2007 - Travels with Big Bertha

Big Bertha arrived in January and with deja-vu sat on the drive-way until March, when we were at last able to go to Canterbury and try everything out. At least the weather was good to us this time and we even had visitors for Sunday afternoon tea at the picnic table out in the sun.

By April we had organized our first trip 'overseas' - we were to join a Club Rally in Ireland, another first as we had never rallied before. On the 18th April we left home to drive to Fishguard in Wales ,some 320 miles away. We decided to break our journey at Newport and as we had some time to spare spent 3 days there. It was a lovely site in the grounds of Tredegar House and we had the run of the park without any public once the gates were shut in the evening.

We left Newport and drove to Fishguard where we joined the queue for the 14.00 ferry behind a motorhome towing a little car behind it. We did not realise at this stage that we were both bound for the same rally site in Ireland! We were surprised at how easy it was to drive on to the ferry, find our seats in the Lounge, eat our lunch, drink coffee and doze our way across the Irish Sea. We arrived at Rosslare around 18.00 in grey drizzle and set about following the map to the nearest campsite at St Margaret's Beach....only to find that Irish maps bear no relation to the actual drive! After much difficulty and 30 minutes later (should have been 10mins according to the directions) we found the campsite along with two other motorhomes that had been on the ferry with us. We had all taken a different route! The office was closed, it was raining...we wondered what to do next, when a fellow appeared from nowhere, said '17 euros each please and park where you like'. We found a hardstanding in the swirling mist rather like the moors from the Hound of the Baskervilles, and set about putting Big Bertha up. After about 10 minutes another fellow arrived with a tray of coffees and biscuits, saying he was from the caravan next door and had been there 2 weeks. Once we were sorted we took the tray back and sat chatting for about 1 hour - they were so helpful and gave us lots of tips about Irish roads, driving and all the best campsites. We went back to Big Bertha in the pouring rain, put the heating on and had an early night.......we had arrived in Ireland.....what a welcome!

Last outing of the year - September/October 2006

In October we thought we would have one last outing of the year to celebrate Brian's 70th birthday, so chose Winchester Club Site. It was very wet and muddy on arrival and we had some downpours whilst we were there, but never mind we still managed to have a good time.

We visited Alresford and Winchester, had some lovely walks along the river and lazed around.



Little did we know then that this was to be our last outing in Bertha. We had come to love her throughout the year even though we did not like to colour to begin with.

At the end of October we visited the Caravan and Leisure Show at the NEC in Birmingham, mainly to pick up one or two bits that we needed (mainly a new Porta Potti as ours was at least 20years old!). On arrival we obviously went to have a look at the new 2007 models - like you do. What a surprise, a new cream and brown range! We bumped in to our friendly salesperson Terry from Camping International who pointed out all the changes. We were very taken with the slightly larger model - the Pathfinder - particularly as it had it's very own toilet! Also an oven and blown air heating! What a dilemma...we went off to have lunch and a long discussion over coffee...went back to Terry to see what trade-in he would give us for our one-year-old Pullman...went away again to go over the finances....and hey presto the decision was made to upgrade. (On the proviso that I took as much temp work as I was offered during the winter months!)

Next year - 2007 couldn't come quickly enough...............watch this space

July and August short and long breaks

On one of the hottest days of the year we decided to go to Hythe Caravan Club Site which is only about 1 hour away from here. When we arrived we met up with some friends from home who had already been there for a few days. It was an exceptionally hot week and we spent most of the time drinking 'cool drinks' and sitting in the shade. On one day we had visitors and all 4 of us played 'shift up the line' with our chairs as close as possible to the camper in the 4 inches of shade that it provided as the sun moved around.!

At the beginning of August we had a Country Music weekend at Clipgate Farm near Canterbury. We were blessed with another hot weekend, dancing in a barn as well as a field, barbecue and listening to music in the field as well as light aircraft taking off from the airstrip over the fence.


The following weekend found us at Whitchurch in Berkshire, again at a Country Music Dancing weekend with our friends in the posh caravan. This time we had a hall to dance in and showers in the school to make use of...all mod cons here.

From there the 4 of us travelled to Derby Club site for a few days. We walked around the park and visited the town with it's Silk Museum. Brian and I also spent a whole morning at the Donington Park Grand Prix Motor Museum, which is an absolute delight for 'small boys'.








From Derby on up to Keighley to an 'adults only ' site ( Bronte Caravan Park). This was a beautiful site on a very steep slope terraced...luckily each of the hardstandings was level. We unfortunately had a lot of rain there so ended up with a river running through our awning.


We did manage a trip to the Railway Musuem and then a ride on the steam train out to Oxenhope. We had a walk there through the fields and sat to have a picnic lunch by the river. Skipton Castle was also very interesting as was Haworth, Bronte Parsonage and village.




We made our way over to Skipton for the August Bank Holiday to the Yorkshire Dales Country Music Festival. Again a farmer's field, a huge marquee, 2000 people, 21 bands, portaloos and portashowers (our first experience of those!) We had an excellent time; I know a lot of people laugh at or mock line-dancers etc., but they are some of the friendliest and most helpful folk we know.


After the festival our friends left us to carry on up to Scotland to visit relatives there. We drove back down to Teversal which is on the borders of Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire...from the top of the Teversal Trail you can see 5 counties (but I can't remember which! we were too puffed out from the walk!)



Whilst at Teversal we decided to visit the Heights of Abraham, going up on the cable car, but like the fools we are walking back down, that was really hard work with our toes shoving in to the toes of our boots it was so steep. Although it is pretty it is also very touristy and car parking is exorbitant.

We spent a much nicer and cheaper day at the Crich Tramway Village, riding the trams back and forth as well as walking through the woods to see the woodcarver at work.





HardwicK Hall and Stainsby Mill was another good day out, courtesy of National Trust. This year we actually covered the cost of our annual ticket.







We finally arrived back at home on the 7th September...just as well we have a resident house-sitter in the form of our youngest son.

the Summer of 2006 - round the UK

We started off on 10th May going to Dorset for 10 days with friends who have a caravan. We had some lovely walks and visited places like the Abbotsbury Swannery and Tropical Gardens, Corfe Castle and Bovington Tank Museum.



Following on from there we drove together up to Lacock in Wiltshire, which is a National Trust Village and Abbey and very pretty. (Now we know that it was used for filming the tv drama Cranford) We went to Bath and Bradford upon Avon. The 4 days of the Bank Holiday weekend were taken up with a music festival at Corsham, where we met up with lots of our country music friends.










After the Bank Holiday, Brian and I went on up to the Forest of Dean, an area we had never visited before. We found it so beautiful and there were plenty of walks around to keep us happy.

From there we drove up in to Wales, to a little place called Cynghordy. Friends of friends of ours had just opened a 5 van certificated site there and we were their first paying guests. The site is lovely; 5 hardstandings, lots of grass with trees around, a lake full of fish, hens, ducks wandering around. There is even a stream you can walk up which has wild mink come to visit and the red kites are soaring overhead.


We spent a week just relaxing in the sun, reading our books and generally unwinding. We managed a visit to the Botanical Gardens and also a walk around the RSPB reserve.
We finally arrived home on 16th June having stopped at Lacock overnight on the way back.

2006 - Delivery and our first outing

Hello this is my first go at this...


First we had a tent, then as the joints became creakier we decided we needed more comfort. We bought a small folding camper, 10 years old and for the summer of 2005 tried it out at music festivals






and short weekends locally. We were hooked! So November arrived and off we went to the Earl’s Court Show armed with some pictures of our old Fiesta. Our local dealers were exhibiting along with others so we spent all day comparing makes and specifications, eventually settling for a Pennine Pullman. All we needed to do now was strike a bargain with Camping International. This we managed to do, so back home on the train clutching our order form for a new unit to be delivered in January 2006.


Our Pennine Pullman arrived in January,





having been christened Bertha with presents from Father Christmas, and then sat on the drive until the end of March, most frustrating. However, eventually our first outing was to Canterbury Camping Club site and co-incided with our wedding anniversary, very wet weather and me having the 'flu! Not a good start to the year. We spent all of one day putting up the unit, followed by the awning, so much for these 'experts' that say it only takes 20 minutes. We were quite glad to see the arrival of the fish and chip van in the evening, at least I did not have to cook. In the end we spent 5 interesting days there getting to know how everything worked and which cupboard we had put stuff in (the Pullman has plenty of storage space for only 2 people!)