We have been camping many, many times and putting a tent up and taking a tent down can sometimes be frustrating, especially in bad weather, so for 2015 I decided to surprise my wife with our first ever glamping trip.
It's fair to stay there are loads of places, some more luxurious than others and you really need to have an idea of which part of the country you are looking to visit/stay and even easier to narrow down if you also have an idea of the type of accommodation, wether it be a pod, yurt or even a shepherds hut.
After plenty of searching I had narrowed it down to three, a yurt, shepherds hut and the Atlantic Surf Pods, I was sure my wife and I would definitely stay in a yurt in the future, so ruled that out and a friend suggested that although the shepherds hut was lovely, it just wasn't funky/different enough and I had to agree, so I sent an email and Ana replied, confirming availability and price, so I paid the deposit.
It's fair to stay there are loads of places, some more luxurious than others and you really need to have an idea of which part of the country you are looking to visit/stay and even easier to narrow down if you also have an idea of the type of accommodation, wether it be a pod, yurt or even a shepherds hut.
After plenty of searching I had narrowed it down to three, a yurt, shepherds hut and the Atlantic Surf Pods, I was sure my wife and I would definitely stay in a yurt in the future, so ruled that out and a friend suggested that although the shepherds hut was lovely, it just wasn't funky/different enough and I had to agree, so I sent an email and Ana replied, confirming availability and price, so I paid the deposit.
Our Stay
I had read in the Pre Arrival information email that using the postcode in the Sat nav would most likely take us to the wrong place, so although we set it, we knew to be prepared when we were close.
Arriving from the North, the first right turn signposted for Bude takes you down to a roundabout, where you'll find a large Morrisons, with petrol station, but if you carry on past this turn you see a sign on your left for Atlantic Farm, advising you to carry on a little further and about 150 yards down the turn us on your left, just before a blue parking sign.
The first thing you notice on arrival is the landscaping, the driveway immediately makes you feel that you have arrived in an exotic country, with the choice of planting and it is done very well.
As you drive along, you arrive at sort of junction, with a camping sign pointing you to the left, with a small Surf Pods wooden arrow above. With the camping field in front of you, you now turn down to the right (again there's a small wooden arrow), it's here where we saw Ana, who instructed us to go through the gate to our left, then turn right and the pods car park is on the right and she would be 'round in a mo.
Sure enough she arrived a few moments later, knowing who I was, (which was a nice personal touch) and she said we could head to our pod, while she went to get the key.
Arriving from the North, the first right turn signposted for Bude takes you down to a roundabout, where you'll find a large Morrisons, with petrol station, but if you carry on past this turn you see a sign on your left for Atlantic Farm, advising you to carry on a little further and about 150 yards down the turn us on your left, just before a blue parking sign.
The first thing you notice on arrival is the landscaping, the driveway immediately makes you feel that you have arrived in an exotic country, with the choice of planting and it is done very well.
As you drive along, you arrive at sort of junction, with a camping sign pointing you to the left, with a small Surf Pods wooden arrow above. With the camping field in front of you, you now turn down to the right (again there's a small wooden arrow), it's here where we saw Ana, who instructed us to go through the gate to our left, then turn right and the pods car park is on the right and she would be 'round in a mo.
Sure enough she arrived a few moments later, knowing who I was, (which was a nice personal touch) and she said we could head to our pod, while she went to get the key.
It's only a short walk to the pods, even if you're in one of the older pods furthest along the path like we were, so a few trips to the car to collect all our stuff wasn’t so bad.
Walking along the path to our pod, we couldn't help but notice how nice the new pods looked and the fact that the comments on Trip Advisor about the furniture (the older pods having better rattan style and the newer pods having less appealing bench style seating) were true. When we arrived at the end towards our pod (pod number 5, Seahorse) we noticed they all had modern brown rattan style outdoor table and chairs, except our pod, which was disappointing!
Walking along the path to our pod, we couldn't help but notice how nice the new pods looked and the fact that the comments on Trip Advisor about the furniture (the older pods having better rattan style and the newer pods having less appealing bench style seating) were true. When we arrived at the end towards our pod (pod number 5, Seahorse) we noticed they all had modern brown rattan style outdoor table and chairs, except our pod, which was disappointing!
The
key was already in the padlock, so I opened the door, at that point Ana arrived
back and showed us where everything was, she was very friendly and wished us an
enjoyable stay. After dumping our stuff, we had a look around our accommodation for the week and one thing that drew me to these pods is the space inside, most pods are a similar shape and size, however these pods have loads of space inside.
We had read plenty of reviews, so we had come prepared with a few extras from our camping kit
- Clothes rail - we use these when doing a car boot, so we already had one to use and it was a great idea, keeping our clothes off the floor.
- Camping table - again we already had one from our camping trips and it proved to be another good idea.
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- Collapsible crates - I wish we had brought one, but I only thought about it when we arrived, we usually use them for carrying the washing up down to the sinks and would have been handy to have here, as although the sink is only a short walk, it is outside in the open and had no hot water, so it's a good idea to boil the kettle and take some hot water in the washing up bowl, the second time we didn't bother going to the sink, we washed up in the bowl outside the pod instead.
One of things that wasn't clear on their website or emails, was exactly what was included in the pods, just a vague list, so to clarify, this is what we had in our pod
If you’re used to camping, then your camping kit will come in handy to make it a more comfortable stay and the pod is large enough for extras, like the camping table and clothes rail.
- Kettle and toaster - hard wired (so no sockets), toast as a breakfast option for when it's raining and a hot drink is always welcome
- Electric cool box - not massive, but enough to get some water, milk, butter and bread in
- Plates - an adequate selection of
- Cups and glasses – a good selection, including 2 Cups and 2 plastic Cups for kids
- Cutlery - knives, forks, spoons, tongs and spatula
- Pan - we only had one and it was a frying pan, we have no idea why, but it was black underneath, as though it had been used on a bbq, however the bbq was gas, a good clean later and it was actually a blue frying pan
- Washing up bowl – including a cloth and 2 tea towels
- Linen – bedding and bath towels
- 2 large bean bags - we also brought 2 camping chairs just encase we wanted something more solid to sit on inside the pod, although there was a sort of bench inside and with a bean bag against the pod wall it made a nice seat.
- 2 usb sockets at one side of the bed
If you’re used to camping, then your camping kit will come in handy to make it a more comfortable stay and the pod is large enough for extras, like the camping table and clothes rail.
The bathroom was to the right side of our pod and although it's a wet room, I'm not sure how many would actually want to take a shower in there. Firstly there's the spiders, then being a wet room, there's no dry place for them inside, so the towel/clothes hook is on the outside, so if it’s raining your clothes will get wet and getting dried in such a small space would be a challenge. We only used the toilet and the sink, but some other guest had chosen to use the wet room shower and said it went hot and cold, it's a similar system to most campsites, having a button to keep pressing, Peter told me that if you didn't keep pressing the button, it would start the heating cycle again, causing the bursts of cold.
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I don't understand why they made them so small, there's room to make them double the size and then you could fit a caravan style enclosed shower cubical in, making them much more useable.
On our first night we decided to nip to Morrison’s (just a 5 minute drive up the road on the way into Bude) for some steak to cook on the bbq (having the gas bbq is a great idea, but once again it didn’t look the most inviting, having been sat outside it had rusted in several places and was quite large, whereas the newer pods had nicer looking, more modern bbq’s).
We managed to avoid the rain, right up to serving and then we had to pull the table and chairs under the overhang of the pod to eat outside. At that point we had a visitor, a cat, Sat looking at me hoping I was sharing. After we had finished and washed the pots, we closed the bottom half of the stable door and the cat actually jumped up, clung onto the top to try and get in.
We managed to avoid the rain, right up to serving and then we had to pull the table and chairs under the overhang of the pod to eat outside. At that point we had a visitor, a cat, Sat looking at me hoping I was sharing. After we had finished and washed the pots, we closed the bottom half of the stable door and the cat actually jumped up, clung onto the top to try and get in.
As the night drew in it started to rain heavy and cool off, so we shut the doors, which sadly don't shut together very well, leaving gaps in between. The "curtains" are pieces of wood that hook onto nails and hang over the windows at night and on the bottom of the doors during the day. My wife was feeling a little cold at this point, but Ana had not shown us how to work the under floor heating and I couldn't turn it on at the lcd, so assumed there was an override switch (circuit breaker) somewhere, which I later spotted on another pod, it was at the back
For our second night I decided to put the heating on, which meant climbing though the bushes to the back of our pod to turn the circuit breaker back on (I would have gone to ask them to put it on for us, but it wasn't that complicated and I wouldn't have known where to find someone anyway, but a switch inside the pod would be much easier to turn it on/off). I preset it on the control panel with the times and temperature and it did the trick, however when we returned to the pod the next day after being out, someone had turned it off at the breaker. Later on I got talking to one of our neighbours, (who had got a 2 night deal from Living Social) and he told me they had been doing some work through the day and switched off all electric to the pods and he had to tell them he needed it on (as we did) because the cool box had milk etc in it, so I presume when they went back to switch on all the breakers, they left the heating off.
Communal Bathroom
Situated opposite the car park, this communal bathroom is advertised as "luxury", well sadly it’s not. There's a large, deep bath with lovely warm shower (most of the time), toilet, large sink and shaver socket, but is in desperate need of a fresh lick of paint and good clean, the light above the bath even had masking tape around, as if someone was going to paint the ceiling and hadn't got 'round to it.
Once again I don't understand why it's not a bit bigger to make drying off and getting dressed easier. Outside there's a seating area, which I can only presume is for those waiting to use the shower and although we only had to wait one day, in the Peak times I imagine it gets very busy.
There's also a fridge, to the right of which is a spare socket, ideal for hairdryer/straightners, if you have a long enough lead to safely use them under the canopy out of the rain. I suggested to Peter that they would be better removing the seating and building 2 shower cubicles, with the existing one becoming the family bathroom, most people will be happy to use the toilet/sink (unless you need hot water) in their own pods wet room, but would prefer to use a better shower. The last day we used the shower I had to wait a little for a gentleman to finish up, then my wife got in, then me and halfway through my shower the water went freezing cold and never got hot again!
Situated opposite the car park, this communal bathroom is advertised as "luxury", well sadly it’s not. There's a large, deep bath with lovely warm shower (most of the time), toilet, large sink and shaver socket, but is in desperate need of a fresh lick of paint and good clean, the light above the bath even had masking tape around, as if someone was going to paint the ceiling and hadn't got 'round to it.
Once again I don't understand why it's not a bit bigger to make drying off and getting dressed easier. Outside there's a seating area, which I can only presume is for those waiting to use the shower and although we only had to wait one day, in the Peak times I imagine it gets very busy.
There's also a fridge, to the right of which is a spare socket, ideal for hairdryer/straightners, if you have a long enough lead to safely use them under the canopy out of the rain. I suggested to Peter that they would be better removing the seating and building 2 shower cubicles, with the existing one becoming the family bathroom, most people will be happy to use the toilet/sink (unless you need hot water) in their own pods wet room, but would prefer to use a better shower. The last day we used the shower I had to wait a little for a gentleman to finish up, then my wife got in, then me and halfway through my shower the water went freezing cold and never got hot again!
Wi-Fi - We were never given the Wi-Fi password, but one of the gardeners (who were all really friendly) saw me using my phone near the car park and asked if I wanted the password, but we'd already managed to guess it. At our pod I could intermittently connect to one of the sites routers, but my wife couldn't, however in the car park we could both connect to a choice of two.
Summary
At this point some people may say we were expecting too much, but from the website and pictures it’s a bit misleading, believing the pods are more deluxe than they actually are. The setting/landscaping around the pods is great, the pods themselves are unique/quirky, with plenty of space inside, however they are in need of some repairs, when our pod was last painted, nobody thought to use masking tape to stop the paint going over onto the wood.
We think the pod next to ours (which had the pvc glass doors) was the first "show pod", but after that, it looks like they started to cut back/change the design. The pods are advertised on their website as all being "Deluxe", well in our opinion they have the potential to be Deluxe, with some upgrades, but are not currently, I know they are keen to maintain the “camping” aspect and we feel with some sensible upgrades, they can get the perfect balance.
At this point some people may say we were expecting too much, but from the website and pictures it’s a bit misleading, believing the pods are more deluxe than they actually are. The setting/landscaping around the pods is great, the pods themselves are unique/quirky, with plenty of space inside, however they are in need of some repairs, when our pod was last painted, nobody thought to use masking tape to stop the paint going over onto the wood.
We think the pod next to ours (which had the pvc glass doors) was the first "show pod", but after that, it looks like they started to cut back/change the design. The pods are advertised on their website as all being "Deluxe", well in our opinion they have the potential to be Deluxe, with some upgrades, but are not currently, I know they are keen to maintain the “camping” aspect and we feel with some sensible upgrades, they can get the perfect balance.