Holidaying at home is on the increase as families seek to beat the credit crunch. And camping is one of the most cost-effective options of them all. Ben Bentley pitched his tent in the Shropshire countryside.

Malcolm, my new camping friend, forgets his telescope. I forget my tea towel.

When the occasional camper goes under the cover of canvas it’s inevitable that certain creature comforts will be forgotten. But the main thing we seem to have forgotten in recent years is to go camping at all.

And camping, that most basic form of holidaying, is a reminder that, briefly at least, certain possessions simply don’t matter. You have the sky above your head, the earth beneath your bottom, a bit of canvas in between and everyone is happy.

And with camping you quickly realise that mucking in and sharing is all part of the fun. A bond is created when I am furnished with a fresh tea towel, although I fall short of reciprocating with a telescope.

In these times of financial belt-tightening, soaring flight prices and general doom and gloom, holidaying in Britain – and in particular camping – has become more popular than being obese. Sensibly holidaymakers are saying bye-bye gite, hello groundsheet.

Outdoor activity stores have reported tent sales are up by 40 per cent and camp sites are packed as Brits make the most of having no money.

I decide to hang on to everyone else’s tent flaps and pitch up under the stars at the rural idyll that is the Green Caravan Site at Wentnor, nestling in the Onny Valley between the Stiperstones and the Long Mynd. Karen Donohue, manager of the site, says that after a bad start to the year, bookings are well up on this time last year.

“It’s back to the lifestyle we had when we were kids and it’s so nice to see families together,” she says. “There is more luxury to camping nowadays and people want that – it’s not two sticks, a piece of canvas and a pair of wellies outside the tent anymore.”

With me is my four-and-a-half year old daughter, Poppy. By no means are we professional outdoor types but the camping concept certainly brings out the hunter-gatherer instinct in me: I go down to Aldi and snap up the last of the tents and blow-up beds.

The next minute Poppy and I are standing in a field in Wentnor wondering what on earth to do with it all.

She suggests a B&B but luckily the first thing you find is how helpful other campers are. There’s a kind of in-it-together Dunkirk thing going on. I make more pals from a problem with tent poles than from a year’s subscription to Friends Reunited.

Things are going well – within half an hour I have a group of new friends, including Malcolm and his family, and my tent is pitch perfect.

So straight away we all start splashing around in the stream with fishing nets, kids and adults together. The joy of camping and the spirit of adventure instantly turns us into big kids and there follows an afternoon of endless French cricket, Swingball, headers and volleys, and a combination of all of the aforementioned activities in a game that can only be described as It’s A Bit Like It’s A Knockout.

For the kids it’s a welcome break from the Wacky Warehouse; for the adults it’s a second childhood.

And that’s another boon of camping: if you get the weather, you make your own fun. And, beautifully, spend barely any money.

Just like the olden days.

The pitch for two people is just £10 per night. Cowboy food consisting of eggs, beans and sausages, also from Aldi, is rustled up for the price of a gas canister.

The next day, we join a group of campers on a walk to the top of the Stiperstones. Here we fly a kite and are generally rendered breathless by the views of Shropshire.

It costs nothing and is priceless. They call that a memory, don’t they?

Happily, apart from the quality of the equipment and site facilities, camping hasn’t come a long way since I last I sported short trousers and a woggle and sang around the camp fire. This is pretty much as I remember it; except that back then we wanted to escape the idea of life without luxuries and now we long to return to it.

Night time, of course, is what camping is all about. After an evening spent under the starriest sky communally chattering about toilet training and the universe, it is time to get down to the business of “tenting”. That is, getting into the tent and going off to sleep.

With nothing to keep you company bar the ba-ba of a restless sheep, moo of a cow, tranquil babble of the stream and the noise pollution of heavy snoring, it is pretty easy to drift off into the land of nod.

My last waking thought of the night, as I recall, is how I could learn a lot from this camping business.

Apart from the obvious financial boons of a holiday spent hunkered under canvas, you can see why tenting is increasingly popular. In an age of caring for our environment, it is an obvious way of stepping off the conveyor of fast living and plugging into nature. And what better countryside to consider than Shropshire?

The Green Caravan Park itself is an eco-friendly site and is in proud possession of a prestigious Gold Award from the Dr Doolittle of wildlife and conservation, David Bellamy.

Campers, perhaps more acutely aware of the environment due to their direct connection with the countryside and the perils of being wasteful with food and energy, recycle discarded food packaging into an impressive array of colour-coded bins; they are watchful of water usage, use wind-up torches and wildlife abounds.

Friendly goats (called Dusty, Buckaroo and Billy) wander the site and amuse the kids – and are cheaper to keep the bushes down than an electric strimmer.

After three days of unremitting camping joy (the weather held out), it is almost tragic to return to bricks and mortar and hot running water.

To dry it out after the camping trip, I assemble the tent in the back garden. Last time I looked it was still there. Might just be sleeping out in the garden tonight.