Hi Randa,

well, we bought the van new June 2010 and had it converted quick enough to do a month in it that September - France, Switzerland & Italy. We had a sabbatical from work in 2011 and spent 4 months of the summer in S Europe in it, across the Alps/Dolomites mainly, as far east as Slovenia but went down as far as mid Italy and did quite a bit of France. We had the Fiamma wind out awning blown off during a storm on Lake Bled at 2am, wrecking it and damaging the van (£1000 to replace it and repair the van when we go home :( ). We also later had to make a sudden dash home due to a family bereavement, whereas we planned to be away 6 months, so we missed our leg down to Croatia and across on the ferry to Italy :(. Despite this, we had a blast, but it is these long trips where you get 'van fever' and thoughts of a caravan begin to surface!! We managed a month in 2012 and a month this year and of course do long weekends here in the UK. We also take the van out when walking or cycling anywhere, even just for the day, as we keep all our walking gear in it and its ready packed with changes of clothing and tea/coffee etc. so we can just get in it and go.

We usually do a long haul trek of some kind between Jan & March and also we sleep in the roof of the van (brrrrr!!) which means sadly that the van is laid up for like 4 months each winter, but I hope the Eriba will get us out more in the winter as it will be more comfortable in the cold.

The pic was taken in Orpierre - Hautes Alps, where I would lay in bed in the morning watching the rock climbers go up the face behind before it got too hot, lovely little place. I haven't decided our route for next year but there is one thing I would like to see that I haven't yet and that's the Millau Viaduct, so we might do the Pyrenees again (for the first time in years), and do that on the way. We have never toured Spain by road, been there on holiday in planes of course but saving that road trip for full retirement, as I would want at least 3 months to do Spain and Portugal together. I started to do a blog, for my family to keep track of us really, but I haven't updated it at all in over a year, I must do that. If you are interested its Simon & Lesley's Travels

You will see that we are pretty much obsessed with mountains! Especially this one:
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I am up for tips on touring anywhere, together with the do's and don'ts for newbies with a caravan!!

Lesley

That's reminded me of our time with our campervan.

We searched high and low for a van that met our needs and eventually alighted upon a Horizons Unlimited Innovation 1. These are Ford Transits converted by the Pegg Brothers in Tamworth. In the case of the Innovation 1 they use a standard roof short wheelbase Tranny with the Liftback door, rather than barn doors and cut the roof off, replacing it with a purpose moulded taller roof, specially sculpted at the front, with a large Heki rooflight amidships and a smaller one towards the rear. That provides internal headroom of around 6ft 5ins. The engines can be any of those available on the Transit as can be the trim etc., we had the 125PS engine, which was the most powerful at the time (2006). An SWB Transit is a tad under 16ft long, about the same length as a Range Rover.
The Innovation range was a spin-off from HU's Cavarno vans with a change in furniture layout. Like the Cavarno there were two swivelling seats up front and behind another pair if seats that dropped down into benches at the push of a button. Between these two rear seats was a gangway to the rear with kitchen on the offside which had a compressor fridge, with gas locker for a 907 underneath and a floor cupboard with cutlery drawer. On the work surface was a combined sink and hob unit, the gas/electric hot water boiler being fitted under the offside rear seat. Opposite the kitchen was a loo room with a proper swivel Thetford, a mirror and light. The full height folding door for this area could be swung across the gangway for privacy. Next to the loo room was a half height wardrobe with shelves and hanging space. There was a removable slab of kitchen worktop between the wardrobe and the kitchen which meant the work space was much larger than most similar vans. Under this worktop was a 2ft deep open space or boot between the van's rear wheel arches, that could be used for all sorts of gear. In our case it was home to a couple of bearded collies in a purpose-made crate.

At roof level the was a big locker over the van's cab which housed a bolster that acted as a seat back when the offside rear seat was extended to a bench and it also filled the central gangway when you wanted to have a big double bed instead of two singles. Standard issue was two further roof lockers above the kitchen on the offside but our van had a further matching pair forward of the kitchen, making an impressive row of four. There was a centre leg table supplied and the leg clipped into the rear wardrobe with the top sharing the overcab roof locker. To use the table you swivelled the drivers seat round and ate facing each other on the offside. As an option we had a diesel fired warm air heater fitted in the front passenger seatbase and this kept us snug through some very frosty nights. A further natty option was two flexible armed LED reading lights in the cab which had a centre red light when switched off, so you could find them in the dark. A tap on the red light and they burst into white life.

A beautifully built van, but after nearly 3 years we got cabin fever and moved on to something slightly larger.

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Well you're view of the mountain was certainly better than the one that we got presented with.
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Deeps, if it is any consolation, we have walked a whole day, sometimes much longer, numerous times to get a good view of a mountain, only for the clouds to come over and spoil things. The photo of the Matterhorn in the lake was hard work to come by. No cablecar or train for us, just a very long slog on foot from Zermatt totalling about 10 hours, for which I sacrificed a big toenail with the friction in my boot on the way down (gross I know but I like to work for a reward!). This summer on the way home from Barolo we took a detour up to Breuil Cervinia to get the closest view of the Matterhorn from the Italian side... it was almost like you could touch it, and the perfect picnic spot at the Blue Lake for a rest afterwards - and there was hardly anyone else up there.
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I bl**dy love mountains :)

Hi Andy, had chance to look at your pics, nice van! I like the fact you can walk through (well, when the dogs aren't in it!). Ours is currently a walkthrough as we have no rock and roll seat bed in the back, as there is just the two of us and we sleep up the top (more room up there). We can also get both bikes in there when we are going off for the day, as I am sometimes not happy leaving them on the bike rack even though locked and chained (had one chained up and stolen in Avignon with bolt croppers in broad daylight). No loo either and the old man not only has to brave the elements at night but he has to climb down first and climb back into bed again after!

Hi Randa, what a helpful post, thankyou very much.

Love the pic of the viaduct and yes I did see the documentary, thought it amazing.

I have been looking at the insurance and will let you know if I find any particularly good options for our combination. I had heard of Red Pennant but that's like a holiday insurance right? that you only take out only whilst you're away, i.e. on top of your standard motor policy? I am going to add the caravan to our current campervan insurance until it expires in May, as we wont be going outside the UK until then. We live next door to Wales and from Feb-May we're going to take every weekend in Gods country (Hubby is Welsh lol) to practice travelling with the Eriba close to home. Neither of us has towed before. Does anyone recommend the lessons offered by the CC & CCC? Once we've got the towbar fitted I was going to borrow a trailer and go to an industrial estate at weekends with some cones and practice!!

We bought at the NEC (we had already made the decision to buy) and the show offer was a free Reich mover or £1000 off, we took the £1000 off. We are both quite strong (I am 6'2" & taller than hubby!) fit, in mid 50's and thought we'd see how we get on first rather than pay £1000 for something we don't need.

We have a wind out Fiamma on the van and we've never wanted a proper awning, despite the vans small size. Also, given our storm experience with the last wind out awning, I am none too sure about the zip on sides you can get for them to make a 'room'. We can park the van either at right angles or parallel to the Eriba so the wind out awning gives shelter between the two and covers both doors. We use a pop up festival tent for storage with the van (and to mark the pitch as we have had our pitch stolen whilst we've been out for the day!) so we can dispense with that when using the Eriba.

Re the electrics, the van is going back to the convertors to have the towbar fitted and I am hoping that we can have just one hookup for both vehicles. I don't really understand electrics so I'll have to ask them for the best options as they installed the van electrics. We never have enough room in one fridge, so will use both - so both leisure batteries will need to be charging, which may be challenging on one hookup in France! I'll see what they say. We don't have an oven and never missed one yet. We have a Cadac, as I wont have meat or anything fried in the van, but the old man loves cooking outside (something primeval in it for men I think!). One of the joys of touring for me is buying fresh food almost daily, but when we're on retirement income we need to be a bit more cost effective! Just fresh croissants and a baguette daily from an artisan baker is over 5 euros a day.

I did know about the Peage :( but we do try to avoid them anyway to be honest. We only regularly use the bit in between Calais/Dunkirk and Reims, or to avoid large cities - especially the Italian ones! (we drove through Turin once...OMG !!)

I never thought about the mudflaps, good idea! although why they are so expensive is a mystery to me! I also need to get a cover. We have a double garage and neither the van or the Eriba will fit in it. Mind you, if they did, I'm not sure I would know what to do with all the stuff that is currently in it !!

We do use an ASCI card and we are really looking forward to getting the most out of these when we've properly retired and are touring for long periods.

All this talk of holidays.... I wanna go now!!!

Not expecting it until the end of the month.... which is just as well, as I haven't arranged the fitting of the towbar to the van yet!... or the insurance.....or the mudflaps. I need to be more organised!