Monday, July 13, 2009

The Cigar, Moon Vehicle, Space Ship, Perfect

Our Airstream gets a lot of attention wherever we are, lots of people just stop and stare, a few say hi and have a chat, even have a peek inside. We sometimes feel like animals in the zoo as many stop to take a pic, so Sebastian is planning to make a sign ‘€1 for a photo’, maybe Alan Sugar will snap him up for the Apprentice. The nice French architect who pursued us with his camcorder as we left the camp-site was probably a once off, but who knows?

Whenever we pitch at a camp, we are always the centre of attention, which after a long days drive adds to the stress levels. Especially on a packed campsite in Interlaken where we tried twice to get onto a tiny pitch by the lake that just wasn’t to be – the owner tried to sell us a caravan mover! But really the pitches were tiny and the access road wouldn’t even fit the land rover down without hitting the kerbs. Every pitch was crammed to the edges with tents, windsurfers and cars. After 1 night on a pitch that was just too small, we found a lovely spot right by the Lake for the rest of the week.

The Swiss seem to excel at rules and we had broken several on the first night; trying to get onto a pitch before reporting back to reception, overhanging the imaginary line between two pitches and making noise after 11pm – ‘absolute silence required’. They are also good at relieving you of money; hiring special connectors for electricity hook ups, and handles for the ‘taps’. The site manager rides around on a bike all day, puffing upon his pipe, looking for rule breakers and whist always pleasant, is never warm, he is more like a policeman than a customer services type.

And the title? Well, they are all names our Tin Pangolin has been called on our trip so far.

Upgrades I would like
OK, now I am going to be greedy, our Airstream came pretty fully loaded from the start, but after a month on the road, there are a few things that I would already like to add;
1. The South African safari trailer tents we saw had amazing storage solutions for every knife, plate, cup, bowl and spatula, integrated into the drawers and cupboards. I am going to look to buy or make something that will serve the same purpose.
2. An outdoor speaker would be nice and rather than turning the volume up to hear the radio or even the TV, which you can watch through the door whilst sipping beer outside.
3. An extra plug socket in the kitchen, seems odd that there is only one as we also have a coffee machine and toaster to attach, neither is necessary but both make life so much easier.

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