children are not made. Who wants to pay £250 - £400 for a jacket that a child will grow out of in a year or two?

Here is a good description of how waterproofness is measured.

Don't make the mistake I made many years ago. For Christmas my brother bought me a brand new North Face Gore Tex jacket. What he didn't tell me was that he picked it up in a Shanghai market. Confident with the jacket I strayed out onto the very wet Plynlimon Hills. It turned out that the jacket was just about as waterproof as a fishing net.
 
any recommendations for good value rain gear? Don’t want to spend a fortune on branded stuff particularly for the kids where they’ll grow out of it in 10 minutes. We do have ski stuff for all of us.
How does this relate to the topic of this thread? :headbang
 
I was advised at Snow and Rock that Gore Tex jackets for children are not made. Who wants to pay £250 - £400 for a jacket that a child will grow out of in a year or two?

Here is a good description of how waterproofness is measured.

Don't make the mistake I made many years ago. For Christmas my brother bought me a brand new North Face Gore Tex jacket. What he didn't tell me was that he picked it up in a Shanghai market. Confident with the jacket I strayed out onto the very wet Plynlimon Hills. It turned out that the jacket was just about as waterproof as a fishing net.
I think the Gore Tex guy died this week.
 
Always camped in the med when ours was small, medium and big actually she's 25 now but still happy to be on a freebie, if she's with us now wine or pub always works..
 
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We’ve been having the same issues- bought our cali when we didn’t have kids and used it loads. One kid, all fine, slept across the rear parcel shelf and we used the Cali screw on coat hooks to rig up a curtain so the back area is like a little room. Daughter slept well in there. We then had the “main room” for cooking, chatting, boozing before going to bed upstairs. No need to put the bottom bed down at all.
then no 2 comes along. This is when van use started to wane. Getting one to bed in a mini travel cot then the other alongside wasn’t easy! It got to the point it wasn’t the relaxing holiday anymore.
we used a khyam easy up awning which was great. Stuff all the rubbish and bikes in there and literally 2 mins up and 2 mins packed away.
in the end we gave up with the Cali. Holiday time is precious so we just sold it and bought a Motorhome on Friday! A 7 berth motorhome.....

the Cali cost us about £8K in depreciation over 9 yrs. Held enough value that we could get a decent motorhome.

got a few Cali bits that I’ll need to get rid of, bike rack, khyam awning, tea towel rail, insect screens for the windows etc.

just need to buy some camping chairs and a table now!
 
I went away to the Yorkshire Dales with just Ben (and our dog) last weekend. It is amazing how little we took. And we fully self-catered except for Friday evening when we ate a burger and chips in the van at a motorway service station.

Here's my packing list-

Hillwalking packing list
Clothing
Underwear and socks
Trousers/shorts
Shirts
Sweater
Wash bag
Saturday Breakfast
Coffee
Milk
Cereal
Bacon
Roll/bread
Hill gear
Rucksack
Water bottles
Map/spare map
Compass
GPS
Walking boots
Thick socks
Fleece/sweater
Waterproof top/trousers
Gloves
Packed Lunch/snacks
Rolls
Butter
Ham
Cheese
Crisps
Apples
Bananas
Nuts and raisins
Chocolate
Cooking and eating equipment
Gas
Stove
2 saucepans
Kettle
Plates
Bowls
Knives
Forks
Spoons
Teaspoons
Glasses
Mugs
Saturday dinner
Pasta
Pasta sauce
Yoghurt
Fruit
Salt
Other
Duvet
Pillows
Pop-a-loo
Drinking water
Dog food
Dog bed
Leash
Sunday Breakfast
Coffee
Milk
Cereal
Bacon
Roll/bread

Apart from a blanket and a bag of wine gums, I don't think we took anything else.
Nice complete list , not much wine I notice !
 

VW California Club

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