I joined a few weeks ago but was having trouble viewing the pages due to adverts but that has now been resolved thanks to the admin on this site.
My husband had joined another Eriba forum ( I assume it's the one you have all been talking about) and we have now asked for our registration to be cancelled. We didn't say why but one forum is enough and I didn't like what I was reading about them. There seems to be some paranoia going on so I thought we had better introduce ourselves...

I am Sarah and my husband is Lee. We are just in the process of selling our MH and looking to buy an Eriba for next year and we welcome any advice! We don't want to have to buy a large car to tow and the Eriba seems to fit the bill. We are also hoping it can be stored under our carport and the low height seems like this could work. Lee isn't keen on towing and so I will be hitching the van and towing, hence the name I chose! Lee thinks he will be frowned upon on Sites when we pull up with his wife doing the towing. A motor mover will probably have to wait initially as we want to put all our budget into a van and awning but the Eribas look light enough to be man and wife handled!

Thank you to the member who has messages me a few times....it has been that personal touch which has caused us to return to this forum! I might not be on here too much especially between now and Christmas as my workload gets crazy at this time of year! Any advice on a first Eriba would be most welcome. It only needs to house the two of us and the occasional grandchildren ( who are old enough to sleep in an awning)

Sarah ( and Lee)

Well first of all - to you both; Sarah and Lee. I'm probably not in the best position to offer you advice regarding what model of Eriba to purchase being a relative newcomer to caravanning myself so I'll leave that to others. Further down the page, it might even be in the Gallery section (tab above) there's a link to all the various van layouts so you might want to have a look at this first to narrow the field down a bit. (Edit: found it, here's a direct link g15-POPULAR-ERIBA-TOURING-LAYOUTS.html )As an example, my wife's main requirement was that the van should have fixed beds and not seats that one has to make up daily. Then of course she wanted a loo and like most women the list grew and grew LOL. Anyway, we finally decided upon a Triton 430 which following the first tow went straight into winter storage. . As regards the quote below:

Quote: Hitched wrote in post #1

---

Lee isn't keen on towing and so I will be hitching the van and towing, hence the name I chose! Lee thinks he will be frowned upon on Sites when we pull up with his wife doing the towing.

---

Hello Sarah and Lee
Here's a very warm welcome (as promised)
So glad you you have now introduced yourselves, you really have nothing to fear here.
There is a wealth of very experienced owners here, so ask lots of questions to avoid potential costly mistakes later on.
Thanks for your kind comments about the assistance I've given so far, believe me it's only the tip of the iceberg!

Andy

Hi you two I would wave if I could work out how the attachments'work ,maybe I need a computer forum?

Thanks Eriba Folks for your warm welcome! Lee here....maybe i need a forum to get over my thing about Towing but I do have a very competent wife so I'll leave it to her. I guess I need to listen into the Hitching lesson when we come to buy as it would be fool hardy for only one of us to know how to get hitched so to speak. I am a great believer in both of us knowing how to do everything both at Home and Away....at our age you don't take each other's health for granted!
I leave the Van Finding research to Sarah as she is so much more methodical than me. if it was up to me I would still be researching the motor home we bought 5 years ago!
I look forward to being a part of this friendly forum and it's a relief to know that members have opinions ( and a life!) on matters other than caravans!

Oh and we will work on getting a more apt profile picture ...Pepe le Pew I have been trying to get rid of the little bug off my screen and eventually realised it was your profile pic! I'd like one as annoying as yours....

Sarah and Lee.
We've done the motorhome to Eriba route as well.
In fact we've done it both ways but are finally happily settled in our Eriba Troll.
We seem to have had similar reservations about towing but very quickly got over it and even now after quite a few years I still sometimes get a bit of a shock when I see the van behind me in the rear view mirror!
Tony & Frances

Thank you everyone for your welcome and your comments.
We live in Llandudno but we both work Out of Area so between us we cover most of the NorthWest within a month! We have talked about moving but we love the coast and it's a great place to return to at weekends ( that's when we are at home!) . Anyway there is little point moving 'with work' as it would mean we would be moving every few years!
We are planning a trip to Leisure Sales, Poole in the new year and so we have time beforehand to research as much as we can. We want to be one step ahead of the Sales patter!
Budget wise....we have sold the MH for £44,500 and need a car and an Eriba out of that. Mrs Hitched would like some of the money to go towards something else but I am counting on her falling in love with a shiny new Eriba which gives me permission to fall in love with a shiny new 4x4!

Hi Lee and Sarah
A belated welcome from me.

I hope you mean Automotive Leisure in Poole and not Leisure Sales of Alsager.

Leisure Sales are only 15 minutes from us, but aren't worth travelling that far. They operate from their bungalow home which has been up for sale for a year or more http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-...74&fromMap=true. They have only a couple of vans in stock (if that) and it seems they rely on sourcing from Holland if they get someone who is interested. If my experience is anything to go by they try to sell you a KIP van rather than an Eriba if you visit. My view is that they're not worth bothering with.

Automotive Leisure on the other hand are the real deal and though a goodly distance away are worth the haul. I would say though, try and catch them on a quiet day as Jason and Steve can get stretched pretty thin when they've got half a dozen potential customers mooching about the place.

We also came to Eribas via motorhomes and they certainly help give you back 'freedom' from dragging around in a big bus all the time while you're away.

If you are wanting an Eriba with bathroom then I'd certainly say go for a new one if you can, because the current (from 2013MY) bathroom is by far the best and are what the Tourings should always have had.