Tag Archives: Avtex

Stanmore Hall and The Severn Valley Railway

21 Monday May 2012

Posted by in General, Travelling in the UK, Trips, Weekend Break

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The mandatory post pitch party photo – featuring wine, beer and a sammich….. Oh and Sue of course.

Sue had arranged to get a couple of days off so we thought a short trip was in order. We had been watching an old Caravan Channel a few days earlier and they had featured Stanmore Hall… or mentioned it… or someone had, I can’t actually remember now! Anyhoo, they had pitches available, and we both wanted to do either Iron Bridge or the Seven Valley Railway, plus it was handy for some friends to drop in and see us. We actually had nothing planned when we arrived on Thursday due to the vagaries of the British weather and were just going to “wing it” between showers. Continue reading →

The Glazing Caper…

10 Thursday May 2012

Posted by in General, Maintenance, Modifications, Projects

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One of the things we both liked about our Sterling Celebration 550 was the drop down TV storage compartment. It ment we could just simply drop the TV down when we needed it and push it up out of the way when we didn’t. It could be safely transported in its stowed position, so no need for  a bag to put it in or a place to store it when travelling. Best of both worlds, or so it would seem.

We did notice a drawback, to improve the sound quality, Avtex had installed bi-directional speakers, that is they face forward but to improve the sound, they also have a grill at the rear and use whatever surface is behind the TV to reflect some of the sound. Now this is absolutely fantastic if your TV is mounted against a wall. Ours was mounted in front of a hole. The other thing that was also slightly annoying was the fact that if you had the blind down during the night, it tended to get rattled a lot as the quilt would get caught in it so it was always pulled up at night. This then required who ever was up first, if they wanted to open the front blinds and not disturb the person sleeping had first to drop the blind with the same silent skill as a Ninja.   Continue reading →

Caravan & Motorhome Exhibition 2012 – Manchester

19 Thursday Jan 2012

Posted by in Events, General

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Well Sue and I made our first visit to the Caravan and Mortorhome Exhibition to-day. It was in fact our first visit to any caravan type exhibition, so we didn’t know what to expect. We only live a few miles outside Manchester and knew when we were on the M60 at 10:45 this morning it was going to be busy.  There were already delays three junctions away. However, we are made of sterner stuff in Manchester and we pressed on. We eventually arrived and parked in one of the Trafford Centre car parks, a short walk… no more than five minutes from the ‘Event City’ halls. The queue to get in only took about 10 minutes and I think the delay was due to the fact everyone was in the same queue… if they had split off everyone that had pre bought their tickets it would have been a little quicker. Once inside… it was warm! top tip – wear light layers and take some water! Continue reading →

5 days at Barnard Castle

12 Thursday Jan 2012

Posted by in General, Trips

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We had to wait almost a month before our next trip. We had arranged with out friends, Pete & Julie (you might remember them from the ‘Hello World’ posts) that we would meet up somewhere. As they had traveled down to see us in Oxford, we decided to head over in their direction this time. I had always wanted to visit Beamish museum in the north east and this seemed like a good opportunity. I booked us in to the Camping & Caravanning Clubs site at Barnard Castle using the on line booking system. I sent an email to Pete with all the details… knowing that he can’t get internet… or a mobile phone signal in the valley where they live I gave him a ring on his land line to let him know so he could toggle off to the local library 20 miles away to check his email. The dates were fine with them. We would arrive on the Saturday and they would drive up on the Sunday to meet us. The route I’d planned was over the M62 and to pick up the A1M north, so there shouldn’t be any problems. Sue had done here usual job of loading up the plastic boxes ready for the trip. This was going to be for 5 days, our longest so far.

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