campervanliving

Our last T25 before we bought the Bay. Happy campers. Some vehicles make good campers. Some vehicles make bad campers. That’s life. The VW transporter is one of those that has lent itself perfectly to living, eating and sleeping in for many years. Its first three incarnations with the rear engine provided a ready-made sleeping platform and plenty of living space. It was a design that offered campers a huge amount of versatility. You only have to look at the range of conversions – From Westfalia to Devon, Autosleeper and beyond – to see that. The problem with classic VWs – and newer models for that matter – is that they aren’t cheap. So many of us have had to ‘make do’ with other, 'less desirable', vehicles in their quest for campervan nirvana. I’m one of those too. Before I got the red and white T2 I had a series of 3 T25s. Two of them were aircooled and the other was a water cooled petrol model. This was the time when they were deeply unfashionable, came in a range...

It was around this time eleven years ago that my daughter Maggie (that's her at Malham Cove last spring) was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukaemia. It was a frightening time for all of us. She had just had her first birthday when her jaw began to swell and distort, disfiguring her face, exploding the bones in her jaw and sending her teeth in all directions. She cried in pain almost constantly for weeks. It was a while before she was correctly diagnosed and was able to receive treatment and I can remember standing at the kitchen sink, crying myself with the worry of the unknown as I listened to Joanne upstairs trying to comfort her. Without knowing what it was or what it would become, we had no idea what turn our lives would take. Why am I telling you this? Because the rest of the story is all good news, that's why. And the reason it is good news is because of the NHS. This is the NHS that cares for its patients, that pulls out all the stops to save lives, that offers sup...

UPDATED 28/01/16 The internet, or more specifically, social media, is a powerful thing. It can spread jokes, images, movies and empathy and outrage to every corner of the world in seconds. It likes cat pictures and shots of your dinner and film of my dog trying to get comfy. And there is nothing wrong with that. However, I am really curious about the effect that social media can have on the real world. Sometimes I feel that social media is just a way of communicating something, anything, to our fellow humans, whatever it is. There are other times when I feel the swiftly flowing wind of possibility blow through my time line. These are the times when the internet becomes an open door and it feels as if we’re really starting to get somewhere. My twitter postcard comps, for example, are experiments in making things happen – and I am always thrilled to get so many inspired entries turn up on my doormat. And when I see posts on facebook from the WTF [ more here ] about upcomin...

My first solo camping trip was a disaster. And it was all down to terrible preparation. Actually I wasn’t solo. I was with my school friend Oliver Wilson, a funny, ginger haired kid with a round face and a great line in one liners. He made me laugh constantly. We were sixteen, had just finished our ‘O’ levels and wanted an adventure. So we decided to go camping. For both of us it was our first camping trip without our parents and we hoped to spend the week getting into all sorts of trouble and laughing a lot. We did both. However, Oliver told me later, when we had got home and could put a little distance between us and the trip, that when we arrived at the campsite he didn’t feel like laughing very much at all. He had wanted to punch my lights out. The reason? His idea of a perfect campsite was wildly different to mine. I had chosen the location, Thurlestone, in South Devon, because I had been there many times with my parents. I had enjoyed lots of happy summer holiday...

Hell’s Mouth Beach, North Wales, August 1987 There used to be a campsite at the southern end of Hell’s Mouth beach. The location was perfect but the facilities – one stinking, broken loo in a tumbledown shack and a fresh water tap – left a lot to be desired. It was basic and cheap but somehow perfect. On a low cliff overlooking one of the area’s best surf breaks, it provided a base for surfers riding the waves of this famous spot. We’d leave a few quid on the window of the farmhouse as we passed and pitched as we wished. The only problem with the field was that it had no shelter, so when the wind blew you really knew about it. Even in August a fresh south west wind could tear apart our camp and keep us awake with flapping canvas and lashing rain. It must have been howling the night we decided to pitch in the dunes because we left the car on the camp site and trekked some way across the stream. There would be no other reason for leaving the flat clean grass on the camps...