Having become a bit blase about our motorhome travels we've not produced a Blog over the last couple of years. However we've had several requests so, being in the planning mode for our next winter break, we're setting up a new Blog for your edification.
Much has happened over the last year with Bertie, last winter seeing a series of mechanical breakdowns. During our travels south in January we had a failing clutch which, by the time we reached Valencia in Spain, had just about given up the ghost. The breakdown service were, frankly, pathetic so, leaving our friends Colin and Tina to continue with their holiday, we decided to return home which we achieved after a nerve-wracking struggle. Our garage tried but failed to correct the problem so we found an extremely helpful commercial workshop who got it quickly sorted.
Not to be thwarted we parted with yet more Tesco vouchers for a second attempt - and on crossing from France into Spain the fridge failed! Rather than attempt to get it repaired locally we chose to buy a portable chest freezer which operated off the van electrics. Althogh somewhat inconvenient it was a success so we continued and rejoined our travelling companions at Algeciras, only to find we had no front brakes! Fortunately there is a NorAuto, the Spanish equivalent of Halfords, on the retail park we always use and they spent a very wet afternoon getting it fixed for us, albeit with difficulty as their supplier kept sending the wrong parts! Eventually their workshop manager cannabilised another vehicle to get us going although warning us we should have it properly overhauled when we returned home - which of course we did, more expense! This really didn't help our confidence and we reluctantly decided not to travel to Morocco (there were other considerations) but to remain in mainland Europe.Thankfully there were no more problems and we continued on our own although our confidence in Bertie was not high and we eventually cut the trip short when we started having problems finding suitable stayovers - Spain was absolutely chock full of motorhomes of all nations.
Unfortunately this was not the end of our woes. Although it was still working there were strange noises coming out of the heating boiler so we arranged a visit to our local maintenance guys for their help. Obviously we needed attention to the fridge but due to its age, spares were no longer forthcoming and our only solution was a completely new fridge - at £1800! On top of that investigations into the boiler saw an imminent failure in the control and motor systems and, yes, spares were no longer available. £1200! To be fair the guys did have a good hunt around and managed to save us a few hundred pounds but it took them ages, mainly because it was high season and they were extremely busy.
So with our confidence in Bertie seriously questioned we hesitantly booked another trip, this time to Normandy in September. Happily all went well although we did again cut it short due to prolonged poor weather.
And so getting towards the end of the year we arranged with our commercial workshop friends to see to the annual service and MoT after the habitation check was done - nothing serious reported, just a poor connection on a bathroom light and a little bit of damp around an old repair which we did ourselves. But then a phone call, which we thought was for us to collect the van but no, "you've got a few problems". New rear road springs, new radiator, repairs to the exhaust and several smaller jobs later they eventually found somewhere that could give us a new MoT. As I write we haven't yet got the bill but we're now resigned to one last episode in a very expensive year! To be fair Bertie is 19 years old with over 150,000 miles and has been well used, but we won't be replacing him as he still has everything we need and now hopefully all the problems have been fixed.
As a final piece of icing on the cake, Terrys car was diagnosed with a terminal problem!
After all this you can understand our depression and reluctance to make any more commitments but in the end "to hell with it" and we scraped together the last of our Tesco vouchers and booked Le Shuttle.
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