We had a very nice time at the Caravan, Camping and Motorhome show last week. Surrounded by fellow outdoor enthusiasts we saw many marvellous versions of camper vans, caravans of all sizes and came home with some nice practical and very cute things.

I mentioned in my last post that I was sorting out my things for this summer. Last year’s tour gave me a good idea of things that I need to adapt or improve on, as my kit was put together in quite a short space of time and needed to fit in a very small space. Even though I have camped for years, doing the whole thing by train and bus meant getting everything into two bags and so some things had to be minimised and others done without.

One of the things that I know I needed to improve on was cooking. I have a small table and a little one ring stove but just used the other cutlery and storage that I already had but found that my meals lacked a bit of variety. I have been thinking about how to do more camp cooking and came across this brilliant company Nomad’s Kitchen at the show.

I was drawn in by the ultimate cuteness of the ‘kitchen’ that they sell, so bought one of those as this means that everything is in one handy little case. Look it even has a mini chopping board! I also like the fact that they are a small start up company founded by adventurous friends and will be buying a utensils set from them soon.

As well as that I could not resist this cute and practical doormat for the tent, to save the groundsheet from my muddy boots.

I also bought some practical heavy duty clips and a fab light that is a flashlight, mini table lamp and reading lamp in one. It is all very exciting planning the adventures, final booking will have to wait and see whether I have a vehicle this summer but there will be three months of a UK tour happening! 3 weeks of that is taken up with a music festival then our trip to Scotland so just got the other 9 weeks to fill 🙂

Although I may never buy one I really loved all the little caravans at the show. There were so many cute versions of the little vans that I have often seen at campsites and they were helpful as well for ideas about storage if I do have a van of my own, like this worktop with hidden storage in the rear kitchen of this teardrop trailer.

These slightly bigger ones were also very cute with everything you could need. I do love small spaces, I am so happy now to have a small house, a small tent and to have minimised everything, it feels very freeing.

One of my options for the future is to buy a little caravan, when I get too old and crumbly for tent life, so it was nice to see that they are so comfortable and affordable. I would be very happy living in something like this.

We also loved the top of the range static caravans and lodges. We had many lovely caravan holidays when we were children and although they never looked like this there is just something about a caravan that I love. These larger ones look more like a £500,000 show home than a lodge for about a quarter of that price.

I have had another busy week, with two very interesting short courses by the WEA, one on women who worked on canals during WW2 and the other on women in textiles throughout history. I also had a mock driving test which went well on the whole, though I was very nervous. It is only two weeks now until the real thing, only 50% of people pass first time so I am not expecting to pass then but I am enjoying the driving lessons anyway.

This weekend there is more crafting planned working on the gift for my niece. The fabric I am using, jersey, is a challenge but hopefully I will finish it all this week. There is obviously a time limit as I am redoing the moses basket covers and that is needed when the baby is born. I have just about finished the knitting for her animals as well.

It is a lovely sunny day here, after quite a wet week, I am not used to rain anymore, now I am not living in Yorkshire 🙂 so am hoping that this continues as I would like to get a bit more walking in before I leave Worcester in just over 3 weeks.

I hope that you have all had a good week and have a good week ahead, and are enjoying signs of Spring if you are in that season, it makes everything better to have sun, crocuses and daffodils! Have fun, take care, stay safe and thanks for visiting.