was Mb good, bad or no different ?

[Steve TTTD]

Tertre Rouge was just about the same compared to previous years.
However we did lose the water supply for about 5 hours on Saturday afternoon which put the toilet and shower blocks out of action.
We managed to rope off a large pitch when we arrived on Wednesday Afternoon (We did have another Seven people coming down), Although if we'd been later then the team would have been dotted arond the campsite.
Security was good as usual, both from the French and from other campers, as the nutter in the Rover 2000 found out when he thought it would be a good idea to go for a drunken hoon up the campsite at 2am on Friday nigfht.

[JDS]

..... and the fact KN looked absolute chaos this year.

KN was actually quite well organised with ACO bods on bikes taking people to their pitches. There were some stupidly marked ones (with a tree, stump or lake in the middle of them) and a few people we saw complained and got re-allocated, but in general it was quieter than normal, two of the pitches next to us were vacant (so we expanded into them on Sat am) and half the trackside pitches remained unoccupied all week/end (doh!). The only issue overall I would say was getting out at the end, but that's always terrible from there and the Police etc. did their best to get it moving. However, as far as atmosphere goes, forget it. It was the quietest and most subdued that I have ever seen it .....

[Christopher]

Hmmmm, reading all this I am now torn about what to do for next year.

Never tried MB or TR, so that is an option. Maybe KN is not as bad as it looked, so a return might be possible. Or stay with BN as this year was not a bad experience.

[redstu]

We didn't have any problems on BN, except for a minor one one arrival where out 2 adjacent pitches were actually on opposite sides of the gravel track! at a diagonal as well, however we luckily sorted this as the ACO had done exactly the same with the english family next to us so we just swapped.

Our pitch was therefore just south of the toilet block beside the 1st-for-tickets enclosure (Blue MG ZT and clio williams parked up). About 20M from the 6 foot beer pyramid

So just watched the toilet and shower queues ebb and flow.  Note for anyone arriving early next year in this area (R 14 place 76) water and electricity are available if you are quick.

I'd still rather be on MB but for me BN is a good second.

[tommy84]

Can't really judge HA as it was my first time there, but compared to last years BSJ it was really unexpected.
Last year on BSJ we were guided to our pitch at wednesday 3am (not numbered, but they wanted to enforce the 7x5m)

This year, we arrived at around 3am again on wednesday, missing the road at first and without any signs we asked the Houx security were HA is. "A droite"

Without any checks whether we have Nord or Sud, whether we pitch up 7x5 or 10x10m and without anyone controlling the setups it was great fun like BSJ '06 or Spa-Francorchamps.
Seen many Nord tickets on the Sud part, btw, so there was no organisation at all, no pitches marked at all, nothing.

And the atmosphere was stunning

[Topcatz]

BSJ was quite this year with loads of empty pitches and was pretty slow to fill, unlike previous years. We got there midday Monday because we wanted to get a good spot, but you could still have got a good spot on Thursday or even Friday!
Some of the site looked pretty unusable due to the boggy nature of the ground and very deep tractor ruts (but that's never stopped the ACO trying to make people use it in previous years!).

'Security' was distinctly more pleasant than last year with a sense of humour and a desire to be helpful, which was a welcome improvement on last years 'Gestapo', but they did bugger off Sunday and leave us at the mercy of the Pikeys.

The lower shower block apparently didn't have any water for the early part of the week, the middle showers were locked on Monday & only had COLD water until midday THURSDAY! The toilets & showers in the middle block never seemed particularly dirty, but I suspect that is down to the lack of people using them as much as efficient cleaning!

Has to be said, the 'Corporate' take-over of the best bits of BSJ with the Danes claiming the very best bit of the site AGAIN, has left the rest of us pitching on an area that is very vulnerable to the weather, it can be very boggy at the best of times in the lower fields. There also generally seemed to be a lot more deep ruts that I remember from previous years.

I reckon the ACO posting all the camp sites as 'Fully Booked' way back in Jan. probably accounts for the empty spaces, not everyone has either the knowledge OR desire to go hunting for camping space via the agencies (AND paying a premium for no good reason!)

[Christopher]

..... and the fact KN looked absolute chaos this year.

KN was actually quite well organised with ACO bods on bikes taking people to their pitches. There were some stupidly marked ones (with a tree, stump or lake in the middle of them) and a few people we saw complained and got re-allocated, but in general it was quieter than normal, two of the pitches next to us were vacant (so we expanded into them on Sat am) and half the trackside pitches remained unoccupied all week/end (doh!). The only issue overall I would say was getting out at the end, but that's always terrible from there and the Police etc. did their best to get it moving. However, as far as atmosphere goes, forget it. It was the quietest and most subdued that I have ever seen it .....

Were the KN pitches numbered this year or just marked out on the ground?

How did the ACO staff allocate the pitches?

[grumpy]

HA (Sud) was as good as ever, just a bit smaller. Though could have done without the F1-Express techno/schmooze hybrid music! 

[JDS]

..... and the fact KN looked absolute chaos this year.

KN was actually quite well organised with ACO bods on bikes taking people to their pitches. There were some stupidly marked ones (with a tree, stump or lake in the middle of them) and a few people we saw complained and got re-allocated, but in general it was quieter than normal, two of the pitches next to us were vacant (so we expanded into them on Sat am) and half the trackside pitches remained unoccupied all week/end (doh!). The only issue overall I would say was getting out at the end, but that's always terrible from there and the Police etc. did their best to get it moving. However, as far as atmosphere goes, forget it. It was the quietest and most subdued that I have ever seen it .....

Were the KN pitches numbered this year or just marked out on the ground?

How did the ACO staff allocate the pitches?

They were both. They were marked out on the ground and each had a yellow numbering steak in the corner (A1, A2 ...... Z99 etc.) As for how they allocated them, I guess they put them in a pot, threw it all up in the air then picked the scattered tickets at ramdom and sent them out. However, once at the gate the ACO 'helper bods' were personally directing people to their pitches (which got a bit tiresome by the third time I had come back from the shops/pub etc.) To be a little serious for a moment, we got ours from Just Tickets so they allocated us adjacent pitches (as best they could). As for next year, who knows?