Our new home :-)

Our new home is here... safe and sound. We picked the caravan up on Tuesday morning - its taken me two days to calm down LOL.

Barrons of Darlington were superb and we now have an amazing Bailey Ranger 460/4 touring caravan. It is so well fitted out and was well worth the money.

The first drive was rather stressful but managed it all the same so will just take time and patience to get there.... no dents yet so remember these pics before it does ;-)

Its still on Marts sisters drive for the next week or so until we decide which site we are going to start on. We packed it up yesterday (fitting a 2 bedroom house into a 4 berth caravan was quite tricky... getting the 32" widescreen TV would have been good fun) so its now ready for the open road and doing 20MPH on EVERY road for the first six months...

More pics of the van here....
http://www.flickr.com/photos/garyshield

I've also had my acceptance from the Open Uni to start a degree in October so things are on the up after a really naff year. :-) More soon.

One week to go....

with just one week to go until we take delivery of our very first touring caravan we are both really excited about the prospect of a year away from the stresses and strains of house ownership and the joyful delight of the 9 - 5.

Our first stop may well be very close by and I mean VERY close by.... until we gain confidence in driving with the van attached. Then the country is our oyster.

The Bailey caravan we are getting has only just been issued, so we have been really lucky to be able to find a fixed bed van which our car can pull... it all comes down to these ratios of weight, noseweight and pulling power... who thought buying a caravan could be so exhausting!

Photos will appear next week but until then we have a trip down Sarf for Marts birthday and hopefully a visit to Frogmore house near Windsor Castle. Today we managed a quick visit to the Darlington Railway Museum. Fascinating place and well worth a fiver entry for 2 adults.... who are the adults?!?!? Nice to see the worlds first steam powered railway and Stephenson's No 1 Locomotion. What a piece of history... also nice to see the 'Blue Peter' as well.

A New Start :-)

11th August 2006 - a real red letter day in the last year.

We completed the sale of our house in Kendal on the 11th and have now moved in with family until we get the caravan sorted. WATCH OUT around the 29th August - Pick up day!!! Then we will be off around the UK for a tour to find our next home. In 1997 I bought a house because of work, this time it will be the other way round. We will find where we want to live and work from that point.

Until then we intend to spend some time for ourselves wandering round the UK. One friend just mentioned do we have a name for the caravan.... not yet Sandra, but if anyone has any good ideas what two homeless hobos should call there caravan please let me know @
gary.shield@hotmail.co.uk

It's great having a fresh start - just got the house sale money today so its a definite move ahead. First stop? hmmm, jury out on that one.