Our adventure in budget touring

In the first part of our new series, former PC editor Nigel Donnelly joins the hordes hunting for cheap caravans, and Bailey from the classified ads

- Nigel Donnelly

WE HAD FINALLY admitted to ourselves that we’d outgrown our old VW campervan.

You don’t mind sleeping in a wonky 4ft bed, skipping across a field for a wee in the middle of the night and dressing while bent over when you are limber enough to do it.

Now, the truth was that the prospect of a weekend in the camper was becoming a chore. We didn’t want fewer holidays. We wanted better holidays.

We had reached the point where a pretty campervan photo on Instagram mattered less than a proper bed, our own toilet and some heating.

Decision made, we sold the camper, paid for some boring but necessary house repairs, and then found that what was left in the purse was a skinny budget to go caravan shopping.

That budget meant we were browsing at the murkier end of the market. We couldn’t afford to look at caravans on dealer forecourts. We were looking around Gumtree, eBay and Facebook Marketplace, with around £2500 to spend.

The hunt is on

It’s a competitive market, too. People like us, searching for something to use for touring, are up against folks looking for building site offices, temporary accommodation while building a new house, and enterprising DIYers who want to strip out a caravan interior to transform their Transit into some bougie mobile bunkhouse. Caravans are often sold before you’ve responded to the advert. You need to be quick and lucky.

After a few weeks of combing the classified ads, something promising popped into view.