Ending Up Anywhere

There are a few campsites we've stayed at in one of the many tents we've owned over the years that we've been wanting to return to. Karma Farm near Thetford is one of those and we returned with Cleopatra, our campervan, this weekend. Karma Farm bills itself as an 'eco' campsite. It's a working farm that farms ecologically. That theme continues into the campsite where many of the facilities appear to have been recycled from some other previous use. To me though, it just seems as though everything needs a bloody good clean up and mending. There is something quirky about the site though and it's in a very tranquil setting and many pitches are secluded, set in small clearings among trees and clumps of stinging nettles taller that I am. The piece and quiet was well and truly shattered this weekend owing to dozens of kids running and cycling around playing cops and robbers with water pistols, and climbing the tree house in the next clearing to ours.

We've camped in a tent at the Camping and Caravanning Club's Sandringham site and so knew what to expect. It's a huge site with 275 pitches spread through extensive grounds on the Sandringham estate. It was a busy weekend but the sheer size of the site means it's not at all crowded or claustrophobic. We were parked on our grass pitch at around 6pm and barbecued sausages for hot dogs over pine cones in our miniature barbecue. We did similar on Saturday night too and it wasn't until I was in the dishwashing room on Sunday morning that I saw signs saying barbecues must not have wood or cones added to turn them into camp fires. Just lately it seems what I consider to be quite reasonable things are against the rules. On Saturday morning we cycled to Snettisham on national cycle route 1. We had a cup of tea at a car boot sale taking place on the village green and then continued our bike ride to Snettisham beach. We only stayed at the beach long en

We were given a very warm and friendly welcome to the Whittlingham Broad Campsite near Norwich. It's a campsite so new that if you look at it on Google Earth it's a clay pit. The whole site has a kind of hippy vibe and evokes a feeling of what camping used to be years ago. You could easily fill a week with some of the suggestions of things to see and do on their fabulous website. Essentially it's just two fields in a prime location, bounded by trees and Whittlingham Broad lakes. The upper field it for tents only and has several permanent yurts and luxury shepherds huts. The lower field also allows small campervans and therefore this is where Cleopatra was parked for our Norfolk Broads camping weekend. It just so happened that a school was pitched at one end of the lower field and a scout group at the other. To say they were noisy is an understatement. It's a real shame they allow campervans only in the lower field. In long periods of fine weather no damage is