Back to Real Life

I've moved on somewhat from my brief obsession with videoing caravans. That's now going to be a standard part of our website offering and I have to say it's been jolly good fun. I think the power of social media can be seen in the fact that one of my little movies (hosted on YouTube) has been watched nearly 500 times in less than 1 month. The analytics provided by YouTube have given me a load new data to ponder.

Back to "Park Life". August is a great time of year for us, Wales in Bloom is over, any over winter teething problems the customs have developed have been put to bed and we can plod along with all the jobs we've putting off for months.



It's traditional for Tree Tops to host a charity BBQ on the Sunday of the August Bank Holiday. Our customers generally start asking if we're holding the event about 3 days after the park opens in March. Each year we put ourselves at the mercy of the British weather and put on event for at least 200 people. We are blessed with a great team at the moment, they got stuck into setting the event up. Despite the event only running for an afternoon and an evening it takes about 4 days to set up and prepare.

Every year we become obsessed with the long range weather reports, we debate, we doubt and we curse the met office if the reports are bad. Each year we pronounce that a bad long range weather report will see the event cancelled and each year the event go ahead regardless like lemmings running at a cliff. I think it's fair to say the weather in the 1st half of August gave us real cause for concern as did the long range forecast.



Given the vagaries of the British weather we beg and borrow all sorts of garden marquees and gazebos. We own a few of our own, but we like to provide enough cover as possible. Being positive we tell ourselves the cover is there to prevent sunstroke.

Last year we braved monsoon style rain. My father and I were busy at our respective BBQs when the heavens opened. We stood with falling hearts watching our customers wander back to their caravans. We were just about to close the lids on the BBQs when they all started coming back out again armed with wet weather gear, brollies and the various types of structures. They then sat with stoic determination and enjoyed a great afternoon despite the weather. I’m sure some glasses were filling quicker than they were being emptied. The average Tree Topper is made of the kind of stuff that would make the British Army proud.

This year the weather reports looked like it would once again test the resolve of the Tree Toppers. On Friday the weather was grim, on Saturday it was windy and not terribly pleasant. I awoke to a grey windy Sunday morning, I was not amused. The met office had changed their view of the day and promised a change in the weather at lunchtime. When the sideway rain started midmorning there was a number of groans in the office and a few expletives. At this point we had about £1,500 worth of food and booze sitting in the office, not to mention the cakes, pavlovas and other goodies people had spent their time making. There was quite simply no turning back.



My father and I went to prep our BBQs in readiness for the onslaught of burgers, steaks, chicken and sausages. Not forgetting the dreaded vegetarian option. Can you guess what happened next? The sun came out and the strong winds dropped and the day was perfect.

Is there a moral to this story? Probably, but I’m not that bothered. Our customers are a great bunch (we always say we hand pick them) and it was nice spending time with them in the sunshine. We often only see them when they need help solving some problem or mishap. This makes the BBQ is a nice day for us, lots of hard work, but fun all the same.

There’s 4 great things which have happened in August. We won Wales in Bloom for the 18th year. I had a chat with Rufus Bellamy (Prof, David Bellamy’s Son) who gave me the great news that we have maintained our gold David Bellamy Conservation Award and will receive a commendation for maintaining standards for 10 years. We are through to the last 3 in our category for the National Tourism Awards for Wales (http://www.ntawales.com/english/). Getting this far in the competition is something we’re very proud of. The environmental stuff and the gardens are something we understand and we’re good at and it’s an integral part of our business. Applications to this kind of award make put into writing things about our business which we normally do by instinct, this is never easy. We now have to wait until the end of October to find out if we get any further.

I said there were 4 good thing that have happened in August, the fourth has to be the nice weather we had for our BBQ

For more information about what's going on at Tree Tops visit our websire at http://www.treetopscaravanpark.co.uk/ .  You might also like to join our facebook page, www.facebook.com/treetopscp .