Abandoned, upheaval ahead!

I was just getting ready to blog again and catch up with the weeks events when my mam phoned to drop a bombshell. She and my dad have decided to relocate back oooppp north. Gulp .. i've been abandoned. It is all happening in the next 2 months too. Eeekkk, even gulpier! The good news is that the new house is on the sea front, the bad news is that it is a couple of hundred miles away.

It is a strange feeling knowing that mam and dad won't be just around the corner anymore. Even when we leave town for extended periods in the motorhome, their house is still home. Now it won't be ... sob!

Logistically it is now going to be a busy 2 months for us. A lot of our belongings are stored in mam & dad's loft and shed, our vehicles are registered to their address, our washing is done in their laundry room ... wow, it is going to be like moving home ourselves all over again, a huge task ahead. I don't want to think about it tonight, I don't think i'll sleep!

What else do I have to report?

Well, shower's not fixed. We set aside sunday to do it and it hammered it down with rain on a regular basis. Not conducive to having a body half in and half out of the thetford opening trying to dismantle drain hoses. This is now on the urgent list ... our interim shower is also moving north. :(

I know I said it would be fixed at the weekend come rain or shine - well I lied!

We ran out of gas a few days ago, just after the MOT on the motorhome ran out. As we have Gaslow refillable cylinders we have to drive to a pump to refill which is really handy if you are on the road, not so if you van hasn't left the same property in a while and the MOT has expired. It is now booked in for MOT on friday with the gas refill to occur immediately afterwards.

So far we have managed with an electric oven, camping gas burner, deep fat fryer, toaster, electric steamer and disposable bbq's so believe me we haven't starved. It is a good job the shower is not working, no hot water needed there then! We have been boiling the electric kettle to wash up - but we also have a gas one too to use on the camping stove in case of power cuts! Do we sound prepared? ha ha.

Our portable satellite also stopped working at some point about 3 weeks ago. We also have an indoor digital TV ariel so it there was no urgency to get it fixed. (- are you seeing a pattern here?) But with the TV ariel you have to move it around for different channels which really became boring especially if one of the dogs knocked it when you were watching TV. Luckily my brother is an ex satellite engineer and came round to take a look. Turns out the LNB had slipped and was upside down - don't know how that happened. All works now and it was repaired for free too! :)

My London exploring is going well. Last week I walked from Kings Cross to a meeting at Pall Mall and only had 1blister. When will I learn not to wear heels for hiking? I saw lots of places that I had heard of but never seen and am beginning to get a better idea of how London is laid out. I only made one wrong turn on the whole walk and that I only went a couple of minutes past my turning. Christopher Columbus eat your heart out :)

One of the unusual (to me anyway) things I saw was a scientology centre - I didn't know they actually existed. I just thought they were a fad for the rich and famous!

We have spent some more time photographing all our bits and pieces that we have for sale. The motorbike is in one magazine and will be in another this week, the surfboard and psp will hit ebay this week. I suppose there will be lots more on soon when we get in the loft to empty it out. Watch this space.

Finally, we have been spending a bit of time on the computer lately what with looking for a new car and selling what we have. I think Reef got a bit bored!

Birthday boy number 2 and a lazy few days

The end of last week and the beginning of this week were beautiful. Sunny, relaxed and work free for me. Bonus points on every front!

I took part of the week off as my sister in law (who doubles up as our dog sitter as we will not leave the dogs in the van in hot weather) was having work done on her house and didn't fancy the dogs sitting and eyeballing the workmen - as if! As it was so hot Bodie and Reef just didn't want to move anywhere during the day.

Even getting up to drink was an effort. This was good for me, I got to lay in the recliner with my feet up and catch up on some reading ... bliss!

Really I should have been looking at fixing the blooming shower again but the spanish just kept on flooding back as it does quite regularly on hot days ... manana, manana I thought ... as I slathered on more sun cream.

I seem to remember there was one wet day which was just after the grass was cut - happens every single time without fail. Grass gets cut, it rains, grass ends up all over the van. Does anyone else suffer with this or are we just victims? The flippin stuff gets everywhere and the whole episode lasts for a least 2 weeks - by which time the grass needs cutting again. Bummer.

Last sunday, it was Reef's birthday, he was 2. He had an excellent day, walked lots, ate lots (mainly chicken) and took quite a liking to the birthday glasses in which he went exploring. He actually found a cat laying in the long grass and didn't know what to do, i'm not sure who was more shocked, him or the cat. He reverted to type after the cat had moved though and pursued it like a professional. He only wanted to play, not sure the cat saw it like that though. it was probably wondering what the hell type of dog wore glasses.

Just in case you think we routinely humiliate our animals by dressing them up, I would like to assure you we don't, they just wouldn't stand for it and they have a full range of expressions to communicate this - ha ha.

On wednesday it was back to work for me and the start of Mr P's day's off. I had to go to London for a meeting again so I have now decided to treat each trip as a chance to explore - rather than a chore - to see if this affects my willingness to go there. Usually I hit London, jump on the tube and get to the venue as quickly as possible so I never see anything.

This time I decided to walk the length of Oxford Street to see why everyone raves about the shopping there, followed by a walk to the meeting venue. Note to self: don't ever do this in heels again. I was ok, much better than the tube and I did see some great buildings but I didn't want to get the camera out and look like a tourist! ha ha. I did manage one picture of the Mall, that is Buckingham Palace in the distance. It is taken from just behind the meeting venue so I could run and hide afterwards. :)

I'm off to Cambridge tomorrow for a hen do. Treasure hunt, punting, picnic and vodka bar ... sounds like a plan!

Sad today.

That is it, they have gone.

Went to say good bye this morning before work and just wept for the following hour. I am not entirely sure why, I mean, they are happy, healthy, heading for a new life so I should be wishing them well (and I did). I just cannot help being sad though. I will miss them dreadfully. Does this make me selfish?

On another note. Managed to flood the van yesterday. Shower drain failed. First the shower would not empty then I noticed a trail of water heading for the front footwell - about 6 feet from the bathroom. This meant travelling under the bathroom, under the battery charger, under the fresh water tank, under the fuse box, under the drivers seat and engine battery before finally arriving at its destination.

I bailed the shower out with an espresso cup (only thing small enough to fit into the grooves at the edge of the shower tray - took ages) and then stuck towels down and went to work. Sod it, decided it would wait till the weekend, I have had enough this week ... I feel a wee bit down. :(

The bathroom is back :)

Result .... the shower is back where it should be. :)

Last friday Mr P came home grinning from ear to ear with the shower tray wedged in the back of the car. If you have ever been without a bathroom for over a month you will understand the excitement of that moment.

Shower tray mark II is truly an object of beauty ... no holes (except the plugholes) no cracks, no scale, no yellowing and it is so smooth. A lot tougher than the old one too. This is made of fibreglass whereas the old one was like a thick plastic type material. Ok, i'll stop now, I am well aware how odd this may sound to those not shower deprived!

On saturday, the excitement was no less but the enthusiasm for installing it waned a little as the thermometer in the van crept up to 28 degrees. It was not a job to be tackled on a rare day of british sunshine. So we chilled and lapped up the rays ... mañana, mañana being the general consensus.

Unfortunately this cunning plan was ruined when sunday dawned hot and sunny too - damn and blast! There was nothing else for it but to knuckle down and get on with the installation.

First we set about emptying the bathroom. We had to take one of the fuses out to remove power to the thetford and turn off the water so we could remove the sink. The sink was originally duck taped to the window sill but it fell down so many times in the middle of the night that in the end we just stuck it upright in the middle of the floor and danced around it when we needed a wee!

It took quite a while to get the shower tray in place as we don't think it was designed to be removed once in situ. The reach on the waste pipes was so short that the tray had to be virtually in place to get the jubilee clips onto the waste hoses and plug holes.

Luckily Mr P managed to reach in through the thetford door to connect one of the plugs or we would have been really schtuck!

It was just after this point that things started going a little wrong.

As we lowered the shower tray into position, there was a loud crack as the shower plug snapped underneath - 4 years of continuous use had made it brittle.

A swift dash to the local caravan shop ensued and the last 2 remaining plugs they had in stock were purchased. The floor was raised again, new plugs inserted, sink plumbed in, thetford installed and rewired then we realised that the shower drain pipe and the sink drain pipe were the wrong way round and the pipe would not reach the underside of the sink - arrrrgghhhh!

The last hours work was undone again, pipes were swapped and it was all put back together again. This time all was good!

The shower walls were installed, all screwed back into place then that was it for the night. We had started early afternoon and it was now about 8pm ... and felt like midnight.

Monday evening saw the beginning of the sealing, tuesday evening saw more sealing, wednesday evening would have been first shower but the stench of the sealant and tiredness proved too much and it was delayed till thursday morning.

The verdict .. bliss .... absolute bliss .... :)

Showerless :(

Our motorhome bathroom is currently in disarray. There are no shower walls, no floor, the sink (which is suspended by masking tape) has no drainage, no running water and the toilet is balanced on polystyrene and plywood. Humph!

The cause? A cracked shower tray. Welcome to the joys of home repairs whilst full timing.

We carried out a few temporary repairs to it over the last year when the crack appeared and kept reappearing but finally enough was enough. One morning the crack became a gaping chasm and no amount of sealant was going to fix it.

We spent a fun sunday dismantling the entire bathroom. To take out the shower tray we had to remove everything above it, except for the light, which was the only thing that did not get in the way! Even with an empty room, the shower tray was still a sod to remove as electrics and pipes actually passed through it.

The tray is now off being used as a mould for a new one, we had the option of repair but as the van will be sold later this year, we didn't want anyone else having to go through this again.

It has been 3 and a half weeks since our shower tray left home - I miss it.