Well… we’ve been a little bit quiet on the website lately, and there’s a very good reason for it!
We’ve spent the last couple of weeks in Las Vegas and Nashville celebrating Tom’s birthday and our 3rd wedding anniversary, so safe to say there hasn’t been a huge amount of caravan progress going on! 😂
And actually, our trip home turned into an extra day thanks to all the Heathrow chaos, so we ended up being away for 11 days!
We’re not complaining though… what an incredible trip! 🇺🇸
But while we’ve been away, we’ve been thinking about just how much we’ve actually squeezed into this summer. And when we look back at it, we’ve had an absolute belter!
It all started back in April… 🚐
Our first proper summer trip was Castleton, and we absolutely loved it!
We stayed roadside with loads of other campers, right near the Hope Valley — you guys will know the spot we mean!
The following day we headed up to Stanage Edge for a walk, then came back to the van, got some dinner on and just enjoyed being out🌳
Nothing fancy. Just the van, some food and a good view🚐
Exactly why we love doing this!
A couple of weeks later we headed to the new motorhome aire in Cleethorpes🌊
The location is brilliant, right next to the Signal Box Inn, and we managed to catch an amazing sunset down on the beach🌅
And obviously… no Cleethorpes trip is complete without a chippy! 🐟😂
Then came the heatwave ☀️
At the end of May we had the first proper heatwave of the year, so obviously we had to get away!
This time we headed to Bridlington, where we met up with family on a campsite.
We also got to see our friends — the proper caravanners 😂 — and had a nosey around their caravan!
That Sunday night we headed back to Cleethorpes, staying at the aire again as it’s close to us but far enough away to feel like a proper night away. 🚐
It was absolutely rammed because of the bank holiday heatwave, but we had such a good night!
We ended up joining a BBQ and met some people who have now become friends! 🙌🏽
And that’s one of the things we love most about van life — you never quite know who you’re going to meet!
June = beach cocktails 🍹
June rolled around and we headed to an aire near Sutton-on-Sea.
It had much more of a homestay feel to it and was really close to the beach, so we spent some time down there enjoying cocktails in the sunshine. ☀️
Honestly, it’s trips like these that make us remember why we bought the van in the first place.
We don’t need a big expensive holiday every time we want to get away!
Sometimes it’s just a night by the coast, a drink on the beach and waking up somewhere different.
Then we went to France 🇫🇷
And who could forget the French heatwave?!
Our road trip took us through France, with temperatures reaching a ridiculous 40°C.
It was HOT. Very hot. (might need to look into installing AC 😅)
But we had an amazing time, and Annecy was definitely one of the highlights.
We absolutely loved it there and made some brilliant memories travelling around in the van in Europe once again!
It was around this time that work on this website began!
Emma’s dad built the website from scratch, and we’ve since had numerous enquiries come through it, which has been absolutely brilliant to see!
It’s amazing watching something that once started as an idea actually turn into a place where people are now finding us and getting in touch about their own van projects!
Emma’s birthday 🎂
When we got home, we decided to do something a little different and actually booked ourselves a pitch next to Carsington Water for Emma’s birthday.
And because we normally never stay anywhere for more than one night, this felt very luxurious! 😂
We booked a pitch with a hot tub and our own private shower block, and it was exactly what we needed!
No rushing off somewhere else the next morning, no packing everything away after breakfast — just a proper relaxing few days.
And we absolutely loved it!
And all while working full-time…
Because obviously, all of this has been happening alongside full-time jobs and van conversions!
We then completed the pink velvet Transporter build you will have seen on our last news update, just before we headed off to the States.
And then there was the small matter of a little £600 caravan project…
July came with a mouldy caravan 😅
As you know, we bought a £600 caravan from Facebook Marketplace… and it was in a pretty bad way! 😂
We’d (Emma) been looking for a little project, but safe to say this one had a lot more going on than we first realised!
Make sure you check out our other news posts to see exactly what we were dealing with!
We didn’t actually get properly stuck into stripping it straight away. August was a bit of a whirlwind with Emma’s birthday, getting the pink velvet Transporter finished and then heading off to the States for Tom’s birthday.
But we’ve finally started getting properly stuck into the caravan now… and, as you can probably imagine, we’ve already uncovered a few more surprises! 😂
There hasn’t been a huge amount of progress while we’ve been away, BUT we did manage to get one really important job ticked off.
We removed the rear window rail and rear handles where huge amounts of water was getting in, gave everything a proper clean — with a personal favourite, brake cleaner 😅 — resealed it and screwed everything back into place before sealing it all again.
And the best news?
NO NEW LEAKS! 🎉
We left the caravan for 10 days… which became 11 thanks to Heathrow… and came home to find no new water ingress!🤞🏽
After the amount of damp and leaking we’ve already discovered in that thing, that’s genuinely something worth celebrating! 😂
So hopefully we’re finally starting to get on top of the water problems.
And now… we’re back! 🚐
After an absolutely ridiculous summer of van trips, France, birthdays, the caravan project, completing another build and finally getting over to the States…
we’re home!
And today, we were straight back into it.
The next project has officially landed at the workshop — and it’s a Maxus van!
A new one for us, with loads of space and loads of potential.
So make sure you’re keeping up because there’s plenty coming up on both the Maxus build AND the caravan.
We might have been off travelling for a couple of weeks…
…but we’re back now! 👀😂
What a summer ❤️
— The CoyCruisin’ Team 🚐
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