CARA VAN HER PERMANENT HOME

Press, Volume CIV, Issue 30918, 26 November 1965, Page 15

CARA VAN HER PERMANENT HOME

A Bride's Introduction To Highlands Of Scotland

Living in a 22ft box was as much a novelty to Stephen as it was to me. We had embarked on the caravan life rather under the impression that the handing over of a rather large cheque assured us the same amenities and carefree living as we would have expected in a brand new, highly desirable brick-built home.

At least we had done the right thing by starting our caravan life in the spring, with a whole summer stretching before us. It was a good summer too.

I don’t think there was another caravan within 20 miles of our first site near Inverness. Stephen’s job as a surveyor has taken us to some isolated and beautiful places, but none so remote as that. For us, the only things to be considered were a spot near some trees, so we could watch the birds, a beautiful view, and not too far to walk for water.

The ground, we thought, was a little marshy, but our gumboots were stout and Stephen showed enough sense to buy some old railway sleepers to support the caravan's legs.

We survived those first six months almost unscathed—except for minor problems. Our gas supply once turned out to be only compressed air —and one of my first meals as a new bride went uncooked and uneaten. The closet was another problem. Our chemical closet was probably the most- modern form of sanitation in the district, for elsewhere earth closets still served as they had in the days of Robert the Bruce. But it meant there was no handy sewage cart to help us out. Once or twice a week, Stephen would set out for the moor, spade in one hand, closet in the other.

He always chose night for this. Not, he explained, because he wanted to keep the affair a secret, but because he couldn't stand the work by daylight. On about the sixth such journey, Stephen was dusting

his hands with the burial completed when a voice spoke at his elbow: “That’s no a vurry nice job for a body.” The broad man in the kilt sniffed, gazing fixedly at the newly-turned earth. “It calls for a dram,” he added, almost as an afterthought, and as he and Stephen turned for the inn, two more figures silently joined them from out of the dusk. We never found out what they thought Stephen was doing. Nor, apparently, was their curiosity ever really satisfied. On many an outing Stephen would have a solemn companion looking on while he went about his digging and then there was always the invitation to “take a dram,” which prolonged a 15-minute absense well into the evening. Stephen, a Highlander himself, never found any of this at all strange. Complications There were other complications, such as lighting. Electricity too, was still a novelty in the district and no-one was yet capable it seemed, of tackling the enormity of connecting a caravan across the heather to the mains supply in the manse. Our shiny trip switch remained inactive and in a frenzy of pre-marital economy, Stephen had said “No gas-lights” to the caravan manufacturers.

In the warm evenings that followed, a pressure lamp made the caravan unbearably hot and attracted moths, midges and the herd of cattle which shared the heather with us. Once near at hand, the great shaggy beasts would rock the caravan through the night as they contentedly rubbed their flanks against the corners. Our second string, the hurricane lamp, reeked of paraffin and tainted the food. We finally settled for candles in home-made holders which Stephen lovingly fashioned in the shape of hearts and wedding bells. “How romantic,” his mother wrote when we told her about it. As a new bride, I hadn’t dared to add that the ceilings were already thick with black soot where the candles had wavered and guttered in the soft evening breezes. We are still convinced that no-one else has needed to redecorate their caravan completely in less than six months just because relatives were expected to call for tea on their way to Fort William. Move South Our troubles didn’t really begin until, like swallows, we moved southward with the autumn. Our 40ft by 60 plot near Lincoln was booked, the electric mains conduit was to be waiting by the doorstep and the fight between marshwater and kitchen waste in soakways was to be a thing of

the past with a direct connexion to the mains drainage. Although we were exchanging our Highland idyll tor a suburban site, ■we were well aware of the coming winter. The site owner and his wife were veteran caravanners. There was a drop-ended dropsided roof-lifted caravan for their quarters, another for the site shop and yet another for the office. Nevertheless it was our caravan which had to be opened up, the cushions put back on the wheel arches and the table dragged out tor the ceremonial signing of the lease.

“Where’s this place you’ve come from?” asked the site owner in a broad Lincolnshire burr. “About 150 miles north of Edinburgh,” said my husband proudly. “Didn’t the van get out of control then?”

“How d’you mean?” queried Stephen, his voice noticeably smaller.

“It’s the loading. Balance all wrong. Must be, with great heavy things that like that stuck there.” He pointed accusingly at the railway sleepers lying just inside the door. “It’s a wonder you didn’t go off the road.”

That afternoon was the time of rent-collecting, and as the owner and his wife went from caravan to caravan they spread the word. “Newly-weds. Lived on their own in Scotland for six months. Don’t know a thing about it.” By tea-time we had had 12 offers of help and.it was not until we found ourselves the hub of lively interest for the veterans on the site that, bit by bit, we were informed how closely and how often we had courted disaster in the Highlands. Kindness itself, our new neighbours said that the first thing was to set-up properly before nightfall and Stephen and I were allowed only to say where things were and where they were to go, provided this won their approval After their horror at finding we hadn’t lifted the road wheels off the ground before —that we didn’t, in fact, we didn’t know it could be done —one man went off to borrow two hydraulic jacks from the local garage, another to get blocks of wood and a third to fetch paving slaps. Then we were both packed off to drink tea with someone’s wife.

When we were called back, the caravan stood firm and level and a full two feet higher than our home-made steps. The gang of volunteers stood proudly by as the selfappointed foreman took us on a tour of inspection of our own home. “Solid as a rock,” he announced, suddenly dropping his burly frame on to one of

the seats. Sure enough, the caravan didn’t budge and there was only the faintest rattle of crockery in the kitchen. Instead, there was a large cracking noise, and a startled look shot across our friend’s face as it dawned on him that something fragile had been sandwiched between the cushion and the hardboard for our journey.

But the loss of that outsize china meat dish was soon forgotten with the novelty of opening a cupboard door and standing back to watch it stay exactly where it was. In Scotland, life had been full of wooden wedges to prop doors open or to keep them shut. Morning and evening it had been Stephen’s job to go around the tour corner legs, winding here, unwinding there, all in the vain hope that the caravan could be “trued-up” and would stay that way.

Our new-found complacance was short-lived. The next day the caravan door was sticking. The morning after that I needed our Land Rover, so I ran Stephen to work and did some shopping in Lincoln. On my return, the door was jammed fast. This was no new experience I’m afraid, and Stephen and I had become experts at burgling our own van by forcing windows. Nothing daunted by my full skirts, and probably mentally still in the deserted Highlands. 1 started my normal head-first entry. I’d reached the halfway point when a voice spoke from the end of me where, I suddenly realised, all sorts of things must be on view. “Lost year key?” the voice asked cheerfully. “No!” I bellowed back, fighting to keep a grip on the standard lamp and at the same time to stop my tail-end

from wagging too revealingly. “The door needs a push from the inside.” “Can I do anything,” said the voice, showing no signs of going away. “No,” I bellowed again, remembering my manners just in time to add a belated “thanks.” “Call if you need any help,” the voice offered as if 1 could recognise its owner, and then there was silence. For all I know he may have remained an interested but mute spectator, for there came a time eventually when I could hold on no longer and had to complete my immodest headlong dive into the living room. I didn’t even dare to look out the window in case I met him eye-to-eye. For the next six years there were always an old pair of slacks and sweater in a little outhouse—just in case.

Although there was a noticeboard at the entrance to the site, I never saw it used. There was no need. Our grapevine was almost faster than sound and at lunchtime our burly friend who’d supervised the original jacking operation knocked at the door. “I hear your door’s sticking,” he said after bidding me a cheery good morning with a sparkle in his eye I hadn’t seen before. “If you want, FTI take a look.” A few minutes later he returned to announce: “Moles.” “Moles?” I asked.

“Moles,” he repeated firmly. “You mean moles,” I commented brightly. “S’right,” he said. "They're making a nest under your front left corner leg. The slab’s sinking. I’ll fix it for you now and then this evening we’U move the van and sort it out. Can you find your leg brace for me?” I was packed off to his caravan to join his wife while he got on with the job, and she Kept up a bright chatter wnich left me wondering just

how many eye-witnesses there bad been to my morning’s unorthodox gymnastics. From there, we never looked back. The bleak winter and the constant willingness of our new friends not only to show us the ropes but even to do much of the hard work for us helped us to learn quickly about caravan living—including the days when we had to borrow all our water and mornings when Stephen went to work without a hot breakfast because the gas wouldn’t vaporise.

By the following spring we were considered competent enough to be allowed to help

new arrivals, but then came the order to move on again to a new survey area in the south-west. For the last ttme our good friends gathered around to lend us a helping hand. The gas cylinders, they said, should go there, something else had to go just here.

Sadly, but brightly, we finally waved goodbye and promised to write and send photographs. A few miles down the smooth and straight Fosse Way, Stephen pulled gently

into the kerb, his knuckles white with the strain of gripping the steering wheel. “The damn thing will have us off the road,” he gasped, turning in his seat to glare at the caravan. It took more than an hour to empty our household on to the verge, load up again to Stephen's satisfaction and set off once more. My husband's ego, I regret to say, had become transparently bloated by the whole incident

Half a mile further on, an Automobile Association man overtook and flagged us down. "You need some air in your tyres,” he shouted.

This description of the lighter side of caravan living was written for the British magazine “Cara* van,” by Janice Graham.