Reverse Polarity

As you might be aware when camping on the continent they do things a bit weirdly.

Because they use 2 pin plugs sometimes they wire them back to front. And sometimes they use traditional camping plugs and sometimes they use continental 2 pin sockets like you get in a house. This means you need 4 plugs! A normal and a reversed polarity 3 pin and 2 pin option.

Fortunately for us Mrs Blakey's father is a keen motor home owner, Mr Practical and very generous to boot. He made us up all the plug options you could possibly need and supplied us with a little socket tester that you simply plug into the 240v socket in the van and it tells you when you have your polarity right. Clever stuff!

This is only our second night and we've already used two of the plugs he made us up!

Thanks Mr. P!

Euro Tour Day 2

We're in Cannes some 420 miles south of where we started this morning. Toll roads were busier today but still has to be better than the back roads.

The approach to the riviera is stunning. First time I've been down this part of France and I'm impressed.

Cannes was much as expected. Beautiful town with a gorgeous marina full of multi million pound yaughts.

We've just parked up, set up camp and are hitting our first beer. A quiet one at the campsite tonight I think. Cheers!

Euro Tour, Day 1

We're now camped up in a little riverside campsite in Auxonne, near Dijon in France. Caught the chunnel across which is so easy and quick - highly recommended.

About 350 miles driven today on the French toll roads. They are so good! Quiet, fast and well maintained. England take note. Well worth the €40 for the day as we got here 3 hours faster (according to TomTom) and it was so relaxing. Cruise control is also worth its weight in gold on those roads.

We're off into town now to hunt down a restaurant as today is our 1st wedding anniversary! Great way to spend it!

Tomorrow - Cannes/Nice/Monaco!

Weekend in Hampshire

We spent this bank holiday weekend over in sunny Hampshire.   It's only an hour and a half down the road for us and has lots for us to look around on our bikes so it's a place we like to visit.  This weekend we stayed in Sunnydale Farm campsite just outside of Southampton.   It's in a great location as it's easy to cycle to Eastern Docks from there, giving you ferry access to both the Isle of Wight and the New Forest.

Saturday was a lovely sunny day (and my birthday to boot) so we set out early for the Isle of Wight.  We crossed to Cowes and then bombed down the cycle path to Newport in the centre of the island.  We had a leisurely cruise around that town, taking in a cream tea and a pint by the river and then shot back up to Cowes which we also explored.  Taking the chain ferry back across to the main docks in East Cowes we then returned to the main land, passing the Queen Mary 2 and three other ocean liners setting out from Southampton.  Saturday evening is clearly the time for cruises to set out.

Cowes Harbour

Cream tea in Newport centre

Beer by the river in Newport

On the chain ferry in Cowes

Queen Mary 2 goes past

Sunday was a more leisurely day spent biking down to and exploring the nearby Netley Abbey, an old 13th century ruin which was huge and most impressive.  It was disolved by Henry VIII and turned into a tudor manor house before falling into ruin. 

Netley Abbey

Monday dawned another lovely sunny day so we broke camp, drove around to the New Forest and parked up in a layby near Brockenhurst.   From there we whizzed around the cycle paths down to Beaulieu and from there up to East Boldre were we had lunch in the lovely pub garden.   From there we headed back to Brockenhurst, stopping off to watch some model aeroplanes being flown.   Some of them were really rather impressive.

Handy layby in the New Forest

Quick break in Beaulieu

Pub lunch in East Boldre

Mini aerodrome in the forest

This weekend was our last chance to trial our camping set up before we set off for our European Tour in a few weeks.  It was also the first time the kitchen pod had been used since it has been bolted into the van (meaning it's always available and I don't need to unbungee it to use it).   We found a few bits and pieces we felt we didn't need to take with us for our Tour, and we came up with some efficient ways of storing stuff in the van such that we can easily access it, but so it's also easy to put it away when we want to drive on.

The kitchen pod worked a dream.  It was great getting back from a long day out on the bikes, opening up the van and simply popping up the lid of the hob, grabbing the kettle and putting it on.  Absolutely zero effort and the kettle had boiled by the time we'd got the biking stuff put away.

The kitchen pod, ready for action

We also used it as a stand for the laptop, which made for an excellent entertainment centre so we could watch a couple of DVDs.  We'll no doubt be using this a bit when away.

An evening glass of wine and a movie

One thing we did decide on is that we really need a bike rack.  The bikes spent all weekend chained to a fence where we camped up but when we came to move on we had to bring them into the van and bungee them up.  This was all very do-able but the inside of the van was then mostly unusable, and it would be much better when travelling to be able to use the space inside the van without having to throw the bikes out.   Lunch stops would work much better like this for example.  So I'm now on the hunt for a T5 barn door bike rack.

All in all this was a cracking weekend and really helped us making last minute decisions on what we need and what is superfluous for our tour.  Can't wait to get going now!

Bolted

This evening we finally bolted the kitchen pod into the van wall proper.   It feels very securely in place now and I've also managed to add some velcro strips to hold the hob lid open when cooking.    I'm hopeful that's it all nice and neatly and safely secured and that if I really need to I can unscrew the bolts.

Real test is this weekend when we're off to the New Forest for a long weekend.  Then we'll really know how it handles.

Kitchen Pod Attachment

After many months thinking about how to attach my kitchen pod into the van I've finally decided on the approach to use.  I got a very helpful message from Mr Hedgehog (great name!) on the Brickyard suggesting that I use rivetnuts to bolt the pod into the wall of the van.   He then went on to explain what these nuts were and how they worked and then extremely generously offered to lend me his rivetnut gun to use!     How could I refuse?

Basically, for those like me who don't know what a rivetnut is, you drill a hole in the interior metal skin of the van and then push one of these rivetnuts into the hole.   You then use this special rivetnut gun tool to compress the nut such that it pinches itself around the metal skin and basically won't come out.   The rivetnut is hollow with a 6mm screw thread on the inside - meaning you can thread a 6mm bolt into the rivetnut and it will hold it tight.  The great thing about this is that when bolted in the pod will be extremely secure and not move around, but will be really easy to remove by simply undoing the bolts.

So, I've now drilled three holes into the metal skin along the top of the panel under the drivers side window.  Into these I've popped three rivetnuts ready to accept 6mm bolts.    So now all I need to do is drill holes into the cabinet and bolt it right into the wall of the van.  Importantly, when the pod is out of the van, all you see on the wall of the van is three really neat looking metal nuts in the skin of the van wall.    I didn't take any pictures last night when I did this but will add some later.

Of course nothing is as simple as that.   If I did bolt the cabinet right into the van wall I'd no longer be able to open the sliding window that the cabinet would be bolted up against.   So to make this work I need to put a wooden batton in the back of the cabinet and bolt through the cabinet, and through this wooden batton and into the rivetnuts on the van wall.   I'm planning to do this during the week ready for a camping trip next weekend.

Thanks heaps to Mr Hedgehog for the loan of the rivetnut gun!  I'll post a follow up with pictures when I finally bolt the cabinet in.

Cruise Control

It's been a while since I've posted anything up here but that's not stopped me using the van, nor indeed adding bits and pieces to it.  

The most significant item I've added since my last post is Cruise Control.  I paid £280 from my local Stealer for this mod and in my opinion it's well worth the money.   I took the van to Wales this weekend (and slept in the roof of course) and the cruise control was a godsend.

If you've used it before you'll know why I love it.  If not, try and take a car/van for a long motorway journey with cruise and you'll see why it's so great.  The journey down the M4 was easy as pie, with cruise on most of the way there.  It's early days to be certain but I think it's saved me some mpg too - although obviously I'll have to drive a lot of miles for it to pay for itself!

I think it will really come into its own in a couple of months when we take the van to Europe.