Caravanner of the Year on BBC this April!

Did I spy our hitherto illustrious Chairman riding in the back of a motorhome on the public highway not secured by a seatbelt? They were very careful with camera angles, but I think this one slipped through the net.

A few years ago the cc ran economy runs. Fuel tanks were 'brimmed', outfits carefully weighed and anyone 10% over maximum weight disqualified. At the end of the test route, tanks were again 'brimmed', fuel quantityand distance travelled recorded. Calculations were then carried out to find the most economical outfit taking into consideration the outfit weight/fuel used/distance travelled. Would this exercise be too technical for the cc to carry out today. Certainly the test last night was a waste of time and money.

I am in agreement with some other comments. We try to keep to 'A' roads as much as possible and avoid narrow lanes. We do this out of consideration for other road users and our safety. Not allowing the use of A roads may prevent others passing and certainly leads to slower travel resulting in frustrated drivers behind.

As far as we are concerned its come back Jeremy Clarkeson, at least you knew he was against caravans, we are now going to tell all our friends that it was only done for a laugh as none of the six were representative of true caravanners.

The chap with the 81 year old mother saying "No not this way that's upside down" when she was reversing had us R.O.F.L.

The motorhomer with his pieces of paper and spreadsheets was also a laugh.

We think "Carry on Caravanning" would have been the appropriate title.

Still it was more fun than Eastenders!

Are we doing something wrong?  We never make lists or plan a detailed route. 

Write your comments here...We have a list for hitching up and checking the security of the caravan locker doors etc. We are fairly new to the caravan world and l feel that we need to do this. Maybe when we are as experianced as you we can do away with the checklist.

Thank goodness it wasn't just us. It must have made non caravaners think we are all a bit nerdy! We don't all talk to stuffed animals and keep our wives with their fingers on the map!, what a missed opportunity to promote the lifestyle.

 ....mission. 

Moderator edit: Personal insults removed from this post.

 

I guess that gives me a clue. 

maybe we could crowd fund a proper film about caravaners . when ever i hear the name Grenvllie it reminds me of OPEN ALL HOURS another comedy show

 

Plenty of people have commented that the Club is ignoring this thread, despite nearly 100 pages of almost universal agreement that serious harm has been done to the Club by running the Caravanner of the Year Competition on BBC TV.  There have been lots of calls for both Chairman and CEO to resign; a pretty big fuss is being made and, surprise surprise, the Club doesn’t seem to be listening.  The Caravan Club is supposed to be owned and operated for the benefit of its members so why aren’t the Club’s hierarchy listening?

Club Together is clearly regarded by Club Management as a safe place to allow Members to let off steam but nothing of any other significance.  No one outside the Club reads it (nowhere has the national media taken any interest in this Members’ Revolution) so it can be simply ignored.  All the Club Management have done this time, and all they have ever done in the past, is release an anodyne statement which gives no indication at all that they will listen or learn, let alone change anything unless it suits them.   Their statement saying “we think it was OK” amounts to rejection and denial.  There is no evidence at all that the Club’s management hierarchy have any intention at all of listening to the Members on this issue.

The Caravan Club might be a member-controlled club on paper but in practice, these days, it is controlled entirely by its establishment and the members simply don’t have any real voice or clout at all.  Even if all those who have expressed strong views on this thread turned up at the next AGM to demand a vote of no confidence, it simply wouldn’t happen.  Members cannot propose a motion at the AGM unless the Club Council, part of the Club’s establishment, has approved the motion in advance.

To propose any motion to an AGM you need to get together quite a large number of other Members to support you before your motion can go forward at all.  And you aren’t allowed to use Club Together to exchange personal information, so you can’t use that to form up your rebel group.  There is no facility to gather any sort of revolutionary movement together.  Forcing the Club’s establishment to accept change against its wishes might not be impossible but it is a mammoth task and will requires some pretty clever and sustained political activity.  There might be other ways of forcing the Chairman or CEO out, such as open rebellion to get the attention of the press, but I wouldn’t count on it succeeding.

So let steam off on here if you wish, that seems to be allowed – unless of course it ever starts to look like you are achieving anything, in which case your postings might quietly disappear.  I wonder if this posting of mine will survive for long?

As it happens I doubt if much harm has been done by the Club’s participation in this TV programme, except perhaps temporarily to Chairman Grenville’s hitherto unshakeable self-confidence.  Long before Jeremy Clarkson had a go at ridiculing us, the general public had already learned to hate us for cluttering up the roads so why kid yourself that you could ever persuade them otherwise.  And do we really want to recruit more people to our hobby in this over-crowded Country?  Let them think we’re all eccentric fools, I don’t mind at all.

Write your comments here...  Use a Facebook closed group. We would then control what happened and what was said. However, in reality, even if possible, it is not feasible nor practical to get rid of "the establishment" en mass. There would be a great vacuum (of a physical presence rather than the apparent mental vacuum) which would require filling. And let's face it, we need the club to continue to function. I would like to think that those responsible for this fiasco have learnt a serious lesson.....possibly at our expense, but will be thinking long and hard before they consider such actions in future. Furthermore, they may take time to read these posts (??) in which case they may form a better understanding of how most of us feel.

I live in hope!!

Write your comments here...I think you are kidding yourself that Club Management will read this sort of thread for any purpose other than clipping the wings of those who, as they would regard it, "break the Guidelines", to mitigate its impact.  In my experience they use a wide interpretation of the written Guidelines whenever it suits them.

The idea of having a forum or facebook page which is outside the control of the Club's establlishment might be a useful thing but it would be bound to attract an awful lot of garbage postings and impose a big burden of moderation on someone - and realsitically who is going to volunteer to do all that work?

I'm not sure this thread, or this forum as a whole, shows any concerted or common feelings of discontent.  Is there even a commen perception of the sort of caravanning which should reflect what CC is about?

I enjoyed the second episode - mainly because the contestants all came across as decent and likeable people - and good luck to them if they have ways of enjoying their caravan or motorhome which aren't the same as mine.  Caravanning is about the freedom to enjoy your way of doing things isn't it?

Chairman Granville's controlling personality didn't come across quite so much this second time but he's still not coming across as my cup of tea as a companion caravanner.  Too much of a politician on a mission. 

Moderator edit: Personal insults removed from this post.

 

Write your comments here...

I gave up contributing to this forum some time ago and my first post coming back again got 14 likes.

My second post, quoted above, was moderated by removing the final sentence, which I intended to amuse, that's all.  It had no significance for the idea I was trying to get across.  However commenting on a moderating decision is not allowed, so I won't.

I won't be contributing to this forum again for a very long time, for the same reason I left last time, which you can read about here if you wish:

http://www.caravanclub.co.uk/community/discussions/the-social-room/general-chat/Farewell-to-CT/rt/914046/

The BBC programme has made a mockery of the Caravan Club and all of its members. We witness the Chairman of CC ripping the back end off a caravan and acting as though it's an everyday occurence, then in the second episode we see him traveling ' illegally' in the side facing seat, unrestrained in motor home. I do not have any confidence in the CC anymore following the antics of the main man.

T