• BIOGRAPHY

MOTORHOMENEWS

~ A personal take by Christopher Macgowan on tourism, travel and motorhomes.

MOTORHOMENEWS

Tag Archives: OAY

White Water Park, Stockton-on-Tees, is a must to visit.

18 Saturday Nov 2017

Posted by chrismacgowan in Sites

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

#motorhomes, Boys from the Blackstuff, caravan and motorhome club, chrismacgowan, Christopher Macgowan, Middlesbrough, motorhome, motorhomenews, OAY, White Water Park

The Caravan and Motorhome Club has given this site a huge upgrade and makeover in the last twelve month. To say it is impressive is an understatement.

In the shorthand that we all use it is 15 acres, Open All Year, 100 touring pitches, Late Night Arrivals Area, Security barrier, TV Room, Games Room, latest Easy Empty grey water point for motorhomes and a Beefeater restaurant within 100 metres.

I thoroughly enjoyed my stay and on leaving the site could not resist a ride across the Transporter Bridge in Middlesbrough. Anyone who loved “The Black Stuff” about a group of Liverpudlian tarmac layers on a job near Middlesbrough and the sequel “Boys from the Blackstuff” will know why.

Christopher Macgowan

@motorhomenews

Advertisements

What it’s like visiting a CL which won “CL of the Year” 

03 Friday Nov 2017

Posted by chrismacgowan in Sites

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

#motorhomes, caravan and motorhome club, Christopher Macgowan, CL, CL of the year, Ellesmere, Ian and Janet Kelly, motorhome, motorhomenews, OAY, practical caravan, Shropshire, touring


Ten years ago Birch Hill Farm CL won the Caravan Club’s (as the Club was called then) “CL of the Year” and I thought it would be interesting to stay on site and see how things were going ten years on. Success has continued as it won Practical Caravan’s “Best Small Site” award in 2012, 2013 and 2014.

The Club has around 2500 CL owners under the scheme – in an over simplistic nutshell these are sites allowed to take up to five outfits, only Club members can use them, maximum stay 28 consecutive days and the site has to comply with a small but important range of standards such as safe water and so on. By their very nature and a key part of their attraction is the wide variety of types on the network. The Club’s Sites Directory is at pains to describe each one; open all year or not, hardstandings or not and so on – so the member can choose what suits their needs and, typically, members get to know what suits them best and therefore develope a list of favourites. Some Club members so prefer the CL network they rarely make an appearance at any of the 200 Club sites.

When you stay at Birch Hill you can see almost immediately why it won in 2007 but more importantly it becomes obvious that far from resting on their laurels, owners Ian and Janet Kelly have continued to maintain a seemingly impossibly high standard and make further improvements. WiFi boosters for the free WiFi, a combined online booking and personal telephone system, a bespoke dog tag with the site’s details, masses of tourist information and a functional website that might put some larger sites to shame. One of the reasons it is easy to get to is because there is an arrival video of the website which makes life so much easier – on this occasion I was a solo motorhomer and believe me an arrival video is invaluable!

So I salute the policy of continuous improvement which is very much in evidence here and, when all is said and done, deepest Shropshire near the town of Ellesmere is not a bad spot to find yourself in at the beginning of November. Oh, and of course it’s open all year which is important to me as an all year round active motorhomer.

Quick link to website is HERE

Christopher Macgowan

@motorhomenews

Autumn at Chapel Lane, SPECTRE and the All Blacks.

01 Sunday Nov 2015

Posted by chrismacgowan in Sites, This and That

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

#motorhomes, All Blacks, Chapel Lane, Christopher Macgowan, James Bond, motorhome, motorhomenews, OAY, SPECTRE, Tebbit Test, The Caravan Club

  
I stayed at The Caravan Club’s Chapel Lane site over the weekend and it is in full autumnal colours. The wardens are doing a brilliant job keeping the site in tip top condition whilst the leaves fall and a state of calm and  tidiness prevails. The site is south west of Birmingham very close to Solihull and the M42 but is a surprisingly rural setting in the shadow of an old chapel. It is open all year and, needless to say, is very popular. 

Earlier in the week Faye and I had somehow found an evening we were both free and booked a couple of online seats for SPECTRE which lived up to all my expectations for sheer escapism and wonderful action.  The opening scene in Mexico City does your head in. James Bond is partnered throughout the film by the daughter of an old nemesis and in tracking down SPECTRE finds out rather more about his childhood than he had bargained for.

One aspect of the film concerned me. 

My lobbying work places me all too frequently in the “politically correct” arena and consequently I am perhaps more on my toes than I would normally expect to be. After one particularly high charged action scene Bond and his partner find themselves in a heap on the floor at which point she turns to him and says, admittedly rather coyly,  “What do we do now?” and of course we are next in a romantic clinch – and more.

My point is this. I am not sure when someone turns to you next time and says “What do we do now?” it is safe to interpret that as an invitation for some highly personal interaction and I think Bond may have taken advantage of this woman without getting her clear and unequivocal agreement in advance in the cold light of day. 

This is quite shocking and sets a poor example to other would-be spies who see Bond as a role model. How this country is expected to recruit quality spies with standards when this is the way they are portrayed is difficult to grasp.

And then of course there was Saturday afternoon.

Faye is a New Zealander but has lived in the UK since the 60’s and many years ago passed the Tebbit Test. Tebbit you will remember is a former MP for Chingford and a former cabinet minster. In 1990 he made the remark that immigrants should be asked which side their grandparents fought for during the Second World War and which cricket team do they now support living in the UK? If they did not support, say, the England cricket team living in England, they could not be considered truly loyal to England.

Faye passes the test with flying colours and has been an England rugby supporter for years but a crisis emerged early in the tournament when England got knocked out through incompetence and lack of ability. Old loyalties re-emerged quite understandably and I too found myself favouring the All Blacks. So by the time Saturday’s final took place Faye had requested leave of absence from the Tebbit Test and without any UK team of any description in the final I had joined her.

And what an absolutely brilliant game it was; superlatives scarcely do it justice. And what a void is left behind now it is all over!

Christopher Macgowan

@motorhomenews

Coniston Park Coppice Caravan Club site

06 Thursday Nov 2014

Posted by chrismacgowan in Sites

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

Christopher Macgowan, Coniston, Cumbria, motorhome, motorhomenews, OAY, The Caravan Club

DSC_0020.JPG

DSC_0017.JPG

DSC_0029.JPG

DSC_0027.JPG
Enjoying a few days at this excellent open all year site just outside Coniston, Cumbria.

Christopher Macgowan
@motorhomenews

Follow me on Twitter

My Tweets

What I’ve been up to – so far.

April 2018
M T W T F S S
« Mar    
 1
2345678
9101112131415
16171819202122
23242526272829
30  

Enter your email address to follow this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Join 1,659 other followers

Advertisements
April 2018
M T W T F S S
« Mar    
 1
2345678
9101112131415
16171819202122
23242526272829
30  

Create a free website or blog at WordPress.com.

Cancel