Our second consecutive visit to Camp Quirky. The event was good, although due to our 9:30pm arrival we could not park up in the event on the Friday evening. The earliest we could park up the van was 10:00 on the Saturday morning and we were located in the overflow area. The ground is much rougher here and we really didn’t feel part of the event located down here. Pity really, as otherwise Camp Quirky is well organised and run.
We visited Northumberland for the first time, parking up at Waren Mill campsite. The campsite was very muddy so it was a good opportunity to test our new BF Goodrich KO2 tyres. All went well whilst several vans around us needed towed off the grass. Nevertheless, after the holiday weekend we moved pitch to a hardstanding.
We visited several of the small villages, and castles, along this coastline. There’s lots to do here so we may well return for another trip in the future.
The Holy Island causeway was a chance to try out my DJI mount on the outside of the van. I was worried my camera might fall off. Everything went well though, except I messed up the camera clamp mounting on the way over.
The video captures some of the highlights.
The garage advised our tyres were near the limit which I could not understand as I had measured their depth the day before. This experience resulted in new tools, new tyres and new rear discs.
Then new locking wheel nuts and new Fiamma Jumbo ramps.
Now we are ready for summer touring!
The van was called FreeTime when we bought it and I removed these graphics in July 2022 whilst in 40C heat in France. It’s taken a while as we have been debating what we wanted to call the van and Wendy has been learning how to use her Cricut machine.
We decided on Fiat Di Campo. So Wendy cut the graphics and we put these on the van. Whilst we were there we added a graphic on the bonnet and a small graphic to one of the backdoors.
We are still debating if we want to add a mcnaughtsontour graphic on the van, so this might happen in the future.
Let us know what you think – good or bad, all views are welcome.
We needed some drinks holders, especially on long trips, so we converted the central glovebox to a double drinks holder, installing the Fiat OEM parts.
This is a straightforward upgrade. There are quite a few parts and you’ll see in the video if you have the Blue & Me option installed on your van then you will need to cut out the plastic blanking plate. I found the DeWalt multitool was good for this.
The parts are available on Amazon at this affiliate link. We will earn a small commission at no additional cost to you.
This upgrade has worked really well and we are really pleased with it.
We were attending a family event in Wales and were granted permission to park up overnight on the site. What a beautiful setting.
We were attending a family wedding so we decided to take our campervan and stay at the Findhorn aire. We were also joined by our son and daughter in our son’s recently converted Caddy Maxi. You’ll have ready previous posts about the conversion if you’ve been following our journey.
The aire at Findhorn is brilliant. It’s clean and modern, with an electronic booking and access system. Everything worked perfectly from arrival to departure.
We arrived late the previous evening and loved the lack of light pollution. This is the view from our van at 10:30 pm. With the correct conditions you can see the Northern Lights. Unfortunately we did not on this occasion.
It’s a few minutes walk from the aire to the beach.
There is a maximum two day stay so the aire was emptying the day we left and provided a good opportunity to capture the Caddy Maxi in the foreground and our Ducato in the background.
That’s the end of our posts for our 2,200 mile tour of France. You can view video content of the whole trip here.
We were looking for a stop over near the Eurotunnel which we had not stayed at before when Wendy found Tardinghen aire. This is a working farm with a small number of tiered pitches over looking the sea and other pitches in a field area behind the barn.
Facilities are basic with fresh water, waste water disposal and chemical toilet disposal. This suits us as we try and be self sufficient. There is also electric hook up available at some pitches.
The farmer is very friendly and collects the fee in cash in the evening.
On our way back north we have been revisiting several places we stayed at in 2014. The next is the aire at St Valery sur Somme. It’s a very tidy aire with automated barriers. I did not take a photo of the aire, only the weather as it has changed significantly from the glorious 40°C.
It’s rain and 20°C now.
The town of St Valery sur Somme is about a 15 minute walk from the aire. It’s lovely and well worth the walk.
It is a little steep as you approach the town. The historical memorabilia shows this street has changed very little over its history.
