Camper Jam....

Just had a great family weekend at Camper Jam at Weston Park in Shropshire. After a week of dire weather, the sun shone from when we arrived until we left. So after pitching camp with the rest of the 80-90 club, the barbie was lit the wine opened and chilllll. Well I say chill, that was until Laura saw a "Cooking in a Campervan" competition, where you have an hour to cook a meal from scratch..To be honest it was great fun, even though we were all competing in front of an audience, I even drafted Erin in to help me. Our "meals" were then judged by Martin Dorey (real nice guy) of "One man and his Campervan" fame.....I'll admit I didn't win, but it was tremendous buzz and "I'll be back" next year this time fully prepared.

Being a Good Samaritan...

We all lead busy lives these days, with people trying to do a dozen things at the same time and always in a rush to get somewhere. This pace of life unfortunately can affect our willingness to help complete strangers when in need, because " We don't want to get involved"
A couple of days ago as I was dropping Joel of at school, I notice a Campervan with it's hazards flashing by the side of the road. I was in a rush( as always) but I said to myself " if that van is still there in 10 mins I'll stop to help". Sure enough when I was coming back it was still there, so I stopped to offer help. The lady driver ( Paula) said she'd run out of petrol due to a faulty gauge but had called the AA who would be there in the hour. Fair enough and I wished her well. As I dove off I thought I could o better. So I called home picked up an empty petrol can and went to fill it up . Then I went back to the stranded Campervan. The lady was gobsmacked that someone would put themselves out for a complete stranger. She thanked me saying that I had saved her from missing an important appointment .
So the moral of the story is if you can help do help , you never know when the shoe maybe on the other foot. So lets all be good Samaritans....it feels good.

To Oily Go....

Prevention is better than the cure should be the moto for all Campervan owners. And though many owners may regularly service there vans, one area no doubt easily gets overlooked is...your gearbox. Unlike engine oil gearbox oil doesn't need regularly changing, but it doesn't last forever. With age the oil breaks down or leaks away as seals start to age , ect, so it needs to be checked every few years. Now there's no easy dipstick for you to check the levels..that would be too easy. You have to undo the 17mm hexagonal filler plug on the side of the gearbox , then put you finger in the hole to see if you can feel the oil (very hi-tech) all whilst lying flat on you back under the van. Now to top it up you need three feet of hose ,a funnel and some gear oil. Feed the hose via the engine compartment in to the filler hole then top up with oil until it begins to dribble out of the hole. And if like me you're changing all the oil. then you'll need to drain the oil by the 17mm drain plug at the bottom of the gearbox.( but only after making sure the filler plug comes out first) This plug has a magnet on it which pulls all the steel bits out of the oil which wear off your gears over the years and in my case a bearing casing..eeek. This is how I found that my gearbox will need rebuilding in the not too distant future, but hey at least I can plan for that now. At least all my hard work payed off as the gears are easier with new oil however I did stink with smell of old gear oil for a couple of days. so until next time have fun.

Spring Tidy Up

Looking after an older Campervan is a never ending job and after the last two hard winters some paint touching up was crying out to be done. Now two years ago I painted the lower half of the van using Rustoleum paint applied with a roller. The great advantage with this system is it's cheap and easy to touch up. At the same time I started on the top half of the Van which hasn't been done yet, particularly the high top roof which was looking very shabby. As usual with these jobs it hadn't rained in three weeks but when I started the weather broke, so that's only half done...Never mind, now where did I put that brolly?

A Campervan is..........

Loading the kids in the van , grabbing a bottle of wine then whisking Laura from work for an impromptu lunchtime picnic in the spring sunshine....what more do you need.

Rear Seat Belts

As with many older campervans, mine didn't have rear seatbelts. When I first converted the van the rear seat had one three point inertia belt and one lap belt( as the cupboards on one side blocked the upper belt mounting point). Now this was fine initially , but now with two growing children we needed to replace the lapbelt with a more secure three point inertia belt. After some head scratching, we decided the best route was to remove the rear cupboard so I could fit the belt behind to the the proper mounting points. Then carefully modifying the cupboard so the seat belt could pass through it. It works a treat and more importantly the kids are safe and secure.

Summer Holidays

Summer Holidays away in the campervan have given us some of the greatest memories any family could wish. This year will be our third summer with the Van and our furthest expedition to date. As with any older vehicle ,it takes a while to build your confidence that the van will make it beyond the end of the road. So our first camping expedition was to the intriguingly named "Strawberry Woods " Campsite a record breaking 12 miles away..ha ha. It was a great success and spurred us on to go farther a field that summer. Last year we did a grand tour of Wales, through some amazing countryside and up some steep mountains (slowly) followed later in the summer with a jaunt down to the Isle of Wight.

This year however we have set our sights further afield ....FRANCE.. Gulp. Now with such an expedition planning is the key to ensure a successful trip. So I employed the services of friendly travel specialist.....other wise know as the Mrs.... Laura just loves trawling the internet looking for the best deals, places to stay and visit and all that insurance malarkey.

All I have to do is ensure the Van is up to the trip and with that in mind I will be doing several jobs over the coming months in preparation for the "Grand Tour". So tune in next time to read about some of the jobs to be done on the van in readiness for "France 2011"