The camper is a touring caravan that no longer tours. It is parked permanently under a timber and reed pergola, levelled, connected to water and power, and surrounded by the parts of the stay you actually use: a lawn, a braai, a firepit, a shaded lounge and a walled outdoor bathroom.
Sleeping
Inside there is a double bed made up along one end and a single bed along the side that folds down into a seating area during the day. Bedding and towels are provided. Curtains on every window, and a wall-mounted television for the nights when the wind is up and nobody wants to sit outside.
Three people fit comfortably. Four do not, and the booking is capped at three for that reason.
Cooking
The kitchenette is set up for real self-catering rather than reheating:
- Single-plate stove
- Bar fridge
- Kettle
- Crockery, cutlery and cooking basics
- Fold-out table with bench seating on both sides
Outside there is a braai with a grid, firewood supplied, and a double dishwashing stand with two basins so the washing up never comes indoors. Most meals here end up on the fire rather than the plate stove, which is the correct order of things.
The nearest shops are in Ladismith, about half an hour away, so arrive stocked.
The bathroom
The bathroom is outside and that is deliberate. It is a walled corrugated enclosure a few steps from the caravan door, holding a shower with a proper tray and hot water, a basin on a timber stand with a mirror, and a flush toilet. It is private to your booking. Nobody else is on the property.
Showering outdoors in the Karoo is one of those things that sounds like a compromise in the listing and turns out to be the part people remember. At six in the morning with the light coming up over the hills it is not a compromise at all.
Outside the caravan
- Shaded lounge with slatted timber chairs arranged around a raised firepit
- Outdoor dining table and four chairs on the lawn
- Two loungers facing the veld
- Reed screens and a pergola taking the sun and the wind off
- Free secure parking right beside the caravan
- Wood-fired hot tub and a splash pool a few steps away
What you need to bring
Food, drink, a head torch, a warm layer for the evening even in summer, and sunblock. Everything else is here. The one thing worth adding: something to read that is not on a screen, because the phone signal is the kind of thing you came here to lose.