New thoughts on New Wine
Friday, 22nd August 2008 by Julie
As might have been apparent in my previous post, I embarked on our caravan holiday with a fair amount of trepidation. This turned out to be unfounded and everything went far better than expected.
So well in fact that we have already made plans to go again next year!
The caravan we hired was not a recent model, but it was still fairly well kitted out. At one end, it had two 2-seater couches that faced each other (in theory, the eating area). These were transformed into their alternative configuration: a narrow double bed, at the earliest opportunity, and left that way.
On the other end, was a long couch that could become a single bed. (There was some sort of arrangement that could have given us a bunk bed above that but we didn’t experiment.)
What we did experiment with, quite early on, was putting the couch into single bed formation and then stripping off the cushions/mattress, to see how Jon’s camp-cot would stand on it.
Ahem. It turned out that the bed was quite narrow, and only two of the camp-cot’s feet would be supported by it. We increased this tally to three by lying the caravan’s folding table on top of the bed. That just left the final foot… After some head-scratching and various attempts at re-arranging — including an abortive attempt at squeezing the cot into the caravan’s gangway (would definitely make getting to our bed a tricky prospect), we finally tried putting the bed’s cushions into a pile (they were quite firm) and rested the final foot on that. Voilà, baby bed done!
By the afternoon of the first day (Saturday), most people had arrived and our camping “village” (Blue 6) was abuzz with activity. All around us, tents and gazebos were going up, cars were being unpacked, supplies stowed away, and children racing around everywhere, simply thrilled to have all their playmates in this novel environment.
From the second day, with the exception of the Day Off in the middle, our days fell into a fairly standard routine.
We tended to wake up around 07h00 which was when Jonathan and various other baby “alarms” went off in surrounding tents. From then, we had until 09h00, when one of us put Jon down for his nap while the other went off to the excellent morning worship and bible study session. (There was a 07h15 session but those were not for us! :yawn: )
From 11h00 to 12h30, Jon went off his group, “Emeralds”, for babies between 1 and 2 years. (The toy collection there was excellent and Jon got along fabulously.) The main seminar sessions were run during this time, which was great as Tom and I could go together. About 8 seminars were run in parallel, making it quite hard to choose some days!
After the morning session, we invariably stopped by the coffee and freshly-made doughnut stall in the vending area. Mmmm. Warm, crisp, sugary doughnuts… 
(Why would anyone want Krispy Kreme when they could have these!)
Lunches tended to be laid-back affairs, usually involving fresh bread and other goodies from the on-site farm stall. In the afternoon, more seminars were run and in the evening there was worship and teaching. Tom and I took turns to attend these two sessions.
We all really enjoyed the free time in the camp. All the kids got on so well with the older ones being very good with the youngsters like Jon.
For suppers, we were divided up into groups so we only had to worry about cooking (for 7 adults and 6 kids!) on one of the nights. On the other nights, we just showed up. [We also learned that there are meals that work very well in a camping-type environment, and others that should be avoided!]
We did see the advantages of a tent in that it provided a great spot for cosy late night group chats, while rain was pattering down on the “roof” above us.
However, for all the space limitations, the caravan had a lot going for it. We enjoyed the hot water for washing up (once we learned how to switch it on 
), and the fridge was a great asset that we were able to share with a number of tent-dwellers. And narrow as it was, the caravan’s double bed was very comfortable and snug under our king-size duvet. (Next year, I’ll know to take a proper pillow…)
So yes, caravan again next year. But a bigger one (to avoid the camp-cot shenanigans), and with some chairs and an awning to expand our living area. Maybe we’ll even have a built-in toilet to help with avoiding the 5-minute walk to the loos at 3am…
(All photos shown here can also be seen in this album.)
