IT’S summer, and that can only mean one thing: cramming family holidays into a lengthy school break, and crossing one’s fingers we don’t spend hours in queues to get in and out of Cornwall on crossover day.

Of course, if you time it right, you can go against the flow of the traffic, smug at the sight of noise-to-tail holidaymakers on the other side of the central reservation as you sail along an empty carriageway towards that foreign land known as “upcountry”.

So far this summer, we have followed a national trend sparked by the endless heatwave. The fine weather has ignited a craving for outdoor living, with Pitchup.com claiming 24,000 people are booking camping and caravan holidays daily – that’s one every two seconds.

My email inbox is bursting with holiday-related stats like this. It's enough to make me check the work calendar to see if I can fit a break around my colleagues, who are doubtless all thinking the same.

I remember vividly the giddy excitement of my first tent. I’d have been around eight years old, and signed up to a local rambling club that made regular weekend trips to the Peak District and the Yorkshire Moors and Dales. My mother invested in a tent that was clunky by today’s standards, but was like a home from home to me; my Sindy doll had her own blow-up version, complete with sleeping bag and nightie set knitted by my gran.

Many years later, the Other Half and I invested in a bottle-green two-man festival tent, the kind that was hard to distinguish from hundreds of others in a converted farmer’s field. We upgraded during the pandemic when we finally conceded that our daughter counted as a whole extra person and needed her own space.

What’s so great about camping? Let me count the ways.

Firstly, it’s cheap. Outdoor retailer GO Outdoors has scoured the UK for its most cost-effective sites, based on criteria including average temperatures in summer and the cost of a three-night break. At £17 a night, the Old Stables in Hayle came out top, while Mena Farm near Bodmin rounded off the top 10 at £22 a night.

Secondly, it’s versatile. Pitch-Up reckons 12 per cent of customers book their stay on the day of arrival – a real last-minute affair. And why not? If the mood takes you, you can just chuck your tent in the back of the car and go – simples.

Next, there’s the thrill of getting up close with nature. Our camping trip at the beginning of August saw us bed down in rural south Devon, under starry skies and with the sound of owls and crickets sending us to sleep (or keeping us awake). The fact we were barely a couple of hours from home is proof that life under canvas can add some spark to a break on your doorstep.

Of course, camping is not without its downsides. The accommodation may be cheap, but we are not stove people, and eating out for a week almost broke the bank. This was exacerbated by Daughter’s new-found love of fillet steak. “This one must be for you, sir?” said the beaming landlord of a village pub, whose eyebrows near fell off his face when he learned the truth. My defence: at least she eats it all.

And with rurality comes mobile phone “notspots”. We spent much of the week with either no signal or no battery. This can be an indisputable boon when you’re on holiday, but it came at a time when we had numerous issues to deal with, from a shunt on the A38 for us to a family crisis up north. Consequently, Daughter and I spent a good deal of time arguing over who would get to use the charger next, whose battery was lower, whose need was greater etc.

In the quiet zone of the festival site, a murmured conversation at 3am by fellow campers who had parked obscenely close to our tent had Daughter fuming: “It’s like being in the tent with them.” My approach was to have a very loud conversation about “having a word”; by the time I unzipped the tent, you could have heard a pin drop next door.

Daughter and I turned out to be at opposite ends of the spectrum when it came to mattress preference. I deplored the lumpy ground of our folk festival campsite (this was an isolated problem on my side of the tent, apparently), while she found the lovely smooth grass of South Devon “too smooth”. And all three of us got bitten by pesky bugs.

By the end of the week, we were all glad to see our own beds. That’s why next week, when we head up to Scotland - land of lochs, kelpies and culture – it’ll be hotels all the way.