Our first full week away for this season and we chose Hillside Caravan Park, mainly because of the excellent reviews but also due to the fact that it was in Yorkshire and just a pleasant drive down from Catterick where our caravan had just received its first service.
The site is easily accessed off the A19, with just a short drive through the village of Knayton. This is perfectly passable with just the last mile causing caution, as it’s a single track road, albeit with passing places. Entrance to the site is via an electronic barrier, following which we were greeted by Pat, a very friendly warden who duly hopped on her bicycle and showed us to our allocated pitch. Most if not all of the pitches here are fully serviced including chemical disposal. They are of a good size, enough for ‘van, awning and car in front. Pitches are spaced quite nicely, with a nice ‘flow’ around the site, no linear regimental lines of caravans here!
On-site, there is a large grassy play area, perfect for the little ones to run around and play ball games safely. A small information hut provides all the information required on the surrounding local areas, attractions etc. The washblock is of an excellent standard, very clean. A children’s play area near the grassy section concludes the park’s offerings, but for us we don’t need anything else!
This was our fist trip where we decided to erect the awning! We were blessed with good weather, so following the initial trip and set-up on the Saturday, Sunday saw the dawn of the unpacking of the awning! We had already sussed the poles, following a trial run in the dining room. So we confidently laid them out and began threading the canvas through the awning rail. This went better than was expected, we had the correct orientation and the canvas pulled easier than we had anticipated. We had already removed the windows to make this task easier following advice we had read on forums and good advice it was! Next we began to insert the poles, all going well so far. The bracket pads were easily attached to the canvas. Here however we made the mistake of trying to tension everything too soon. We tensioned the poles and began to drive some pegs in to secure it. When we came to zip the doors in and fix the canopy, things started to go wrong and we ended up pulling pegs out and reducing the tension on the poles. Once we had done this and zipped the doors and fixed the canopy, we then drove the pegs back in and finally tensioned. Bingo, our awning was up for the first time and we were pleased. Very pleased, the groundsheet went down along with the Bolon on top. Bliss, we now had some extra real estate, a mere four hours later! Regardless, lessons were learnt during the construction which won’t be made again and hopefully we can get the erection time down to a couple of hours, which will be perfect!
Purchases made for the awning included:
- Kampa underlay
- Bolon flooring
- Bosch 18v lithium-ion cordless drill (2 batteries)
- Screw-in Rock Pegs
- Awning rail lubricator
- Kampa Sabre 150 awning light
- Zappy bin
Thirsk is the nearest town to the campsite and boasts quite a few independant shops along with the ever formidable presence of a Tesco’s and and Lidl. Very handy for stocking up on essnetials for the holiday.Monday was market day in Thirsk and we managed to pick up a couple of items on our ‘must get’ list, including a lump hammer for tough hard-standings!
There is plenty of scope for walking in the area, which we duly did. The majority taking you through farmers fields and country roads. Naturally a little bit hilly, but walks could be kept to a modest distance of around 3 miles quite easily.
- Date: 24th March 2012
- Nights: 7
- Pitch #: N/A (54.297702,-1.305461)
- GPS: 54.297592, -1.305626
