Why a Motorhome is better than a Caravan
The idea of getting away for a day, a week or longer, in your own mobile ‘castle’ is an attractive prospect, no matter how you go about it. However, if you have the option of travelling by motorhome or towing a caravan to satisfy your wanderlust, which should you choose? Motorhome vs Caravan;
You need a large powerful car to tow a caravan
If you want to tow a caravan, you need a tow vehicle powerful enough to haul it uphill and heavy enough to stay in control. While it’s possible to tow with smaller vehicles, the weight of a car affects the weight of what it can legally tow. If you want to drive a small economical car all year round, you’ll be severely limited to the size and type of caravan you can haul with it. If you want a large, comfortable, luxurious caravan, you’ll need a large, substantial and weighty vehicle. Something which will be expensive to buy, expensive to insure and expensive to run. You could, of course, hire a tow car and a caravan at the same time, but that’s likely to be more expensive than simply hiring a motorhome!
You might not be able to tow on your license
Towing anything behind a vehicle is a skill. Going forwards requires awareness, going backwards takes skill and practice. Depending on when you passed your driving test you’ll need to check your license and consider combined weight of vehicle and trailer you’re allowed to tow. Given that you’ll need a heavy vehicle to tow a reasonably sized caravan, the combined weight, if it exceeds 3.5 tons will mean that if you don’t have B+E on your license, you’ll need additional training to add this before you can tow this weight.
Parking a Motorhome is easier
Related to the point about towing, but deserving its own heading is the issue of parking. When it comes to manoeuvring, a single fixed chassis is always going to be easier to move around and to park than separate rate chassis hinged in the middle. This is for two main reasons. The first and most obvious is that reversing with any kind of trailer is far more complicated that reversing when not towing anything, especially when many modern motorhomes come equipped with reversing cameras. Additionally, a caravan hitched to a tow vehicle is typically far longer than a motorhome with a similar number of berths, meaning that you’ll have to find larger spaces in which to park.
Motorhomes are far more Convenient
Another advantage of motorhomes over caravans is the campsite pitching process. If you park a motorhome, you’re pitched. It’s as simple as that. There’s no unhitching of a tow bar, moving people and things from the car to the living area, potentially moving the car to a separate space etc. Simply arrive, park and relax. If it’s raining, you don’t even have to go out in it! If you’re planning multiple stops on your trip away, you’ll soon appreciate the ease of a motorhome vs caravan camping.
Motorhomes are more comfortable for passengers
If you’re driving a motorhome, you’ll naturally have a comfortable seat and a commanding view of the road, which is, of course far better than driving heavily laden car. Spare a thought however for your passengers. If a car towing a caravan, your luggage and supplies may well encroach into the passenger space, which may already feel cramped on long trips. Compare this with the light airy space afforded to motorhome passengers. The front passenger seats are just as airy as the driver’s, whereas the rear passengers are safely strapped into large comfortable seats around the kitchen table, allowing travel games, laptops or colouring books to be enjoyed with ease.
Motorhomes have a better image
It’s the elephant in the room in the motorhome vs caravan debate, but we’d better acknowledge it. There’s a bit of an ‘image’ to travelling with a caravan. Thanks, in part, to shows like Top Gear, with Jeremy Clarkson and co. feeding on motorists dislike at being stuck behind caravans for miles, by destroying caravans in imaginative ways. Caravans and the people who drive them can be (unfairly we’d have to say) stereotyped. A negative image which doesn’t extend to motorhomes.
Motorhome vs Caravan – There’s no competition
No matter what we say, the only real way to see that a motorhome adventure is far better than a caravan trip is to experience it or yourself. If you’d like to indulge your wanderlust in luxury and convenience, book a motorhome today and discover the best way to get out and see the world.
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