Your first caravan/motorhome trip: Lessons learned

More than 25 years but not sure how many, we bought our first caravan from Dyce caravans aberdeen, Elddis, no idea what model, as part of deal we were given 1 hrs familiarization course, only in the yard no towing practise, and told that if we had any problems when using give them a call and they would help out.

Getting back to our bungalow was a little bit nerve racking, we lived in an area North of Aberdeen, Greeness, and to get to our place we had to navigate lots of very narrow country lanes and we lived off road nearly 1/2 mile up a very narrow farm track with a 6ft drop into the stream on one side, fortunately we had a Discovery so this was not too bad and we achieved this without too much drama.

Our first outing was to the isle of Skye, we camped in a field Electricity was provided by a cable stretching from the barn , guy that owned the site gave us some valuable tips as to how to set the van up etc, however, he did not have much knowledge re putting up an awning and ours was proving to be very difficult, I know phone Dyce caravans on our mobile, not a chance no signal, eventually after what seemed an age, we worked out that we were trying to thread it thru inside out.

Great, awning up nicely settled in, knock on door, owner, gales tomorrow best take your awning down, down came the awning, much easier than putting it up, never-the-less we had an enjoyable stay in a field gale force 8 on the Isle of Skye in October and no other campers to be found.

My first embarrassing moment was refuelling at a Carrefour in the Dordogne in September 2021. We were newbie caravaners having purchased our caravan a couple of months before (Coachman Laser 575 Excel). I could see a large Carrefour filling station beyond the supermarket and followed what I thought was the perimeter access road to the pumps running parallel to the car park. This turned out to be the access for the Carrefour delivery vans and a dead end at a loading bay.  Fortunately I was able to reverse up 50m and turn into the car park. Quite pleased with my skills at manoeuvring a 12.5m x 2.5m outfit round the busy car park and back onto the access road to the pumps. No issues from the locals just a few Gallic shrugs! 

Learn to read OS maps. They give you most if not all of the information you will need to  get safely and incident free from A to B. Even if towing. Google Earth will show you lots of extras nowadays as well, 

We learned that even with one like this - no electric light, no fridge, no toilet, no water pump, no battery, no stabiliser, no heating -  and despite the wild extravagance of spending three months wages to buy it new -that it was better than the ex army tent we had before. And even with a 12 month old baby it seemed dead easy. No club membership, no towing lessons, no insurance - we simply towed 200 miles home from the dealer without any problem at all.  Somewhere along the line caravanning has become very complicated since then - and very expensive.

A fun post for a Saturday night.

Our first caravan trip was in 2013, a close to home shakedown trip long weekend at Stamford in our new swift Elegance.

On the way the external locker door under the fixed bed, despite being locked, fell open, luckily nothing lost!. I learned to give up being careful and slam the doors shut.

Same trip as above discovered that the Dorema awning came as a bag(s) of bits, I naively thought it would be more ready to use. I soon understood the term divorce in a bag and learned to check new awnings before leaving home. That was very nearly our first and last ever caravan trip!!

Same trip could not get power on the hook up cable, I had used hundreds of 240 (blue) sockets in my career and had never come across one that needed rotating to connect the power. Learned to be annoyed at Caravan club power connectors.

Same trip, discovered that awnings never fit back into the bag they are supplied in. I learned to get my own awning bag(s).

I learned that the Friday night visiting fish & chip van did quite passable and very welcome fishy grub. 

I learned that motor movers are wonderful things.

Despite all the above we have had some lovely holidays in our caravans and don't intend giving up just yet.

Caravan : left the jockey wheel down and destroyed it.

MH: left the electric step out and destroyed it on a stone gate post, and also fridge not fully shut , contents spread round the van on a sharp corner.

Late in the 1970s, an early trip saw us in Cornwall driving up a very narrow lane having taken a wrong turning. We stopped the car, unhitched and manhandled the van into a field entrance with just enough space in front of a five bar gate. Then drove on followed by a multi point turn in the next field entrance. Back down the road followed by further manhandling to turn the caravan and re hitch. We couldn’t have done the same with today’s longer, heavier caravan.

Decades on, with a road closure in Bergerac preventing pursuit of signs to the municipale campsite, we switched to SatNav directions which led us to the locked site exit. A sharp right turn followed by a blind guess to turn right again found us in a narrow street faced with a T junction with another narrow road and parked cars opposite. Escape was blocked by a van which followed us. Once again, we unhitched, then managed a turn with the essential help of our motor over. The manoeuvre was achieved with about 2” (5cm as this was France) clearance in front of bemused onlookers.

I’m getting a bit too old for such stress these days, but accumulated experience helps.