Full time through winter in search of new life

[Barriesimpson]

Ok, fair enough, but she is and they didn’t tell her .....

Probably because she married an Englishman......

 

[Carpmart]

Ooooh, they never told us.....

Just relaying what my party mad German friends have been telling me! As the only native English speaker, with 50 words of German, I could be wrong, but they were, I thought, fairly clear!

 

[Roby2008]

Probably because she married an Englishman......

That's a fair assumption, she was warned , but did it anyway,and of course it is long past the return/warranty period .....

 

[Barriesimpson]

That's a fair assumption, she was warned , but did it anyway,and of course it is long past the return/warranty period .....

And she knows she made the right choice anyway, so no problem. She gets the warning and lets you know, well, hopefully

 

[Just smiffy]

Well done… I think…

I’m sure you’ll get it to how you want it, I’ll fish the lake for you to determine if it’s a viable fishing destination..

And when your ready I’ll paint the skirting boards..

BUT…. It’s not France…

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[Roby2008]

And she knows she made the right choice anyway, so no problem. She gets the warning and lets you know, well, hopefully

the key word is 'hopefully' ....

 

[Onemanandhisdog]

Did someone mention a MHF discount, after all the grief and accusations I'd keep quiet about being a member of MHF or you might find there is a subsidy!
I am however a little disappointed over all the drama around the Ducati to find it's not an SPS !!

 

[Nanniemate]

Well done… I think…

I’m sure you’ll get it to how you want it, I’ll fish the lake for you to determine if it’s a viable fishing destination..

And when your ready I’ll paint the skirting boards..

BUT…. It’s not France…

But they do talk funny up there

 

[Grianan]

We went to Wildrose a couple of times when it was family owned, seems to be part of a bigger group now. Lovely part of the world … wishing you success!

 

[Riverbankannie]

Wishing you both all the best.

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[Debs]

Great to read that you've found somewhere.

Wish you both all the best with your venture & hope that you'll have the time & inclination to post some updates along the way.

 

[DandJ]

That looks a great set up to 'build' what you're after and a great part of world. Distant relatives were from Warcop/Gt Asby (Coincidentally, have just booked a holiday cottage in Soulby for a week in Sept for our annual bike trip with some manx friends...we'll wave as we ride past)

 

[dawsey]

Did someone mention a MHF discount, after all the grief and accusations I'd keep quiet about being a member of MHF or you might find there is a subsidy!
I am however a little disappointed over all the drama around the Ducati to find it's not an SPS !!

Well the thread is ended and yes I will start another on here for you guys - you were always supposed to be our key clientele, perhaps older but still free thinking open minded freedom loving types just like moi. We have seen that a vast majority if not all retain that mindset and will do some sort of new blog about the development.

And yes all MHF members are welcome, when we open (the new gates) next year or before. If it's before there will be very limited services and work to pitch in with though....

Now for that digger...

 

[nicholsong]

dawsey

Congratulations ! The Tilery seems to tick all your boxes. Your tenacity has paif off.

I know the area - my middle name is Brough, from strong family connections with the North-East (Sunderland, Hexham, Boldon) I spent some time there because when I was at Durham University my Aunt and Uncle had a cottage in Whorlton just E. of Barney, so I visited often.

Do you know the area, or even come from there?

You have two near neighbours from MHFun - barryd in Hutton Magna just across the Tees from Whorlton and CazPaul on the N. side of Teesdale, just E. of Barney, I think.

I also know the Otterburn ranges from my TA days in the HAC. I was RSM's driver and had to drive him to Hexham for a 'haircut' - what else he did was his own business.

I wish you all the luck with getting the place fixed up, firstly the house for habitation and then the grounds for your project.

We are a long way from UK, in Poland, but when we tour UK we are certain to include the North-East because we both love it.

Best Wishes, Geoff

[EDIT: We are also moving house this month, similar-size house but not as many out-buildings, nor the views. although it includes a 12m garage for the MH]

 

[dawsey]

dawsey

Congratulations ! The Tilery seems to tick all your boxes. Your tenacity has paif off.

I know the area - my middle name is Brough, from strong family connections with the North-East (Sunderland, Hexham, Boldon) I spent some time there because when I was at Durham University my Aunt and Uncle had a cottage in Whorlton just E. of Barney, so I visited often.

Do you know the area, or even come from there?

You have two near neighbours from MHFun - barryd in Hutton Magna just across the Tees from Whorlton and CazPaul on the N. side of Teesdale, just E. of Barney, I think.

I also know the Otterburn ranges from my TA days in the HAC. I was RSM's driver and had to drive him to Hexham for a 'haircut' - what else he did was his own business.

I wish you all the luck with getting the place fixed up, firstly the house for habitation and then the grounds for your project.

We are a long way from UK, in Poland, but when we tour UK we are certain to include the North-East because we both love it.

Best Wishes, Geoff

[EDIT: We are also moving house this month, similar-size house but not as many out-buildings, nor the views. although it includes a 12m garage for the MH]

Thanks Geoff - I know the lakes and dales very well. I come from the lakes. It's what allowed me to be confident to bid. The original asking price on that place was £1.25m

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[Chuns]

Aye, the very definition of a backhanded compliment. But Jim has been doing it for years and has seen all sorts. Plus he has had to switch my thread on and off at my request when eagle eyed members ID'd stuff I was still negotiating on by using online tools to find the location from a photo and then posted the location online. Then there was there earlier time when I had to switch off the thread when a negotiation was affected by someone IDing another undisclosed site and informing the UK C&MC who subsequently contacted the owner. In the end that meant nothing to the collapse of the deal but I was certainly a bit slow to learn not to share too much when it happened again. What a thicko I am.

There's the answer to all those noisily complaining that I am slow to share the location or post photos..

Yes, and the creation of an expectation. Just because you publish some words it would seem that some people, on reading them, take some kind of ownership, and then create an expectation of how you should act to satisfy that expectation.

 

[corconx]

Thanks Geoff - I know the lakes and dales very well. I come from the lakes. It's what allowed me to be confident to bid. The original asking price on that place was £1.25m

How long ago was that valuation? Before it was run down. But you have done well and I’m sure many MHF vans will visit over the period

 

[Carpmart]

Looks great Dawsey.. also looks like the kind of property one can grow into…

Love the duke… bet you knew that was on the back…

Shame you couldn’t make the French dream work!

 

[paddymcc]

Looks great Dawsey, lovely part of the world. Will you need to use your pump system to get water from the lake,

 

[Captain Yoghurtpot]

Congratulations Mr Dawsey on finally finding something that meets all your requirements and did not have a complicated and protracted legal and tax situation, or awkward vendors or neighbours.
The place looks fantastic and ripe for your development plans, plus you seem to have finally got a lot of 'Bang for your Buck'.
The grasslands look ideal for some grazing sheep or Deer or Alpaccas mingling with the glamping area, and I can see that spa and pool being a very welcome attraction, as will the lake for fishing.
Looking forward to reading how you are getting on, that is IF you have any idle few minutes to post.
But I think you are going to be busy, and loving every minute of it!
Well done to both of you. ️

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[Minxy]

I was right ... UK it is!

 

[Freo]

All the very best to you both for the future dawsey … and thanks for the great thread. Thoroughly enjoyed it.

 

[Gingernuts]

I would get secure gates on first!
To stop overeager or premature mhf members “visiting” and the Appleby fair go-ers setting up without permission

 

[Jimbohorlicks]

Best of luck on your new venture.
If you organise a meet on your land for funsters they will always muck in and help clear up under your direction.
Lots of us are self contained and just need somewhere for rubbish and elsan.

 

[L' Hobo]

I would get secure gates on first!
To stop overeager or premature mhf members “visiting” and the Appleby fair go-ers setting up without permission

The Appleby Fair would be one of my main worries.
I think dawsey should start an annual MHF Rally that begins the week before at a price that will encourage enough vehicles so there is no space left for other visitors!

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[CazPaul]

We are relocating to France, we will be buying land, setting up a business. Better I have residence, pay taxes, build pension etc.

Thanks for the positive comments guys.

I got the 1yr visa yesterday. It starts from yesterday (15th) so we will be heading back to France on Wednesday to continue the search. While staying with friends for the last few days (a bed that doesn’t move, luxury!) we’ve serviced our old bus, completed the latest list of little maintenance jobs, cleaned her up and will do a fresh MOT tomorrow as that otherwise runs out within a couple of months. I always SORN if out of UK, but it crosses the line to be flitting round the continent with expired MOT.

After an initial 2 months in France and then 3 weeks wilding in England taking an arc from Kent south of London to Swindon, up through Herefordshire & Shropshire, then Cheshire and Lancashire we’ve noted some real differences in the state of the two countries and how different it is to wild camp.

Dear old blighty seems to be falling off a cliff. Roads are so potholed in places they are borderline dangerous, and the place is disgusting with litter lining the side of practically every road from country lanes to motorways. It now seems the done thing for people to just throw their litter out of their car. In comparison to France, indeed to practically anywhere in western Europe, England looks like one big rubbish dump. Visiting the island from the EU puts one in mind of travelling to some Indian or African slum. I don’t know why, I’d guess a mixture of culture ( too many just don’t care), too light fines and local authorities stopping roadside litter picking maybe? Whatever it is, it is getting worse.

Apologies to my Brexiteer friend who will no doubt be spitting out his Horlicks while spluttering about how we won the war - but from that perspective at the very least, the UK has entered a period of regression. Don’t shoot the messenger, facts are facts.


In my last post I said I’d contrast the full time motorhoming experience between France and UK (well, England), so here goes:

Out of season overnighting (on site/chargeable aire):

France - We didn’t stay on a proper site as most are closed. Chargeable aires, usually found in larger towns and city conurbations are about €8-14 inc free water and service with plastic membership card.

UK - The choice is between things like pub car parks, a handful of specialist overnight car parks or truck stops. Charges vary widely, but are very rarely less than £20 for a camper, with £25 seeming to be the most quoted number. Some pubs might let you stay for free, but you’d have to eat there.

Overnighting (off site):

France - Very easy. Almost all communes have an ‘aire’ designed and built specifically for motorhomes. Failing that, maries, sports stadiums and almost any car park inc supermarkets are fine to overnight in. Nobody moves you on, nobody bothers you. Out in the sticks, we’ve parked overnight on field access tracks dozens of times. As long as you don’t prevent the farmer from getting past in his tractor, and don’t leave any rubbish, all you ever get is a cheery wave.

UK - In general, it is difficult to find somewhere quiet and safe. Most car parks have height restrictions, almost all public spaces have height restrictions and very clear and aggressive ‘no overnight’ signs. Park in the ‘wrong’ place and you can expect a knock on the door.

Finding fresh water:

France - super easy. All aires have an often free tap. If there’s a charge to use, it’s usually €2. In 2 months we never needed to use our own onboard systems to produce water.

UK - The only real option is to find an independent garage and ask if you can use their tap/hose in return for buying some fuel. As these types of operations decline ever further, it just gets harder. In desperation, in the last few days I asked some Albanians if I could use their hose in one of the hand car washes - I could see this wasn’t the first time they’d been asked, the jokers demanded £15 for 100ltr I of course politely told them to go poke it and finally found a kind old gent in a garden centre who was willing to let us use his tap. It’s hassle though, and just gets harder. Within 1 week we are finding that it will likely be easier to use our own water-making systems that bother trying to find a tap.

Waste water:

France - Super easy, water service points are literally everywhere, all well signposted. Tap always also available unless it’s frozen or been switched off to prevent frost damage. Then you use the public toilet, all of which still have… a tap.

UK - Grey waste has to be be road side near a road drain or to a verge, as there is just nowhere to properly get rid of it. Thankfully it doesn’t do harm to the environment. For black waste, you have to find a (open, if you can) public toilet. Many public loos appear to have been converted to those auto water dispenser systems, so a water refill isn’t possible. It seems to us that most don’t bother with this hassle, making the few places where you can wild camp in some sort of peace look and smell like refugee camps.

Laundry
France - Again, super easy. Every supermarket has large and small commercial machines and a commercial dryer. Always available, Park next to it, load, have a coffee, done.

UK - You have to first find the nearest council estate, drive to the centre and locate the small parade of shops where the laundrette will be. Then queue, or pay for a ‘service wash’. Always keeping one eye on the van as the natives regard the great alien beast and it’s contents with great interest…

Attitude

France - You are welcome pretty much everywhere, being seen as potentially speeding money and contributing to the local economy, even just by buying a baguette from the boulanger.

UK - You are generally treated like any other ‘traveller’ - and sadly, due to the near-complete absence of facilities, many wild camping in UK behave as such. The rubbish and filth that accumulates anywhere people wildcamp in UK isn’t pretty.
Taking a fresh look at the UK from the perspective of living full time in a camper, the UK does now come across as being a bit intolerant and unwelcoming and generally has minimal consideration for travelling motorhomers beyond the network of private CC club sites.

I never used to get such a depressing feeling when coming back to UK from the continent in a camper, or when wilding here

Will update for those interested when we’ve made some progress with the search.

I bet you wish you’d never done this post now

 

[PNAJones]

Hello all, this continues my earlier thread started some months ago which got deleted by mods due to me mentioning the B word…

In October we (myself and my French wife Beatrice) completed the sale of our UK property and set out in our 20yr old B544 to find a project in France. Having been into campers since my early 20s (some near 30 years ago) I/we want to buy a campsite to develop.

In earlier threads I mentioned how I spent a couple of months prepping the old bus to be completely self sufficient - it had to get through a continental winter with us full timing. We’d be in France, so overnighting would be super easy in their system of aires-de-camping car, however, often there’d be no hook up options and water points would be off to protect from frost damage. To preserve funds, campsites would be avoided.

Hence the two 18kg Gaslow LPG tanks, 200Ah of lithium and 600W solar (covering pretty much every spare square foot of the roof) and 25/50A B2B to keep the batteries nicely charged. Systems to collect rainwater and even purify river water were all plumbed in. Adamant that she needed a full oven and microwave (installing a microwave in there is an excellent way to repurpose the big old CRT TV cabinet ), and to be able to run hairdryer and hair straighteners, a high end 2kW inverter was also integrated into all the existing electrics, with me in the process discovering that there is definitely such things as ‘low end’ invertors. When the 1st so-called 2kw rated inverter (ebay, c£120) failed under just 1300W of microwave load. I took it apart to find it had an internal, hard soldered, 80A fuse. Here was something advertised as a 2kW (4KW peak!), that was guaranteed to fail if run with more than a 1kW load. I then spent twice a much on something of the same nominal capacity but somehow twice the size.

Already running out of load capacity with safari tent, roof AC (for summer) and sat dish, when I decided I needed an on board alternative mode of transport other than the Mrs’s old push bike (a 110kg 250cc motorbike, itself necessitating a 25kg chassis carrier for my elderly non-garage equipped camper ) - I had to uprate. Going to the max 3700kg kept us (just about) the right side of UK law. Some Dunlop air assistance on the Alko torsion bar took care of the ‘soggy bottom’, and uprated springs and new dampers at the front took care of the ‘soggy front’ (?)

Loads of stuff goes wrong with old campers - since prepping it and doing a trial run in summer, in addition to routine servicing, I have sorted all manner of stuff

• fridge sparking constantly (serviced, burner cleaned, water ingress (from hob drain) issue resolved
• drop down bed gas struts failed (replaced easily and cheaply enough with pattern 1.7kN units).
• water pump failed (again replaced easy enough. I now carry a spare pump as it is really inconvenient to have no water at all)
• water pump non return valve then failed (fixed with a second in line non return valve)
• boiler purge valve failed (again easy enough replacement)

with all these watery things fixed, for the first time I had pressure remaining in all taps at any time (instead of gurgles and spluttering when opening if left for more than 10min..). This then caused the shower tap to fail internally (drip drip heard in the cubicle at night) so I replaced that after 3 attempts to fix it.

Finally, some element of the various failed valves must have made its way into a pipe as all cold water pressure was lost and cold tap (kitchen) output reduced to a trickle. Fixed by disconnecting all cold pipes from boiler, routing the pipes temporarily outside and connecting mains pressure water direct to the kitchen tap to back flush. It worked, though I never found the offending component.

• bathroom roof vent failed. Just age and fatigue. replaced with something from ebay which required me to spend a day chopping it to pieces to make it fit…
• kitchen turbo vent failed - in addition to the usual banging when retracting, bearings then went on motor producing terrible noises. After some oiling I gave up and bought something cheap on ebay (I by now should have known better). what garbage, a remote control thing which lasted a month before failing.
• roof AC failed on the summer - just age, it was same age as the camper. A Telair Silent whose manufacturer was obviously having a joke with the name..Replaced with a Truma Aventa compact (so I could run it off the solar panels, at least in theory ) - this then failed within a month but Truma sent a new sensor under warranty which I fitted myself, after pretending to be a service agent to get them to send it in the first place…..

• light bar electrics all failed when someone in UK bashed into it (and helpfully drove off) - I just made up a new bar
• ‘mood lighting’ as demanded by the mrs if she were to spend loads of time in there. I experimented with all sorts of lights - fitting and then removing all sorts of LED as the light colour was just nasty. I eventually just fitted halogens back in the light units, and recessed LED strip lights in various places for a subtle lighting option, one of which is on the front of the drop down bed, making it look from the front like one of those crazy over illuminated trucks when on!

Guess what we found to be the best lighting solution? - A normal 240V bedside table lamp with an LED bulb. Just runs off the invertor and produces nice lighting.

- then the worst job of all, noticing sometimes awful smells when driving if ‘someone’ had used the loo and it hadnt been emptied, and noticing effluent collecting in the cassette recess, I diagnosed (eventually ) a leaky cassette seal. It was limescale, same thing as knackers kettles and shower heads, causing it to fail to fully seal when closed, then driving would allow splashes to make it outside the tank and into the van - an unpleasant job, but very simply fixed by removing the silicone seal in the tank and thoroughly cleaning it with a vinegar solution.

In the next post I will outline how the first 2 months went for us mooching around darkest France, not a single night on site or on hook up, if anyone interested

Happy new year - Graham and Beatrice

Nice post, we are 6 months into our first MH ownership, the van is 16 years old and have already done some remedial stuff, nothing too serious, maybe you should do a video blog for the stuff you have done?

 

[Figaro]

Nice post, we are 6 months into our first MH ownership, the van is 16 years old and have already done some remedial stuff, nothing too serious, maybe you should do a video blog for the stuff you have done?

I think he's probably a bit pre-occupied with his new project for now ?