So I felt that a little camping trip with the Tagar 2 tent, the one I trialled in the garden before circumstances made me give in. I had company this time and they borrowed johnny underpants, my fav mid weight tent. We headed to hurst view in lymington, a relaxed site near the coast. I haven’t stayed here in nearly ten years, but little has changed. We paid, found our pitch and set up.

One of the rare campsites that encourage fires, so I had brought a firepit and the tripod grill that I had never used before. I sat and chopped some kindling with my travel hatchet. And we decided that it was time to go buy food. Of course by the time we had bought everything for a bbq, it was dark and had started to rain. And it pissed down. I am sad to say there aren’t really photos of the rest of the evening, as we struggled to start a fire, and then maintain the fire. Turns out I forgot some essential parts of the tripod grill, so had to macgyver something in the wind and rain. Neither tent has a good vestibule, so we had no shelter. Optimistically I had brought two chairs and a table, all of which are now soaked.

But happy ending, cooked a pike of chicken breasts and two burgers, and ate them with avocado and flatbreads, in the car, as we could no longer stand the wind and rain. As soon as we were in the car, the rain stopped.

Not sure how waterproof the tagar tent is (incidentally this tent has been named Billy), but I will find out during the night I guess. I think it’s too windy for any serious rain leakage to occur.

Eco de the pot quality of this post, it’s been a trying day.

So the bus replacement service should have been the clue. Looking at the train times and seeing that there was bus replacement should have settled it, really. But this could be the last chance to camp this year, so felt I could weather this minor inconvenience.

Incidentally, when I come to power in this country, I will make it illegal to charge passengers if they have to use bus replacement, and make them close lines for maintenance at night instead.

The traffic was so bad that I missed my connecting train in Southampton, of course, leaving me to wait for nearly an hour for the next one. I’d run out of water and had no snack foods, so was also starving hungry. When I got to the campsite I was surprised at how busy it was, considering all the weather warnings, so had to wander around to find a good site to pitch. To be fair, it was a stunning little pitch, even if it was miles from any water.

I immediately set to cooking. This is where I realised that I had not brought a mug, washing up stuff, foam mat, or shorts to change into, as it was very humid and hot. Cooked sausage casserole without the casserole, with some mash, and felt a lot better.

After eating, I made a nice bowl of tea, to get around the lack of mug, and got myself tidied up and comfy. I was looking forward to trying out this cute little gas lamp I got on Amazon, so lay in my tent, the cloud up 1 I recently bought, and watched the sun go down over the lamp.

I will get myself comfy and relax after the stress of the day, and see you all tomorrow, or as we all know is more likely, in a week or so.

So I’m not a morning person, and I was extremely slovenly on this occasion, as by the time I surfaced, my companion had already walked pretty much the entire island and I’d not even really heard him leaving his tent. One cuppa and some porridge later, and I was off by myself to find a hot chocolate and maybe some food. On my journey I found myself practically tripping over squirrels, and they were an adorable bunch.

After hunting squirrelly prey for a while, descended upon the cafe for a ridiculously priced tepid chocolate with marshmallows. And met some more wildlife.

Came back to camp for a little lunch, and then we wandered to the beach on the off chance that we would come across a seal or two. Spoiler alert, we did not.

There was a highly photogenic gull, and plenty of ants. Big ants. When you looked at any patch of ground, it would take a second, and your eyes slowly adjusted to the fact that the ground was moving. Mildly horrifying. When the tide went out we watched a beached boat for a while and then I turned in early.

Then the rains came.

It was a rainy night but not too bad in the grand scheme of things. Certainly not as bad as Chichester the last time. Did not stop raining, so was a rather soggy morning, striking camp and basically mooching about until we could put our bags on trailer to go to the ferry. Due to my lack of sensible clothing, I was wearing shorts, sleeveless shirt and T-shirt, with a lilac rain coat and waterproof cap. Not my most fashionable.

Had a cup of tea and sossie roll at the cafe and headed home.

So it’s back to Brownsea Island for a couple of nights, and this time I’ve done different things wrong. My first mistake was thinking it would be as warm as last time, and therefore bringing no warm clothes. This surprised ‘today me’ as there is a yellow weather warning and I even ensured I had enough guy ropes and tent pegs to stop tent from flying off the cliff.

Second mistake was not bringing any warm clothes. I realise I have already mentioned this in the previous statement, however it has so much of an impact I thought it was worth mentioning twice.

Third mistake was pitching my tent on an incline, as I had shuffled down my tent by a foot within a few minutes of falling asleep. Not sure if it can be remedied, so will spend tomorrow night as well, with a very slow falling sensation.

On the bright side, seen a lot of deer, and some gorgeous views from the side of the island I was too lazy to explore last time.

I have some other pics on my other camera but might have to wait until I’m home to see if they will be posted. My camera is a bit shit, so not happy with most of the photos.

I’ve had porridge and a cuppa so now getting settled in for a day of freezing to death.

So firstly, as always, the apology. I realise it’s been a while, but genuinely nothing of any interest has happened. There are only so many photos of my tomatoes I can post.

I’d fancy going camping on Friday, but something called storm Lillian was thrown in my face by a few friends. It didn’t really look like it was gonna hit our neck of the woods but in the end I decided to stay in. However, Sunday came around and weather was good enthusiasm levels were high so off I pottered to Chichester.

The walk by the canal is stunning, no avoiding that conclusion, but did seem to be a longer walk than I had planned for. I didn’t hurry, but took ninety minutes to get to campsite. When I got here, wind had got here first and was making itself at home. First time I’ve ever been worried about losing the tent whilst pitching, but finally got it set up. Didn’t have enough pegs to put out guy ropes, so fingers crossed.

Rain is incoming, so at least I’m pitched up, with a pot noodle and a hot chocolate inside me.

If I wake up tomorrow I’ll share how I get home, assuming that I do. The clouds have rolled in so I’m rolling into my sleeping bag.

Well I had decided yesterday that I would go camping and try out this little campsite just south of Chichester. Seemed like a fairly doable walk from the train station, so booked the pitch and the train. After work when I had leisure to check out the route to the site, it occurred to me that a section of this walk was gonna be on a country road with no pavement.

Having had a bad experience with rucksack and country road, I decided that I would see how much a hire car would be for the weekend. Long story short, expensive, but what the hell.

Picked up my Vauxhall Crosslander this afternoon and headed home to pack. Realising that weight is no longer an issue, I packed two solar panels, a 300wh power bank, a 12v fridge, two tents, and my usual sleeping kit. What I didn’t pack was hatchet for chopping wood, or bottle opener or the tripod grill I was intending to cook burgers on.

Traffic wasn’t too bad, although finding the place was near impossible as the w3w address they gave was actually for a back road, across a field, to a church. But finally got here, got set up and basically burned to death in the 30 degree heat.

When it cooled down to below the temperature of the surface of Venus, I made a fire and then chilled for the evening.

Also experimenting with having the head end of the tent open to the elements, might be cooler but also might be a nightmare. We will see.

See you in the morning.