Retro camping: This is how we camped in the 1970s!

Page contents

The world of camping
Europleasure tents
70's camping fashion
The technologoy of the time
About Camping magazine

The world of camping

In the camping world, tents were divided into two camps, as it were. Solo campers and couples opted for ridge tents – small, traditional shaped tents with room to sleep and little else...

Meanwhile families holidayed in frame tents – big, bulky and heavy and difficult to transport and pitch.

Then there was a third option – these early inflatable tents from PTC

Europleasure tents

This is the slightly dubious sounding Europleasure range of tents, whose advertising featured scantily-clad ‘dolly birds’ puffing away on cigarettes and boasted of Bell End extensions. Their catalogue was “an eye-opener” apparently.

At Grange Farm campsite in Chigwell, Essex, now gone, it cost just 23p per person.

The cost of a camping pitch was generally much cheaper then than today. Many sites didn’t charge at all for a tent and would simply charge you per person.

At one site in Northumberland for instance, campers paid 18p per night – around £1.50 today.

A drawing showing a family on a camping trip

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An artist's impression of 70s family camping. With bell-bottoms so wide you could camp in them.

70s camping fashion

Trousers were so wide in the 70s that it led to a worldwide shortage of fabric - meaning some people had to resort to wearing the skimpiest of shorts and bikinis.

Black and whitie photo showing a man pitching a tent

Style never goes out of fashion...

...but thankfully, looking like a serial killer does.

The technology of the time

It’s tempting to think back to the 70s as a time when camping was much simpler and cheaper than it is today, but that’s not really the case.

A six-berth ‘Family Luxe’ frame tent by Black’s of Greenock would have set you back £195 - which doesn’t sound too bad until you consider that would equate to around £1,600 in today’s money.