Bridgewood Camping

Bridgewood Camping offers pitches in a Dorset woodland between the beautiful town of Sherborne and the historic village of Cerne Abbas. But these are not just any pitches – they’re wild ones – or very nearly wild anyway. Your Hipcamp hosts, Sarah and Paul, are very happy for you to stay in their six-acre wood and have smoothed away the very roughest edges by providing rustic facilities. Overall, though, there’s no denying that this is camping for those who want to get off grid and close to nature. It’s tents only with bivvies and hammock campers more than welcome too.

If you like the sound of all that but lack a tent, The Woodland Cabin could be for you. It’s a rustic hideaway which is off grid like the rest of the campsite but has its own eco en-suite. By that we mean a compost loo and a gas-powered shower with a limited water supply. There are beds (but no bedding), seating, a camping stove and a log burner too. Outside you have a fire pit and a picnic bench. It’s in its own area of the woods, like each of the six camping pitches – which are well spaced apart. These share two compost loos and two shower cubicles. There’s no water supply to the woods, so if you want to use them, you need to collect a solar shower bag from the field where they’ll have warmed up in the sun. It’s also where you’ll find the water tap and Sarah and Paul’s pigs, chicken and bees.

For a taste of their homemade produce, head for the horsebox trailer. Inside, you can buy eggs, honey and logs for your fire and find out about the area too. An OS map details the local footpaths. Use them for a walk through the wider woodland or to navigate to the local pub. The closest shop and a lovely tea room can be found five miles down the road at Cerne Abbas – famous for the huge chalk outline of the Cerne Abbas Giant on a nearby hillside. It’s a great place for a walk. In the other direction from the site it’s seven miles to lovely Sherborne town.