Homes On Wheels

Northern Advocate, 29 July 1939, Page 4 (Supplement)

Homes On Wheels

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This summer between CO,OOO and 100,000 car-towed caravans —ranging from £SO, two-berth boxes to £7OO, 30-footers, with three rooms, bath, kitchen, electric light, gas cookingwill take to the roads of Britain, says A. P. Luscombe Whyte in the "News Chronicle.”

The now industry of caravan-build-ing is quietly booming. In figures, Britain cannot compote with America, which has about 700,000 “trailers,” as they call them, about 250,000 of them permanent homes which roam the continent after ideal weather. But experts predict an eventual 200,000 Bri-

tish caravans, which will deal a nasty blow at seaside landladies. In design the British caravan is equal to any and prices are no higher than in America. They start at about £SO, which will buy you two berths, an oil cooker and a folding table on wheels. Even a “Baby Seven” will pull this model without distress, but it is intended only for sleeping and eating and doesn’t provide much lounging space for wet weather.

The most popular caravan here is in, the £ 150-£2(50 class. About 15 feet long, it is a one-room four-berther. Thanks to ingenious design it has

plenty of turning-round room. Everything is built-in. Tables fold into the wall, stove, wash-basin and sink disappear into shallow cabinets, head-height lockers run the length of the caravan.

During the day three settees, occupying very little floor-»pacc. provide enough comfort for most people. At night these pull out to make one double and two single betis.

Cooking and heating wore a problem in the old caravan, taut a new nenpoisonous gas, which liquifies at low pressure and can be stored in steel cylinders, has ended that. One threefoot cylinder supplies heating and, cooking, gas for several weeks before it needs recharging.

A friend of mine finds a caravan of this type a perfectly adequate home for two during nine months of the year. His only expenses are for gas, an occasional small repair and about 10 per cent, increase in petrol consumption of his 12 h.p. car.

If you want to entertain friends and demand privacy at night, you can get a two-bedroom caravan for about £250. Normally this consists of one big room, about 18 feet long, with built-in furniture, fire, wash bowl and radio. Against one wall is a wardrob.e, with a folded double door which opens out across the width of the caravan and turns it into two separate rooms. A third minute room contains a modern chemical toilet.

This model is usually made with double walls to insulate heat and cold

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and needs very little heating, even in winter.

These two-wheel models are meant to be occupied only at rest. But if you care to pay £6OO or £7OO you

can buy a 20-foot fourwheeler and lounge about or cock a meal while the car lows you at a steady thirty.

In essence the design is similar to that of cheaper models, but it includes such luxuries as a separate bathroom with a shower, hot running water from a gas heater, electric light generated by a small motor, deep armchairs which turn into bods and, of course, a built-in radio and cocktail-cabinet. A phone connects you with the driver.

This is a more efficient ‘'machine for living” than many week-end cottages, costs nothing in rent and enables you to patronise your friends.

Added luxury you can get only by ordering a special model of your own. There are one or two £2OOO doubledeck caravans about, with four <?r five rooms, space for two servants and air-conditioning. But they are not according to the English idea, which still likes to regard the caravan as a means of roughing it with a few comforts.

In Britain, less gregarious than America, the “trailer camp” has not developed to such a pitch as across the Atlantic. At the end of his day’s run, the American turns into a vast enclosure, lined with paved and lighted “streets” and draws into the space allotted to him.

Attendants connect his trailer with mains lighting, water and sewage pipes. He buys his stores at the shops, drinks in the bar, dances, plays tennis or swims—without leaving the camp. Some of these big camps can hold over 1000 trailers.

But this country has a number -of small camps, where you can pitch and obtain water and stores and one or two super-camps in the all-dancing, allswimming category. Apart from these, it is never hard to find a plot of ground where you can park for a shilling or, given a friendly farmer, , for nothing.

Friends who know tell me that a caravan adds little to the difficulty of driving—once the trick of reversing has been that they tend even to forget the home rolling along *

behind them. Which is not advisable at sharp bends. Most caravans are fitted with their own brakes, which can be worked from the car driving seat.

If you feel like a caravan holiday, but don’t feel like laying out capital for a three-weeks’ home, you can hire most models from one or other of the camps. Average price? Say two guineas a week. It’s well worth trying.