I have been going on coach holidays for forty years. This is the first bag I have ever written a letter about
I have been going on coach holidays for forty years. This is the first bag I have ever written a letter about
Six things these quilted camper van bags get right that a lifetime of black holdalls got wrong, written by a customer, not a travel writer.
Maggie Whitfield · Customer · Cheshire · 5 min read
Let me be plain about who is talking. I am Maggie, I am 67, I live in Cheshire with my husband Geoff and a labrador who sulks whenever a bag comes down from the wardrobe, and I have never once written to a shop about anything. What I have done is go on coach holidays. Forty years of them, with my sister June mostly, to the Lakes, the Dales, the Borders and every seaside town with a pier. So this is not a review. It is a woman who has watched a great many bags go into a great many coach holds, saying which one was worth it.
The one I am writing about is called the Campvana, a quilted weekend bag from Manchester Boutique, a small British boutique that has been quietly making the ordinary things a bit lovelier for a few years now. I first saw it on the tarmac at our coach pick-up, and when the boutique later asked if they could put my letter up for others to read, I said yes, on the condition I could be completely honest in it.
It was half past six on a grey morning at the start of September in the car park behind the leisure centre, Geoff still in his slippers in the car, and the driver was loading the hold for three days in Northumberland. It was the usual row on the tarmac. Black case, black case, navy case, black case, every one of them with a ribbon tied round the handle so its owner might have a hope of finding it again. Then there was hers. A little quilted camper van with pine trees, a tent and a crescent moon on the side and the words stay wild stitched along the bottom. The driver picked it up, laughed, and said that was the one bag in his hold he would never hand to the wrong lady. Read on.
Half past six at the pick-up. You can see which one is not a black case.
Here is what forty years of coach holidays taught me about luggage. Holdalls come in two piles. The pile that is sensible and black and looks exactly like everybody else’s, so you spend the first ten minutes of every holiday squinting at labels in the drizzle. And the pile that is cheerful and stiff and heavy, the hard cases with wheels that are a job in themselves before you have even got them up the coach step.
Either it was sensible and I could never find it, or it was lovely and I could never lift it. I had been choosing between the two for forty years.
So I asked her, plainly, right there on the tarmac while the driver shut the hold, where on earth it was from. Then I did what I always do, which was go home and order one for myself, a louder one in magenta and yellow covered in flowers called the Floravana, fully expecting to send it back. It did not go back. June took one look at mine and ordered the Campvana, the same as the woman from the pick-up, and after two more coach trips and a good many overnights at June’s, I can tell you why these bags work in six things.
The Floravana, the morning it came. The dog was not impressed.
You can pick it out of a coach hold in one second
I am starting here because it is the thing that sold it to me. At the hotel end, when the driver lines the cases up on the pavement, everybody else is bending over the black ones reading labels. I walk up, pick up the purple handles, and I am inside with a cup of tea. Nobody has ever walked off with it by mistake, and nobody ever will, because nobody else’s bag looks like a flowery little camper van.
First holiday in years I have not had to hunt for my bag. The driver knew it was mine before I did.
Brenda K., LongridgeIt is a picture, not a piece of luggage
This is where it becomes dangerous. Each bag in the collection is its own quilted camper van with its own picture, and they are not all the same van in different colours. The Campvana is soft pastels, a moon in one window, a sunset and a wave in the other, pine trees and a little tent in between, and stay wild along the grass. My Floravana is bold as brass, a yellow roof, purple windows and a whole garden of raised flowers climbing up the side. There are around nineteen of them to choose from. Choosing it is half the fun.
June’s Campvana on my armchair. That tent is exactly where I would like to be.
So much nicer in real life than on the screen. I keep finding little things in the picture I had not noticed.
Sheila M., GarstangIt is light enough to carry yourself
At my age this matters more than anything the brochure says. The bag is light in the hand, so I can take it down the stairs, out to Geoff’s car and up to the driver myself, without waiting for someone to offer. On the way home I carried it from the coach to the car in one hand and my umbrella in the other, which I could never have done with my old case.
Packed the night before and waiting at the bottom of the stairs.
Light as anything to carry, which was the whole reason I bought it. My shoulder thanks me.
Pauline R., KirkhamThree days go in, and you can find things again
The bag is roomy, and because it is a wide, square sort of shape rather than a floppy sausage, things lie flat instead of being stuffed. For our three days on the Yorkshire coast last month I got in two outfits, a warm cardigan, my walking shoes, my wash bag and a paperback, and I could see everything when I opened it instead of digging to the bottom for my tablets.
Holds far more than you would think. Everything had its place and nothing came out creased.
Christine D., Poulton-le-FyldeTwo handles that are kind to your hands
There are two carry handles, one on each side, and they come together over the top so you hold them as one. They are comfortable in the hand, even with the bag full, and they are part of the picture too. On the Floravana they are purple with little stitched leaves running all the way down, and on June’s they are soft pale cream. There are no fiddly clips or buckles to fight with in a car park at dawn.
The handles are comfortable even when it is full. Nothing cuts into your fingers.
Margaret H., LongridgeTwo honest sizes, with the measurements written down
There is a 40 centimetre one, 40 by 20 by 20, for a night away, the gym or a day out, and a 46 centimetre one, 46 by 23 by 23, taller and wider all round for two or three days. June and I both have the bigger one, and it takes three days of a coach holiday without complaint. Between trips mine does the overnight at June’s and the Tuesday swim, and it has never once looked like a chore.
Ours, at the foot of the bed in the hotel. June says hers is the sensible one.
I bought the bigger size and I am glad I did. Three nights away and still room for the shopping.
Joan W., GarstangA quilted camper van bag, against the holdall in the loft
You can spend thirty odd pounds on a weekend bag in any shop in the country. I know, because I have. Here is the difference, laid out plainly.
Black, like every other case in the hold
A ribbon on the handle and hope
Floppy, so everything ends up at the bottom
Heavy before you have packed a thing
Lives in the loft between trips
Spotted in one second
Around nineteen pictures to choose from
A wide shape that keeps things tidy
Light to carry yourself
Goes to the gym and June’s in between
About the price
The Campvana and the Floravana are £32.95 in the 40 centimetre size and £35.95 in the 46 centimetre size, both down from £66.00. Every design in the collection is the same price.
I will pass on what the boutique told me, which is that the bags are in the autumn sale to make room before the Christmas stock comes in, and that they are made in runs, so once a design has gone it can be a long while before it comes back. Their words, not mine. What I can tell you from my side is that a markdown is usually where I start asking what is wrong with something, and after two coach trips with mine, I have not found it.
And I do not trust perfect scores, so I read the reviews before I ordered. Just over three hundred of them, sitting at 4.2 stars, which sounded like real people rather than robots, so I read on. A good many of them were women who had bought one for a holiday and ended up taking it everywhere else as well, which is exactly what happened to me.
Six in the morning, by the front door. Geoff has the car keys.
If you have a coach trip booked, or a sister who keeps asking you to come and stay, or a black holdall in the loft that you have never once been pleased to see, this is the bag I would choose for you myself, while the design you like is still there. Pick the picture that is you. You will know it when you see it, and so will the driver.
Maggie
THE QUILTED WEEKEND BAG COLLECTION
- Quilted camper van designs, each with its own picture
- Roomy, with a wide shape that keeps things tidy
- Light to carry
- Two comfortable carry handles
- Two sizes: 40 x 20 x 20 cm or 46 x 23 x 23 cm
- For travel, the gym or a weekend away
- Free UK delivery
Autumn sale on now. Once a design is gone, it is gone.