See also Alan Rogers (disambiguation) for other people with similar names.

Alan Rogers was one of the major personalities whose work created the camping

Camping

Camping is an outdoor recreational activity. The participants leave urban areas, their home region, or civilization and enjoy nature while spending one or several nights outdoors, usually at a campsite. Camping may involve the use of a tent, caravan, motorhome, cabin, a primitive structure, or no...

, caravann

Travel trailer

A travel trailer or caravan is towed behind a road vehicle to provide a place to sleep which is more comfortable and protected than a tent . It provides the means for people to have their own home on a journey or a vacation, without relying on a motel or hotel, and enables them to stay in places...

ing and motor caravan

Recreational vehicle

Recreational vehicle or RV is, in North America, the usual term for a Motor vehicle or trailer equipped with living space and amenities found in a home.-Features:...

 industry.

After service in the British RAF

Royal Air Force

The Royal Air Force is the aerial warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Formed on 1 April 1918, it is the oldest independent air force in the world...

 in the Second World War, Alan devoted his post-war leisure time to his twin passions of rallying

Rallying

Rallying, also known as rally racing, is a form of auto racing that takes place on public or private roads with modified production or specially built road-legal cars...

 and caravanning.

In the early 1960s he, like many other caravanners, had become disillusioned with the quality of campsite

Campsite

A campsite or camping pitch is a place used for overnight stay in the outdoors. In British English a campsite is an area, usually divided into a number of pitches, where people can camp overnight using tents or camper vans or caravans; this British English use of the word is synonymous with the...

 information available to the users. He reasoned that what users wanted wasn't a list of facilities available on the site, but an accurate and impartial guide to the way that the site was run.

In 1968 he published his first guide

Alan Rogers Guides

The Alan Rogers Guides were started in Britain in 1968 by camping enthusiast Alan Rogers. The guides place utmost importance on the quality of the campsites they include; campsites cannot pay to be in the guide. The range now has expanded to six titles covering 27 countries...

, the Alan Roger's selected sites for caravanning and camping in Europe. Retailing at four shillings (20p), from small beginnings the guide

Alan Rogers Guides

The Alan Rogers Guides were started in Britain in 1968 by camping enthusiast Alan Rogers. The guides place utmost importance on the quality of the campsites they include; campsites cannot pay to be in the guide. The range now has expanded to six titles covering 27 countries...

 grew in strength through the years based on its clearly defined statement that the only way sites would be included in the guide was on the basis of quality. In the introduction to the first guide Alan wrote "I would like to stress that the camps which are included in this book have been chosen entirely on merit and no payment of any sort is made by them for the their inclusion."

In the same gude Alan accurately predicted trends for the future. For example he pointed out that a number of overseas sites were providing mains electricity hook-ups and suggested that British caravanners and motor caravanners should take advantage of this by having their units wired to take mains electricity. In 1968 no standard British caravan was supplied with mains electricity wiring.

The Alan Rogers' series of guides

Alan Rogers Guides

The Alan Rogers Guides were started in Britain in 1968 by camping enthusiast Alan Rogers. The guides place utmost importance on the quality of the campsites they include; campsites cannot pay to be in the guide. The range now has expanded to six titles covering 27 countries...

 continued to expand until 1986 when Alan decided to seek retirement. The eventual purchasers of the Guide's publishing company Deneway Guides and Travel Ltd were Clive and Lois Edwards.

Clive Edwards remembers the negotiations with Alan Rogers clearly. "The actual business negotiations were conducted quickly. What Alan was really concerned about was that we would maintain the philosophy and the impartiality of the Guides. Following Alan's retirement we found that he was always willing to offer us advice and guidance".

Perhaps the true measure of the success of the movement that Alan Rogers started is to note how many of the things he called for in his original guide have now become reality. Mains electricity connections in caravans and motor caravans, marked pitches of a minimum size, hot water freely available in the amenity blocks, British style toilets on French campsites, the use of trees and bushes to mark pitches and an end to the practice of over-crowding of sites during the peak summer holiday times.

Many of the sites - like Camping du Pavillon at Bidarte in the Pyrenees

Pyrenees

The Pyrenees is a range of mountains in southwest Europe that forms a natural border between France and Spain...

 recommended by him in 1968 - are still recommended in the current guides, although all the sites have developed along the lines originally recommended by Alan Rogers.

Alan Rogers died on January 14 2000 aged 81 after suffering from long illness.

See also

• Alan Rogers Guides
  Alan Rogers Guides
  The Alan Rogers Guides were started in Britain in 1968 by camping enthusiast Alan Rogers. The guides place utmost importance on the quality of the campsites they include; campsites cannot pay to be in the guide. The range now has expanded to six titles covering 27 countries...