Enid and I have been members of the Avondale Club since 2001. We have made numerous friends over the years and have run many rallies as well as assisting with many others. Rallies are an excellent way of meeting people and getting to know them.

We have a 2000 Avondale Rialto four-berth caravan, which we tow with an Audi Estate. We have travelled all over the British Isles and enabling us to see some spectacular sights. You are never too old to enjoy new experiences and see new sights.

The reason we joined the Avondale Club was partly because of the very warm welcome we received from older members at our first rally in Market Bosworth. Our caravan was new but our fridge would not work on gas. A friendly club member allowed us to use their fridge whilst on site, a typical friendly gesture from a fellow member. Whenever anything goes wrong with the caravan or car, someone is always on hand, to lend a hand, to repair the fault.

This help extends to many things whether its erecting a new awning, when either we don’t seem to have sufficient bits or can’t understand why we have so many, or when the weather is against us, many hands make light work.

With the passing of the years we all get older. Enid and I are now 87ears young and we enjoy passing on our knowledge and experiences to younger members. Any club needs a constant flow of new members with new ideas. Our club needs to grow its membership to enable rallies to be organised, competitive site fees to be negotiated and to ensure a diverse range of activities are maintained to suit everyone’s taste.

We enjoy sharing this great hobby of touring with our fellow Avondale Club members, attending value for money rallies in interesting places and being able to swap information and experiences when we meet up.

Dave Holland

We put up our new awning

A nylon one, quite thin

It really was quite handy

To put chairs and table in

…

Well everything was going well

Our awning was alright

Until a gale force wind blew up

In the middle of the night

…

I woke in a panic

Hearing madly flapping sounds

The awnings blowing away I cried

We’ll have to take it down

…

But Hubby lying snug in bed

Said, “You know what to do

Just hammer in some extra pegs

So I don’t need to come out too”

…

On stepping out the van I found

The steps had moved away

I fell flat upon my face

Hitting chairs upon the way

…

So reluctantly he had to come

And help me off the floor

The awning got thrown in the car

And it was used no more

Sheila Hill

Heather and John are perfectionists

As everyone will know

They wash and polish everything

Not a speck of dust would show

*******

As they sat in their van with a coffee

And thought of their very first van

With no table they'd pull out the bed slat

Just enough to put their cups upon

*******

Imagine their shock and their horror

When they decided to try it that night

They pulled out the bed slat to use it

And a half inch of dust came into sight

*******

"Quick" shouted John, "bring a duster

Clean it up before anyone sees"

But in this Club you can't keep a secret

They're normal said everyone, Pleased

Sheila Hill

We started our caravanning with a tiny Compass 2 berth caravan. It had a kitchen across the back and the bathroom had a washbasin that had to be ‘tipped up’ to enable us to use the loo. However, we had some lovely holidays in that van, as we had always used hotels for our holidays we thought long and hard about buying a caravan. We decided to go ahead and try it for a year, if we didn’t like it we would sell it and go back to using hotels.

That little van became ‘our friend’ it followed us to France and Holland in that first year, non-caravanners' used to say they wouldn’t drive abroad even without a caravan. Our reply was, after you get round the first roundabout it’s easy.

Our 2nd van was another Compass, like so many people we went to the dealers for some accessory and came away with a new van. This one was slightly larger than the first; we thought it was the bee’s knees.

We then progressed to an Avondale Avocet, this one had a lovely bathroom with a large wardrobe, luxury, or so we thought. This was when we joined the Avondale Club; in those days it was the Avondale Caravan Owners Club. We went to a newcomers rally where we met some very nice people, we arranged to meet up again at other rallies but due to Colin damaging his knee in the Lake District we were unable to caravan for almost 2 years, (2 operations later).

We then took our Avocet to Holland for a month, however the night before we stayed in Dover ready for an early ferry the next morning, we realised we had no water through the taps and had to spend the month using a 5 gallon container. Luckily we stayed on sites with full facilities. As Avondale we’re unable to correct this fault we changed the van for a L shape Avondale Eagle. We didn’t keep this long as the L shape layout didn’t suit us so again we changed the van.

We decided on an Avondale Osprey, this was a super van, nice bathroom, plenty of kitchen space. We had found our ‘ideal van’ or so we thought until arriving at a rally when we were asked ‘what have you done to your van?’ The body of the van was leaving the chassis. Lots of sticky tape was produced to stick it together. As Avondale had stopped trading a couple of months earlier and our Insurance told us it was a manufacturing error we decided that the time had come for a change of manufacturer.

We now have a Coachman VIP, the layout is similar to the Osprey, we are very pleased with this van and we are hoping that it will last us until we are ready to give up caravanning.

Ann & Colin Crowther