Farm camping and caravan sites - down on the farm

We bet there’s not a kid in the country who won’t look up hopefully at the mention of ‘camping on a farm’ (once you wrestle the Xbox from their mitts, that is.) Even the most citified sprog will be tempted by pitching up on a farm campsite, with the wide open fields and the animals to practise their mooing and neighing on…while the grown-ups can stock up on fresh produce at farm shops and try and explain patiently why llamas and wallabies are present on a farm park in Wales (see below).

Farm campsites range from back to basics field camping such as Ebborways Farm in Somerset or Redlands Farm in Dorset to sites with glamping options like camping pods or yurts: West Wales Camping Pods in Carmarthenshire is a farm site with a heated family camping pod alongside its electric grass pitches. We have stacks of farm sites on Pitchup.com – here are some of our most popular:

Gundrys Farm, Dorset

Based fifteen minutes’ walk away from Moors Valley Country Park, Gundrys Farm is a medium-sized site and has its own flock of Poll Dorset Sheep, which children are welcome to help feed. The farm has plenty of spacious pitches with optional electric hook-up for tents, tourers and motorhomes, starting from £12 a night.

Bakesdown Farm, Cornwall

When you think ‘teeny farm campsite’, this might be what you mean. There are only four pitches in the camping field at Bakesdown Farm, giving you plenty of privacy and space, and each pitch comes with its own firepit. Firewood, vegetables and eggs are available to buy on site. Camping pitches at Bakesdown start from £16 a night, but if you want to try some farm glamping, book yourself into the Bakesdown handmade yurt, sleeping two adults and two children from £36 a night.

Lincoln Farm Park, Oxfordshire

Looking for a bigger farm site with lots to do around your pitch? This award-winning Cotswolds park comes with its own indoor leisure centre with pools, a fitness centre, spas and saunas, and has a play area for the kids as well as outdoor chess and draughts for those friendly family competitions. Farm-wise, there are resident guinea pigs and chickens, but if your tastes tend towards the more exotic, there are lions, giraffes and more at Cotswold Wildlife Park and crocs to see at the UK's only crocodile zoo Crocodiles of the World, both within ten miles. Lincoln Farm Park pitches start from £19.30 a night.

Etherley Farm, Surrey: Etherley has a poultry farm with produce available to buy, and it allows campfires for dishing it all up of an evening (you can also buy firewood on site). It’s only six miles from the UK’s biggest vineyard Denbies Wine Estate – well, it would be rude not to also check out the local grape produce during your stay. Pitches at Etherley Farm are non-electric and start from £15 a night, with no size restriction on pitches.

Cardigan Island Coastal Farm Park, Ceredigion: Here be the llamas. And the wallabies, rheas and emus, as well as native farm beasts such as geese, ponies, goats and pigs…The park is set on a headland overlooking Cardigan Bay, with seals, dolphins and thousands of sea birds to see, and if the kids get tired of that, the owners also offer tractor and trailer rides and there’s an outdoor adventure playground for them to whirl around. Pitches at Cardigan Island are for tents, tourers and motorhomes, starting from £13.80 a night.

Apart from the real back to basics sites, most farm campsites will have the amenities you’d find anywhere else, such as charging facilities or hot showers, and even the basic sites often have extras you mightn’t expect – Redlands Farm, for example, has a tea room selling fry-ups (using home-grown bangers, of course).

And, if you want to stay at a farm campsite but think you might be really champing at the bit for nightlife and shopping too, stay on a farm site near a city: the camping pods at Stanley Villa Farm Camping in Lancashire are on a secluded quiet site and home to Fylde Trout Fishery, but are just fifteen minutes’ drive from Blackpool.

Some more suggestions:

Numphra Down Farm, Cornwall: Pitches in Wild West Penwith from £7 a night.

Higher Moor Farm, Dorset: Spacious farm pitches a few miles from Weymouth, from £11 a night.

Lower Porthamel Organic Farm, Powys: An organic farm in the Wye Valley – with wifi – from £14 a night.

Neals Place Farm, Kent: Pitches in an apple orchard twenty minutes from Canterbury, with appley treats available in the farm shop. From £15 a night.

Gorsebank Camping Cabins, Dumfries and Galloway: An equestrian farm with wild camping from £18 a night, with bike hire and coarse fishing available on site.