❌ Can't Find A Motorhome Pitch? Watch This!

One of the worst things about the school holidays and working shifts or having kids or having family commitments is that you don't always know when you can get away. You don't necessarily know the dates that you can book months and months and months in advance, and then July appears, or Easter, or whatever other major school holiday is on, and either everywhere is booked up or you've got to have like a minimum of 3 nights or all of this other crazy stuff. So today I want to show you 5 websites that I always go to when I'm looking for last-minute bookings and availability. Now obviously there are things like Brit Stops and there are Aires or there's Wild Parking, there are other options available, but on this video I'm going to focus specifically on trying to find campsites. So if you want to know more about finding campsites at the very last minute, then this is the video for you. If you're new here, hi, my name is Kat and I help motorhome and campervan owners make the most of their time on the road. So if you want more tips for motorhome travel, van life, places to go, road trip tips, all of that good stuff, then A, make sure you're following along to this channel, but also B, I send out weekly emails with lots of tips and behind-the-scenes interesting tidbits in there, so you can join that. I will leave the link for it in the notes for you. So, the first site that I tend to turn to when I'm looking for last-minute holidays in the UK is clbooking.co.uk, and I really like CL sites because they're Smaller, they have fewer facilities, and so they're not necessarily suitable for families. But if you are looking to travel last minute and you're fairly flexible about where you go, going on a small site that's got like 5 pitches is a lot quieter than it is going into one of the massive campsites in the school holidays. So for me, that is a better option. So if you want smaller, quieter sites, I highly recommend signing up for clbooking.co.uk. I think it's free from memory. So let's do a little bit of an experiment. Let us pick a random weekend. Let's pick the last weekend of July heading into August. That's always gonna be a really busy weekend. So immediately it has filtered on the UK. Oh, it might actually have the filters that I've got set up. No, it doesn't. So definitely need something that's dogs allowed. I don't necessarily need a shower and a toilet, but just for the sake of this, let's do a shower and a toilet and let's leave it there and see what it has got on that. So now it sort of updates. Now that could be a lot, to be fair, I may break it. So let's make it a little bit harder and let's pick Cornwall. We want to go to Cornwall on the busiest weekend in the summer and the very last minute we've not booked anywhere. And amazingly, there are 17 results that say that they have got availability here. Now, one thing I really like about clbooking.com, I don't know if any are available, is that some of them have got instant booking now, which is great. Yeah, it annoys me that they show ones that aren't available, but never mind. So, then you can just pick the one that you think looks nicest, so I'm gonna go for this one, and then you can find out the information about it, you can find the arrival times, payment methods, exactly where they are, and you can— somewhere there is— oh, they have a Book Now facility on this one, and this is, as it says, it's not availability cannot be guaranteed, but you can book it Safely through this website, and then if the owner can't accommodate you, they'll refund— they'll refund it. You can see latest reviews and things. So I really like CL Booking. I've used it loads of times and I have had no issues with it whatsoever. So that's my first port of call when I'm looking for something last minute in the UK. However, if I want a full-on proper campsite with facilities, or if I'm traveling with kids or family members or whatever, so you need like a proper campsite. So again, let's, let's apply the Same, the same parameters. So Cornwall, last weekend of July going into August. Let's say 2 adults. We want a motorhome pitch. We didn't ask for electric on the last one, so we won't do that one. And then what we need to do is filter it to include docks. And I think I had showers and toilets on the last one from memory, so let's say a toilet block. as well. So these are showing, again, not every campsite, but it shows all the ones that are signed up to pitchup.com that have got availability over that weekend. But if I want to come all the way down here, let's go, let's go all the way down here. Seaview Holiday Park. I think I've actually stayed here before. Oh wow, maybe I haven't. I don't remember ever staying there. So this, again, you always need to just double-check that it has got what you are looking for. So we're looking for, obviously, for a motorhome pitch, and obviously we're looking for dogs allowed on there. So you can get a non-electric grass pitch if you're going to stay off-grid, and if you are needing electric, it doesn't look like there's any availability left on the site, which is yet another reason why being confident of staying off-grid is so useful, and that's why I'm running the workshop that I'm running later on this month, the Off-Grid and Wild Parking Workshop, and that's going to teach you how to set up your motorhome, how to find places, um, how to use things like Aire, like places like this, and it will give you a lot more confidence in being able to book places that don't necessarily have an electric hookup, especially if you're only going for a weekend. Most motorhomes can survive absolutely fine for a weekend off-grid, but people are anxious about it and don't quite know how to set it all up. So if you want to join on that workshop, it is free, but spaces are limited. So again, All of the details for that will be underneath this video for you. If I'm really struggling, another campsite that I will use is campsites.co.uk, and exactly the same thing, it is campsites that have signed up to be on here. So, if we do Cornwall and we do last weekend in July, this one you can be a little bit flexible if you are flexible. So, yep, we're going to go for 2 nights. We want a motorhome. We want two adults. Oh, I forgot to include dogs. One dog and such. So there we go. And the same exactly the same thing here. So you can then click on actually this will be fun. Let me see if so this is the same holiday park. It says it's available and it says they've got a non-electric grass pitch for £74 on the pitch. As far as I can see, it's an 8 by 8 suitable for tents, rooftop trailer tents, caravans, campervans, motorhomes. So they are charging £74 for 2 nights plus 1 dog. And on PitchUp, this was £64, but I don't think that price included the dog. I think you have to go through, book it. Yeah, and there's a dog on there, so the prices are exactly the same on, on those 2. There we go, it was a good little experiment for that, wasn't it? So yeah, those are, um, CL Booking, pitchup.com, and then Campsite. So if I'm going across into Europe and I want some last-minute places to stay, like campsites in Europe, obviously when I normally travel to Europe, I either use things like Airs and Off Grid Spots and even wild stopovers. So it's a lot easier to travel last minute in Europe than it is across the UK because there are just more places that you can stop. But if I want to definitely book something up and I want to book up either campsites or a confirmed spot, These are the 2 that I tend to use most. So, I— if I want a campsite, I tend to use ACSI Eurocampings. So, this works exactly the same as all the other campsites that we've seen. So, let's pick a place in Europe, and let's do Bordeaux. It's going to be fairly busy. Do the 31st. Apply that. 2 people. Sure. Those are really random dates of birth, but— All right, let's do that. I might have used those in the past, to be fair. They're not, they're not official dates of birth. So we definitely want a pitch, not an accommodation. And you can see it then on the map, and you can see all the different options. Now, the green ones means that you just go directly to that campsite's website, and the red ones mean that you should be able to book with the ACSI website. And you obviously make sure that the dates are right and the pitches Oh, okay, that's— to be fair, that's not bad for a week. Oh, this— ah, the difference here is the electric amperage that you've got, so 10 or 5 amp or no electric at all, and again, if that makes you nervous, learning how to stay off-grid, even on a proper campsite, it's still off-grid if you haven't got electric, it gives you a lot more flexibility on where you can stay, so the link for that workshop will be in the notes. So, that's how you use the ACSI. Now, like I've said many, many times, I generally prefer to use Aires or Approved Stopovers, or in Europe, I tend to wild park an awful lot. If the idea of heading towards an aire or something like that makes you really anxious, then Camping Car Park is a really good option. So the way that this works is, again, you— it's basically airs that have been taken over by a company. So they used to be local county council or council airs that were around little towns or villages, and it's become too expensive to maintain them. So then this private company, Camping Car Park, has bought them up, and they've created a network of old airs and, and some new places as well, but they are paid and can be booked in advance, so they are almost like small sites, very few facilities on a lot of them, but you can actually be assured of having somewhere to stay when you arrive, so it gives a little bit more certainty and structure, and you can book them quite last minute as well. So again, let's say we're going to go to Bordeaux. Bordeaux, there we are. Now on this one, I'm just going to show you, like, that you can book it Quite last minute. So, if we— obviously, they've got all the different ones around, and you can see them all on a map. Yes, you definitely can see them on a map. Come on. There we go. So, they've got the list around Bordeaux, and you can, like, change the radius of— obviously, the wider the radius, the more options you've got, and you can pick the kind of place that you want to stay. You can choose if you need it to have things like electric hookup, but the more services you insist on, the fewer the options you're going to have. One thing that's quite annoying on this is you have to drag it down to see it, so there we go. Like all big cities, you probably won't ever find an aire, like, right in the middle. There are a few exceptions, of course, but this is a motorhome area in Gironde. It offers overnight parking for €16.60 for the night. It tells you that there are 4 available places. I I think that's for tonight. Yeah, it is. So, and it shows you that dogs on a lead are allowed. They're not allowed everywhere, so just be really certain about that. Again, we're booking this. This is for today, so you could book this for today, head there now, and be assured of somewhere when you arrive. Some of them do have like a latest arrival time, so just be mindful of that as well. Now, if we wanted to do the 31st, which is what we've been doing, and arrival time, let's say 6 PM, and we're going to leave the next day, and our departure time, let's say midday. You have a yearly charge, and I haven't paid my yearly charge. That's why that's so expensive. So, you need your pass, your privileges package, you've got to basically sign up to Camping Car Park, and then you have the stay for the night and the tourist tax, which comes to £16— I think it was £16.60, wasn't it? So, yes, you do have to to buy that as well. So that's how you do it, and then you just sign up and then you've got a space, and it's really, really straightforward. So those are the 5 different ones that I use. And again, with camping car park, not all of them have got electric hookups. So being able to stay a night or 2 nights without needing electric hookup and learning how everything works in your van and setting it all up just makes your life so much easier. And that is as well, you can add in things like Aire or if you're in the UK, things like Brit Stops, Pub Stops, all of that kind of stuff, they are all off-grid. So being able to do that does make your life a heck of a lot easier. So like I said, if you do want to learn more about how to set that all up, I am doing a free workshop at the end of July. I will leave all the details for that in the notes for you. If you happen to be watching this video after the end of July, then there will be some sort of way to get the replay. I will share that with you as well. The link will be in the notes. so you can still catch up on that. Right, I hope you found that video useful. If you did, a thumbs up is always very much appreciated. And if you do want to know more about touring in Europe, you will find this video really helpful, and I will see you there. Take care, bye!