Our Elddis AutoQuest

We have just got back from a rally/meet held about an hours drive away.

On Thursday it was snowing so we was not sure if we would go but then on Friday we decided to give it a go. When we got to the rally site it has been decided that the field was to boggy so people were parking their caravans/motorhomes (just 2 motorhomes) on the village hall car park. This wasn’t a problem as the organisers had booked the hall anyway. 4×4’s and some late arrivals though did have to go onto the field as there was not a great amount of parking spaces.

Friday night we just popped up the pub for an hour before settling down in front of the TV.

Saturday there was a Treasure hunt for the kids (and a few big boys) in the morning and a good old game of bingo for the ladies (and a few big boys) in the afternoon.

Saturday evening was fun, this was the first organised meet of the year and as it was close to Valentines day (ok a week after) the theme was just that.

A game was played which I had not seen before but it was entertaining and a number of people won silly but funny prizes. Julian, our eldest son won a small PINK photo frame, Tracey won a set of furry hand cuffs. Not sure what they will be used for:) The games where followed by a disco.

We woke this morning to find it had been snowing, only about a few inches, this was going to be fun as there was a slight upward slope as you leave the car park. In the end, a couple of 4×4’s towed the caravans off the field and of the car park onto the road with the owner then hitching the caravan to their own cars on the roadside.

We was asked if we needed to a tow, I said that I should think we will be ok but would be leaving before them so there was help on hand if we did have trouble. As it happens we didn’t have any problems.

The drive home was tentative but trouble free until we arrived home. There was no way we could get the motohome onto the drive, we shovelled some snow and gritted elsewhere and after 2 hours of clearing and trying we managed to get it on the drive.

The who weekend was totally enjoyable but Tracey is not keen on going when snow is forcast:).

Yes, it’s February and we decided to go away in the MotorHome for a few days.

I had a couple of family birthdays so we decided to visit them in Essex. The site we stayed at last time we visited is not open this time of year, but we found another little site closer to the town centre and cheaper than the last site.

Well, the first night we kept the water heater and living area heater on, unfortunately sometime during the night, the LPG bottle ran out. It was bloody cold but fortunately we had refilled a 2nd bottle on the way down so it was just a tempory set back.

We spent the day then with my parents, parking was not easy as there are not many parking spots near them that can take a 27 foot Motorhome but we managed to find somewhere.

The second night was cold outside but warm in the van, we decided to switch the water heater to electric (metered) but the living area heating is just LPG.

The next morning though we was warm, we couldn’t wash. We had enough water to make a cup of coffee. Not a problem, each pitch has it’s own tap so I could fill the tank, no the taps had frozen, even though the pipes where lagged. I knew I should have filled it before going to bed.

Fortunately we was visitng my siblings and we was able to park the motorhome on my sisters driveway and connect a hose pipe and fill the tank.

That evening, before we left my sisters it started to snow and as we drove back to the site it appeared to get worse, we had to go back to the site as we had left a few items on the site, kids bikes etc, but we was seriously considering returning back to my sisters and spending the night on her driveway.

By the time we had put the bikes on the back of the motorhome the snow had virtually stopped so we decided to stay put. We had a pleasant night and nothing went wrong, we woke to a warm van and plenty of water.

We spent the morning back at my sisters as our niece was celebrating her 4th birthday. We then dropped another of my sisters of at the airport on our way home, stopping for a cup of coffee on the way and calling in to get a LPG refill.

All in all a great few days and learning curve as our first winter outing.

We had planned to go away over the weekend but it had previously been thought it may be too cold so unlikely that we would go.

As the weekend came it was cold, although not as cold as it had been, and Tracey wanted to look around for a new kitchen so we decided to give it a miss. We WILL be going away in a few weeks time.

We had planned to go away for a weekend or two in the next few weeks but we are experiencing the coldest weather for years and our van is not winterized so frozen water tanks are likely.

Tracey has already said if the weather stays as it is, ie snow and ice on the roads etc, then we are not going. She is not keen on the cold weather, although the kids are keen to go.

My concern is not the cold weather, but it’s the state of the sites we would be staying on. They are not commercial camp sites but fields at the back of pubs etc. Will we get stuck in mud and snow? There would be nothing worse than getting stuck in the middle of a field.

2010 is upon us, so what plans do we have for the Autoquest this year?

We do disagree to an extent, both Tracey and I agree that we will spend many weekends away at Camping and Caravan clubs Notts District Association meets. These are great fun and cheap. For the past 3 years we have been to Spain for our main summer holiday, self catering in an apartment. This year we have decided to use the motorhome for our main holiday, and this is where our disagreements arise.

I want to drive through France and down into Spain, spending about a week traveling down, a week in Spain and then however long it takes to travel back via France.

Tracey isn’t so keen, we drove to Spain in the car a few years ago and spent almost 2 days each way non stop driving which was not popular and has basically turned Tracey against any thought of driving to Spain again.

Tracey wants us to travel around the UK, which it looks like is what we will be doing, utalising the Camping and Caravan clubs DA meets nationally to keep the costs down. I am still hoping for (working on) a trip into Europe this year. We will wait and see.

Geocaching is a high-tech treasure hunting game played throughout the world by adventure seekers equipped with GPS devices.

In the US Geocaching has been big for some time and the past time has now spread world wide. I heard about it earlier this year when a friend (Joby) in the US mentioned that he does it from time to time.  Recently I read an article in one of the magazines we get about someone who’s son was into Geocaching and one weekend she went with him and her daughter and reported how much fun it was.

The article has made me really think about taking this up when we go away in the ‘van. Normally the kids go of and play while we sit and relax but taking up Geocaching could get us doing more as a family while we are away.

Do you Geocache? what are your experiences?

This morning on the motorway,

I looked over to my right and there was a Woman in a brand new BMW doing 75Mph with her face up next to her rear view mirror putting on her eyeliner !

I looked away for a couple seconds and when I looked back she was halfway over in my lane, and still working on that makeup !

As a man, I don’t scare easily.But she scared me so much;

I dropped my electric shaver, which knocked the meat pie out of my other hand.
In all the confusion of trying to straighten out the car using my knees against the steering wheel,
it knocked my mobile phone away from my ear which fell into the coffee between my legs, splashed, and burned
‘Big Jim and the Twins’, ruined the phone, soaked my trousers, and disconnected an important call.

BL00DY women drivers !!

This has nothing to do with the motorhome but I read it on the MotorhomeFun forum and thought would post it here as there are no updates at the moment.

When I applied for my driving license 25+ years ago I had to get doctors reports etc due to my disability and I was issued a B1 and B1+E, D1 and D1+E class Driving License. This meant that I was licensed to drive anything upto 3500kg, with or without a trailer. In those days this was classed as a restriction as most people also recieved the C1 and C1+E class which allows them to drive anything upto 7000kg with or without a trailer. This restriction has never really affected me, I could drive vans such as transits etc and had no need for anything larger.

In 1997 the laws changed and it became the norm that people where only issued the B1 license and further tests where required to obtain further classes such as the C1, D1 or even just the E class allowing them to tow larger trailers or caravans over 750kg.

When we started looking at getting the motorhome this year it hit me how limited I am going to be due to having the weight limit of 3500kg and the fact we needed at least 5 berths. We were lucky, we found the Elddis Autoquest 180 with a max weight of 3500kg.

We are happy with the van, but the restriction concerned me.  I emailed the DVLA and asked them a ‘general enquiry’ asking if it would be possible to have the C1 class added to my license.  Within 24 hours they had emailed me asking me for license information which I sent them. I then heard nothing so about a week ago I phoned the DVLA and was informed that the medical board was looking into it for me.

On Friday I received a new license, with B1, C1 and D1 classes all with +E so I can now drive anything upto 7500kg, with a trailer and no limits.

Oh the difference this would have made 5 months ago when looking at Motorhomes, I am so tempted to go looking at something a bit bigger now but my head says stick with what you have for a bit.

We will see which wins, heart or head.

We went to what was likely to be our last meet of the year this weekend, the Bonfire and FIrework meet.

It was held at the Walesby Scout camp in Nottinghamshire. Keeping with tradition it was wet and cold but as true Brits we had a great time nether the less.

This was the first time we have used the gas heater in the ‘van which is no big deal but it turned out to be the first time we changed the gas bottle. We knew the bottle was getting low, we have a 2nd so its no problem or so we thought. As expected it we ran out of gas on the Friday night, at 10pm.

Out we go to change the bottles to find that out of all the tools we had, not one spanner, wrench or any other thing we had fitted (teach us not to double check). I have no problems asking others for help but at 10pm you don’t know who will still be about and have tools to hand. I asked Julian to run down to the Stewards and see if there was any life there and ask them. They did have a set of quick grip pliers but we just could not get the bloody hose disconnected.

Bonfire with the Guy Fawkes' made by kids at the meet

We decided to leave it, so back into the van we got, with no heating and no gas for hot drinks. After a couple of beers we wrapped up and went to bed. It was cold night and a cold morning and we couldn’t even have a cuppa until I had sorted the Gas. Fortunately as I went outside someone was off to fill their water barrels and I asked if he had a suitable spanner. Yes he did, an engineering spanner that he had ground down slightly to make it a perfect fit. With a bit if elbow greese and a lot of huffing and puffing we managed to get the bloody thing off, switch the bottles and reconnect. The whole job takes seconds once you get it undone, Oh the fun of it all:)

Bonfire has been lit and burns nicely

Saturday evening saw the bonfire and fireworks, followed by a ’social evening’. This was great, normally it is a ‘take your own drink’ evening but this was evening was a ‘take your own drink, table and chairs’ evening as there was nothing in the hall. We met some new faces and some that we had previously met and got slowly (with the help of a drop of some slow gin) drunk.

All in All we have had a great few weekends away this year and plan to do an awfull lot more next year. We would like to thank the Camping and Caravan clubs Notts District Association and their members for making us newbies so welcome this year and giving us some great advice and tips.

By the way, there are some good photo’s of last weeks Halloween meet here.

It’s been a few weeks since we last used the motor home, but we knew we would be away for halloween.

Before going away we first added a 2nd leisure battery, we thought that now the nights are drawing in we would need lights on for longer etc and as there was not going to be any electric hookup it was a choice of a 2nd battery or sitting in the dark.

OK so Friday afternoon we packed up and off we went, we dropped the dog off with Tracey’s parents this time as we knew there would be kids ‘trick or treating’ and we would also be out both  nights leaving her alone so it made sence.

Our destination was a small place called ‘Weston on Trent’, it was a meet organised by the Camping and Caravan CLub Nottingham District Association like those we have been to before.

We had got a few Halloween decorations for our Motor Home but when we got there and saw how others had decorated their ‘vans we felt a bit ‘under dressed’. As soon as we arrived the kids where off hunting down friends while Tracey and I where left to sort everything out.

Friday evening we found that the top meter of our flag pole had snapped, it was getting dark and we was planning on taking a stroll to the hall for a drink or two so left it until Saturday morning.

Saturday, up we got and down came the flag pole, take the sheeth off (allows for multipe items to be fixed to pole), and we discarded the meter of pole and put re errected the pole again.

Saturday was dry, although we had been woken early Saturday morning by the rain, the kids we hardly saw all day, off making halloween masks in the morning, 5 a side football all afternoon and then at 6pm they all went off ‘Trick or Treating’.  They were gone about an hour and boy did they get some treats, between the 3 of them when they emptied their buckets they filled a carrier bag.

Once they had all finished Trick or Treating we all went over to the hall in our fancy dress costumes, yes we all dressed up. I have to sort the pictures out but will upload them soon.

Sunday morning we got up to find the bloody flag pole had snapped half way down, heck we have never had much luck with it. When first got it we was advised to secure it to the van in some way rather than have it free standing, this I think was its downfall. Being secured to the Motor Home it mean that the bottom 3 meters would not be flexable as it is against the ‘van, so in the strong winds it bend and snapped. Looking around others had them free standing. Oh well will get a replacement for the new year and try again with that.

Sunday morning was also wet, pouring with rain there I was taking decorations down off the outside of the motor home etc while the rest of the family was inside nice and dry.  Sound familiar to anyone LOL. Anyway we didn’t stay for the ‘Coffee Morning’ even though we had raffle tickets for the raffle that was going to be drawn. We really enjoyed the weekend and would like to thank everyone for making it so enjoyable.