A bumpy start to full time van life
We are learning to cope with little problems before they become big ones
On the 6th October, we left the UK and set off for a whole new life, living in the motorhome in Europe. After an amazing two-night crossing from Portsmouth to Santander, we arrived to a gloomy northern Spain. The good news is though, the fog lifted, the rain stopped and the sun came out, just as we arrived at our first destination.
Leaving the port of Santander was a bit of a nightmare thanks to an inpromptu diversion which took us round the city and back to where we started. Not the ideal start to our new life but we did it in the end.
Our first stop was at Noja, an amazing resort with a long sandy beach. Within an hour of arriving and parking on a piece of waste ground (///pausing.swindles.reviews, next to the beach, we were settled and the metal detectors were out. In just an hour we uncovered about 20 euros - more than we had just spent on shopping.... result !
After a quiet, peaceful night we set off to Laredo. It's only an hour down the coast and another massive golden beach to detect on. The council here provide a large car park for motorhomes and campers, free of charge and just a one minute walk from the beach. There are no facilities here but it's a nice, central and very quiet spot. We were parked alongside another 20 vans from all over Europe. W3W ///governments.tactless.galloped
The beach gave us another 20 euros from metal detecting...... another result
Is van life what we expected?
I think in most, yes. We never expected it to be perfect. Living in the van is fine, as long as we remain organised and tidy. We also have to learn to be more friendly towards each other and not snap at the smallest of problems. Oh yes, there are problems. Sandra is struggling to figure out the van alarm when locking up. It's driving her crazy. And, it took a lot of Google searching to figure out how to change the van speedo from miles to kilometers.
The waste water pipe was leaking all the time. We thought it was faulty but turns out it's user error. We mixed up the switch for the electric empty pump. Grrrrr..... it must be an age thing. Perhaps because we are that bit older, the smallest problems seem like big ones.
Never mind, the sun shone today at 25 degrees, we spent the day on the beach and now we'll look at the map and see where we will go tomorrow.
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