Three Cliffs

It's a nice place for a spot of relaxation, but I can't help feeling it's a bit posh for us because the camp site has gone an awfully long way up market since I last stayed here

Having said that we're in the original camping field and the steep slope of it has meant some serious use of the wedges and some careful driving to get me a level bed for the night. 

I think the view from the back step is worth the hard work! 

Welsh festival of Land Rovers 2022

 After a lot if disappointment in 2020 and in 2021 as well it was absolutely fantastic to meet up with good friends again at the Welsh Festival of Land Rovers at the Royal Welsh showground at Llanewedd / Builth Wells 

As usual we were on display on the SWLRC stand with a very fetching mini Land Rover painted in a very close colour (OK it was camel trophy colour not NATO colours)

For once we were not the only 127 on show because there was this excellent camper conversion (nearly finished) which Ian & Elke had done using a more modern chassis and engine and a Marshalls 127 body that he purchased to go on it. The quality of work was impressive!

As usual the highlight for us on both days was the parade which was led by Huw Williams in his toylander watched on by his mom and dad (and Gary) 

Given this was Queen Elizabeth IIs Platinum jubilee we decided to have a patriotic theme and we had our very own "queen of fundraising" Paulene chauffeured around by our friends from the Family Land Rover Club

But the highlight of the show had to be "Fluffy" the 101/110 and other bits hybrid who turned up on the Saturday night after a family close disaster on the way here on the Friday. Well done Zeb! 

The weather was good, the vehicles superb, the atmosphere was excellent and another fantastic weekend was had by all 

2022 WFoLR now in press

Why am I promoting this when it's not got Katy in it? Well we will be there and I'm the strange one in the high vis interviewing the drivers and owners in the display ring so Katy was waiting nicely parked on the stand.

She has featured in the Landy before though so I'll give it a plug (no commercial link exists between us we just like being nice to people who are nice to us)

Its a good read about a good show! As you can see from this and other pictures on our site, we’ve had nearly everything you can link of at past events, all Series (including the first Land Rover sold in Wales), Defenders, Disco’s Freebeies, Ambulances and Fire Engines, even an ewok! At the time of writing this there are still places available via the registration link on the WFoLR site...http://welshfestivaloflandrovers.com/ 

Pictures were by me or Rhian so I should give her some credit as well :)

If you want to read more about Land rovers you can subscribe to The Landy at TheLandy.co.uk where you can also read back issues and the current issue when available as online versions - it's well worth a regular read in my opinion!

Basking in the Sunshine

 I've been trying to get out and about with Katy in the good weather, partially to give her a good shakedown after all the work and partially to get some exercise and take some pictures now the lockdowns seem over (and just in case they come back) 

This was the week that it was scorching hot and I really enjoyed the fact that the beer was being kept cool just by the power of the sun i.e. by the solar panel setup. 

It lasted well for three days (after an initial cooling at home) and the leisure battery seemed still to have a good charge in it because the victron app reported it as fully charged when I looked at it when I got home

So here we are at Cae Glas campsite which is a lovely site in the upper Swansea valley with Cribarth (one if the hills I climbed that week) in the background

What I did realise was that I had forgotten to fit the USB charging point running from the leisure battery so that was remedied before this two day trip a couple of weeks later to the other end of the Brecon Beacons which has Pen Cerrig Calch (another hill I climbed) in the background

All in all about 40 miles and nearly 9000 ft climbed in hot weather (on foot). I'm hoping that my bodywork will be as improved as Katy's if I can keep this up

Summer in Somerset

 Shakedown cruise 1 left us with a few jobs. Most of them have been resolved and it was time for another trip away to see how we are going and to look into some history 

We selected Southfork Caravan site (mind you they do tents as well) which turned out to be a very pleasant place to stay with nice level pitches and clean and tidy facilities so it made a very nice base for the adventures. 

This is in the area of the Somerset levels and if you want to get a decent picture then you need to get a bit of height to take it from which is quite easy when you have a good ladder on the back and the roof-rack to sit on.

It's also the type of rural locations where you find a few friends to park up next to. This quick stop in a farm shop turned into a full tour of the barn to look at the Morris traveller, Morris Minor, Ford Prefect, Fordson tractors, Lister stationary engines and much more. The steak pies and lemon drizzle cake we went in for were just as nice as the selection of cars

We were actually hunting down some family history which meant a lot of visits to local churches which like this one from Martock, were often made of this lovely creamy limestone 

So we went to Ham Hill to see the quarries that it came from 

Up close (take extreme care near cliffs!) you can see the cut marks where it was taken out of the quarry to be used

It was not just used in churches it was also used in Montacute House and the surrounding villages so here we are admiring some of them Rhian says that she finally knows which stone the "Light Stone" paint that we have used on Katy is meant to camouflage her from

No more jobs to add to the list... just to complete the ones we already know about

Interior decor

 The boss said that the interior was now letting the improved exterior down 

So... all the doors came off, the cupboards were refurbished with some new interior woodwork where needed and everything was given a few coats of nice white and blue paint 

It does look a lot better I am sure that you will agree

Shakedown Cruise and ablutions

After all the work of the last year it was time for a socially distanced shakedown cruise.

We decided to meet up with a friend at a campsite that was about equal distance for both of is in Llangattock, South Wales and as we were unsure of the state that the facilities were in we determined to be as self sufficient as possible (mind you we did opt for an electric hook-up) 

So we filled the water tank and pre-cooled the fridge and loaded up for what ended up being a fabulous weekend of weather. We also packed in our freestanding gazebo so we had shelter had the weather changed. In the end that was more useful as a sunsheltet

So here we are all setup and with the gazebo in the background. This grey sky as we setup was the last we were going to see of cloud for the weekend which was wonderful 

Because we were unsure of the facilities because we expected to find the campsite rammed we obtained a couple of options should we not want to use them 

The simplest if this Toilet in a Bag. Open, use, seal, dispose is the idea. 

The second is this folding Pett Toilet which closes to a convenient storage size

But opens to a nice "useable" height

and can be then used with a pack that turns the waste to gel for disposal 

In the end the facilities were clean and tidy and we were very happy to use them but we are very happy with the purchase and especially with the supplier www.enhancedpro.com who were incredibly helpful in sorting out an issue that happened in delivery. It's always nice to deal with a great supplier and I am happy to give them a recommendation should anyone be considering a purchase 

In the end we did find a few issues on our shakedown cruise 

1. Temperature gage was not working - turned out to be a loose connection - fixed
2. Problems with the leisure electrics and rear view camera - turned out to be a bad connection - fixed
3. Speedo cable is still sticking even after oiling it causing the dial to wobble 
4. Still seems to be a minor oil leak - not from what I have already worked on I need to find it to fix it
5. The biggest problem was that we had a significant leak from the camping water system it seems to be related either to the water heater (which we never use so I have bypassed for now) or from the tap which always leaks anyway. I have decided to replace the whale taps with something that is hopefully better 

Time to get ready for the next trip