The Caravan Was Already Waiting: Our First Camping Trip at Glenworth Valley

For nearly two years, “we should go camping” was a sentence we said out loud and never quite finished. Not for lack of wanting. We just never had a setup.

We don’t own a caravan, and our little hatchback isn’t set up for towing. We had no tent, no camp chairs, no folding table, no gas stove, no esky worth the name. Plenty of people we know hitch up a van and head north every long weekend and love it — that has simply never been our situation, and building a camp setup from nothing always felt like a bigger project than one free weekend could absorb.

Then we found out you can have the caravan delivered.

The owner tows it to your campsite, sets it up, and comes back for it at the end. You turn up with your bags. We booked one through Camplify for two nights at Glenworth Valley, drove up in our ordinary little car with nothing but clothes and groceries, and walked into a camp that was already standing.

This is everything that weekend turned into: two hundred and fifty horses running past us at dusk, a Highland cow eating out of my hand, my first time on horseback, two hours of throwing axes into wood, and a quad bike through creek crossings. And underneath all of it, the one booking decision that made the rest of the weekend so easy.

How caravan delivery actually works

I want to be specific about this part, because it’s the bit I would have wanted explained to me.

Camplify is essentially Airbnb for caravans — private owners hire out their vans, and you book directly with them. Some of those owners offer delivery, and you can filter for exactly those vans. The owner tows the van to your campsite, positions it, levels it, connects it, and comes back at the end of your stay to collect it. Your only job is to bring a car with room for your bags.

We messaged the owner before booking, which I’d recommend to anyone. Delivery is arranged directly with the person who owns the van, so you agree the fee, the distance, the drop-off time, and where in the campground you’d like it. It’s generally charged per kilometre from the owner’s home base, counted both ways — so a van based near your campsite works out far better value than one two hours away. That single question, “how close is this owner to Glenworth Valley?”, shaped our booking more than the nightly rate did. Camplify’s own caravan delivery guide walks through the whole process if you want the detail before you book.

We also let Glenworth Valley know a caravan was coming, because they allocate sites accordingly. One email, and we arrived to a site that fit it properly.

Then we drove up. An hour north of Sydney, off the M1, down into a valley where the phone signal politely gives up. We turned into our site, and there it was — level, connected, ready. Camp chairs out. A table up. The awning extended over a patch of shade the owner had clearly chosen on purpose.

We had been in the car for an hour. Setting up camp took us zero minutes. I stood there holding a bag of groceries with genuinely nothing to do, and the holiday had already started.

The owner walked us through everything — the gas, the water, the fridge, the toilet, the beds, which switch does what, who to call if anything went sideways. Fifteen minutes, unhurried, in person. Then he left, and the valley went quiet, and the weekend began.

The first afternoon, which we spent doing nothing

Our site sat along Popran Creek, which runs through the campgrounds, and the sound of it became the background noise of the whole trip. Water, wind through the gums, and every so often a whipbird. Nothing else.

Fires are allowed here, in the existing pits, and the on-site shop sells firewood and ice through the day, so we bought a bundle and got a fire going far earlier than we needed to — mostly for the satisfaction of it. There are hot showers, flushing toilets and running water in the campgrounds, which is a more comfortable proposition than the version of camping I had in my head. There’s Wi-Fi near reception, which we used exactly once and then forgot about.

That afternoon is where the trip won me over. Not the activities — the fact that we got to arrive tired and simply stay tired, with the evening already ours.

4:30 in the afternoon, and the ground starts to move

Someone at reception told us to be near the creek by half past four. They didn’t oversell it. They just said: be there, and ask us where to stand, because it changes.

So we stood there, slightly unsure what we were waiting for.

You hear it first. A low rolling sound that your brain files as thunder and then quietly refiles as something else, because thunder doesn’t get closer that steadily. Then the dirt under your feet starts to carry it. And then they come — up to two hundred and fifty horses, the valley’s resident herd, moving from their paddocks to their night pasture in one enormous, unbroken river of them.

I have never seen that many large animals move at once. It goes on for a few minutes. The late light catches the dust they throw up and turns the whole thing gold and slightly unreal, and then the last of them passes, and the valley is just a valley again, and everyone along the fence line makes the same involuntary noise.

It runs on weekends from 4:30pm, and daily through school holidays, and it costs nothing if you’re staying on the property. Ask at reception on the day — the viewing spot genuinely moves, and standing in the wrong paddock means watching it from half a kilometre away.

Highland cows, miniature goats, and a five-dollar bag of feed

The next morning we did the thing I’d least expected to love.

Glenworth Valley runs petting farm feeding sessions — you meet at the horse yards, buy a bag of feed from reception for five dollars, and then spend a while being thoroughly mugged by farm animals. There are Scottish Highland cows, enormous and shaggy, with a fringe so long you can’t work out how they see. Miniature goats, who have no boundaries whatsoever. Emus, who are alarming up close in a way I wasn’t prepared for. Ducks and chickens working the edges of the crowd like professionals.

A Highland cow took feed off my open palm and I made a sound I’m not proud of. Her tongue was the texture of wet sandpaper and she was in absolutely no hurry. The goats, meanwhile, had a strategy: two of them worked the front while a third quietly investigated whether my jacket pocket was food. It was.

The sessions run in the morning and again in the late afternoon, on weekends and daily during school holidays, and you don’t need to book — you just turn up. It’s free if you’re camping or holding a day pass, and the only cost is the feed. Of everything we paid for that weekend, the five-dollar bag was comfortably the best value.

Two hours on a horse, having never sat on one

You cannot stay at Australia’s largest horse riding centre and not get on a horse. That was the logic, anyway. I’d never ridden. Not once, not as a child, not on a beach on a holiday. I was quietly certain I’d be the person they had to help down after ten minutes.

They have over two hundred horses, and the matching is the whole trick. They ask about your experience, they look at you, and they put you on an animal that suits. Mine was patient in a way that felt almost deliberate, like he’d worked out within thirty seconds that I had no idea what I was doing and had decided to carry the situation for both of us.

The session runs about two hours including the briefing, and the briefing is proper — how to hold the reins, how to sit, how to stop, what not to do. Then you ride out into the bush in a small group, no more than about a dozen of you, and the pace is set by whoever is least experienced. On that day, that was me.

What I didn’t anticipate is how much of it is negotiation. You are sitting on a large animal with opinions. Somewhere in the second hour I stopped bracing against every step and started moving with it, and the ride changed completely — from a thing I was surviving into a thing I was doing. We came down through a stretch of trail where the trees closed over the top and the only sound was hooves on dirt, and I remember thinking that no photo I took was going to carry any of it.

Axe throwing turned out to be the therapy

Work had been heavy for months. I did not expect the fix to be standing in the bush hurling a sharpened piece of metal at a slab of wood for two hours.

You get a lesson first — grip, stance, distance, the fact that it’s far less about force than you think and almost entirely about letting go at the right moment. Then they set you loose on the targets.

I missed. Repeatedly. The axe would hit the board flat and clatter down, or sail past entirely and land in the dirt with a dull, unsatisfying thud that felt personally directed at me. And there’s nothing to do about it except walk down, pick it up, walk back, and go again. Which is, I think, the entire point.

When one finally bit into the wood and stayed there — nowhere near the bullseye, but in — it was the best I’d felt in weeks. Something physically left my body.

Two hours is exactly the right length. It’s long enough for the frustration to burn off and for you to actually get better, and it demands enough focus that there is genuinely no room in your head for anything else. No phone, no inbox, no half-thought about Monday. Just weight, distance, release, and the sound you’re listening for.

Axe throwing is an eighteen-and-over activity, or sixteen with an adult, and there’s a waiver to sign. Long pants, sleeves and fully enclosed shoes are required — no singlets, no slip-ons. Book it ahead, because sessions need minimum numbers to run.

Quad bikes, creek crossings, and fifteen kilometres of dust

After the stillness of the horses, this was the opposite kind of day.

The quad bikes are automatic — a thumb throttle, hand brakes, and no gears to think about — so no licence and no experience is needed. Helmets are compulsory. There’s an induction where you learn the controls in a flat paddock, and then you head out on more than fifteen kilometres of trails: rolling hills, open paddocks, bush track that tightens and twists, and creek crossings where the water comes up over the tyres and you get thoroughly, gloriously wet.

It’s an hour and a half of noise and dust and grinning inside a helmet. There are sections where you’re following the person in front through a corridor of trees, and sections where the valley just opens up and you can see how big the place actually is. You come back filthy. You can buy coveralls if you’d rather not be, and hire a GoPro if you want proof.

What struck me is how different the same landscape feels at speed. On horseback, the valley was something to move through quietly. On a quad, it was terrain. Same trees, completely different place.

Back at the van: fire, food, and a proper bed

Every evening ran the same way, and it became my favourite part.

We’d get back to the van filthy and aching, take a hot shower, and then cook. The van had a proper stove and a fridge, so we weren’t living out of an esky and eating whatever wouldn’t spoil — we cooked actual meals, and on the second night we did the rice and curry properly, on a gas ring, in the middle of the bush, which is the moment a caravan stops being a novelty and starts being a kitchen.

Then the fire, in the pit, contained and small, because that’s the rule and it should be. We sat out with the last of the firewood we’d bought that morning, and the temperature dropped the way it does in a valley, fast and completely.

The bed was a real bed. Not a mat, not a swag — a mattress, with a proper doona, inside a van with a door you close against the cold. I slept better out there than I do in the city, and I woke early both mornings without an alarm, which never happens, and stood outside with a coffee watching mist sit in the bottom of the valley until the sun found it.

So — is having the caravan delivered worth it?

I’ve thought about this a lot, because it isn’t free and I don’t want to pretend it is.

You’re paying the nightly hire, the campsite fees, and a delivery fee that scales with how far the owner tows it. If you’ve got a car set up for towing, taking the van yourself costs less and gives you the van for the whole trip rather than just the campsite — that’s how most people do it, and there’s a good reason for that.

Delivery buys you something different. It turns a caravan holiday into a booking you can make the same way you’d book a hotel: choose it, agree a drop-off, turn up. No hitching, no setup, no learning curve on the first evening. For us that made the difference between a weekend we kept talking about and a weekend we actually took.

It also makes for a very easy first go. If you’re curious about caravanning and don’t want to commit thirty thousand dollars to a hunch, hiring a van for two nights and having it delivered is about the lowest-effort way to find out whether you love it. We did, and we’ll be back — probably in a van again, possibly one we tow ourselves once we’ve got the car for it.

Know before you go

• Where it is: Glenworth Valley is on the NSW Central Coast, about an hour north of Sydney and roughly twenty minutes from Hornsby. You don’t need a four-wheel drive for the main campgrounds.
• Getting a caravan delivered: On Camplify, filter for vans that offer delivery, then message the owner before booking to agree the fee, the distance and the drop-off time. It’s typically charged per kilometre from the owner’s base, counted both ways, so a nearby van is better value than a cheaper distant one. Their delivery guide explains the process.
• Tell the campground: Let Glenworth Valley know in advance that a caravan is coming so they allocate a site that fits it. Powered and unpowered sites are both available along Popran Creek.
• Camping costs: From about $35 per adult and $17.50 per child aged 7–17 per night, with under-sevens free. Powered sites add a site fee. Check-in is midday; check-out is 4pm for unpowered sites and 10:30am for powered ones — worth knowing before you plan your last morning.
• Fires: Allowed in the existing fire pits unless there’s an RFS ban, kept to a maximum of one square metre. Firewood and ice are sold at the on-site shop through the day, so don’t bother bringing wood.
• Running of the Horses: Weekends from 4:30pm and daily during school holidays, free if you’re staying. Ask at reception that day where to stand — the spot changes and it makes all the difference.
• Animal feeding: Petting farm sessions meet at the horse yards, morning and late afternoon, weekends and daily in school holidays. No booking needed. Free for campers and day-pass holders; feed bags are $5 at reception. Bring small change and low expectations about keeping your jacket clean.
• Horse riding: Two hours including the briefing, from around $125 per person, first-timers welcome. Minimum age 7, maximum rider weight 100kg including clothing and helmet. Small groups of up to twelve. Helmets are compulsory and can be hired for a small fee.
• Quad biking: About an hour and a half, from around $125 per person, no licence or experience needed. Minimum age 12, and riders aged 12–16 must have a participating adult with them. Helmets compulsory, hire available. Coveralls and GoPros can be bought or rented on site.
• Axe throwing: Two-hour guided sessions, 18+ or 16+ with an adult guardian, waiver required. Sessions need minimum numbers, so book ahead — especially on weekends.
• What to wear: For riding, quad biking and axe throwing you need long pants and fully enclosed shoes, with shoulders covered. No singlets, no thongs, no slip-ons. Bring far more warm layers than you think you need; a valley gets cold quickly after dark.
• Book activities before you arrive: Weekends fill up, and sessions that don’t reach minimum numbers don’t run. We booked ours in advance and were glad we did.
• Dogs: Welcome only during designated dog-friendly periods — not on school holidays or long weekends — with a maximum of two per booking, on leads.

What we took home

We always thought camping was something you had to already be. A garage full of gear, a certain competence, a personality type. Two years of not going were built on that assumption.

What Glenworth Valley showed us is that you don’t have to build up to it. There’s a version of this you can book for a single weekend, with none of your own equipment, and still get the whole thing: a creek, a fire, two hundred and fifty horses at dusk, a cow eating out of your hand, and a bed you didn’t have to make from scratch.

We drove home on Sunday with dirt still in the car and every muscle complaining, already working out when we could do it again. That’s the review, really. Not that it was perfect — that we immediately wanted to go back.

Planning your own? Browse caravans available for delivery on Camplify, and see what’s on at Glenworth Valley.