The Caravan (Our new home while we are building)  -  September 2008

Whilst on our first visit to France our friends Gill & Mark kindly let us stay in their barn, but we were going to need something a bit more long term, I have no doubt that we could have stayed in the barn for longer, but it was sensible to have our own space as this was going to take some time I think.

​

We decided that the best course of action was to purchase a caravan. Now as luck would have it, a few day's previously we had been introduced to one of Gill & Marks neighbours called "Russell and his wife Gail", Russell was a builder and he had a partner called "Steve", and it turned out Steve was selling a 6 berth twin wheeled caravan, we promptly made arrangements to go and view it the next day. 

We viewed the caravan the next day, and although there were a few bits that needed to be fixed, it would suit our needs, so we bought it, we did have a slight problem, our car didn't have a tow bar so Steve agreed to deliver it to Gill & Marks barn, where it would stay until we had found a suitable piece of land to put it on.

​

Having got the caravan back to the barn we started to clean it inside and out, which is when we found out that that the water didn't work, some of the electrics didn't work, and there were signs of mice. Well the electrics were no problem, just down to the odd bad connection and a fuse or two. We also realised that there was no water container/reservoir, and we needed a gas bottle, so off we went to the shops, in to St Junien and back to Carrefour who just happen to have a deal on Gas bottles €5 deposit, and the best priced gas at the time, we also managed to pick up a large plastic water container (think it was about 25 litres. We also picked up some mouse poison and a gas regulator.

​

By the end of the day we had nearly fully functioning caravan, I was surprised at just how big the bed was once we'd set it up, plus the extra berths a the other end of the caravan served us as an office area. This was going to be our new home for the next couple of years.

​

Now it's time to go and find a plot of land to build on :-)