After years (literally) of promising that I’d selling it it has finally happened – the campervan is at last for sale on Ebay: http://tinyurl.com/davesvan. There are additional photos here.

I’ve set up a Facebook group for the sharing of happy memories, photographs, poetry etc. (Aside: Please forgive me by the way if I don’t become your friend if we’ve never met – I’ve found that I can only use Facebook, Twitter etc with limited numbers of contacts.)

It is a bit sad as I have so many happy memories of this van and I doubt she’ll fetch much. If anyone wants a bargain this could be your chance, but please note that quite a bit of work needs doing.

According to the registration document I bought this campervan on 30 June 1999. It has accompanied me on holidays, house moves, festivals, travels and excursions. It has been used for many significant events, such as the departure vehicle on our wedding day and it even carried my canvasses to the Lambeth Conference.

Unfortunately for various reasons I need to sell it. I know I’ve said that before, but this time I mean it. It is likely I will be posting it on Ebay this weekend. I expect it to make in the region of 1000 to 2000 pounds, but it is very difficult to tell with these things. It will need to go for an MOT in the next few days, which of course it might fail. In summary: it is a VW Type 25 1988 1.6 turbo diesel (‘turbo diesel’ is industry jargon for ‘a bit slow’, but it isn’t too bad). It goes and somebody could enjoy using it over the summer. Structurally it is sound, but cosmetically the bodywork is poor (worse than in this picture) owing to my incompetence. There are some other (hopefully) minor faults which I will explain when I do the advert. The interior is superb – better than most similarly aged vans on Ebay at the moment.

My other posts about this and other campervans are here.

This is the bus that my friend Simon uses for his youthwork project. The video allows you to look around it from the comfort of your computer chair.

I always like looking around buses. They are like campervans, but bigger.

If you have a bus, campervan, mobile home, boat, shed, outbuilding or something else interesting that we could look around please let me know. There you go, a little weekend project for you. I hope everyone has a good weekend, whether you use it videoing the inside of your garden shed or in some other way.

Sorry everyone.

I would like to point out that my van does not present a blockage to the emergency services. There is plenty of room for them to get past. However, the refuse and cleansing operational services (bin men) have to reverse around a corner and so I can see why they would think my van could be in the way. I will therefore resolve to be a better parker from now on.

I blame the people who planned our housing estate in the first place who did not leave enough room for people to park thereby making it very difficult not to upset the refuse and cleansing operational services. This would I assume be Basildon Council.

PS I think that signature is a forgery.

This picture demonstrates why I am going to have to get rid of my campervan. When they built the houses in our road they did so with minimal parking at the front and access to the parking spaces behind via this little tunnel under an ornamental roof. Sadly the van is too high by a matter of six inches or so. I can’t park it on the road in the long run because the residents of the other road where I need to park hate me and my campervanning ways and write me notes saying that my sort is not welcome.

In case anyone here wants a campervan it is a 1987 Type 25/Type 3 VW Transporter, 1.6 turbo diesel. It sleeps 4 – 2 on the main fold down bed and 2 more in the high top roof. It has a sink (tap doesn’t work but I think that’s just a fuse) and 2 gas rings. It goes well and is very economical. It had a new MOT in July. The inside is very nicely fitted out with carpet on the ceilings and everything. The main thing wrong with it is the rust, which though cosmetic rather than structural is fairly significant. I’ll tidy it up before I sell it, but it will still decrease the value quite a bit. I don’t have a price yet, before you ask. On this page similar VWs are mostly going for £4500-6500, but the bodywork on mine will mean the bidding is likely to start at less than that.

Above: My campervan being towed to the garage yesterday by the very kind men from Grange Service Station in Rayleigh. It is having a new starter motor fitted (again) and by some miracle has passed the MOT only needing new wiper blades (again).

It is looking likely that we will therefore have it for Greenbelt, as there is not really sufficient time to do the cosmetic bodywork required to sell it before the wedding even if I was to want to do so. It is likely that I will want to sell it in the longer term for the simple reason that I have nowhere to store it. The parking space at Maddie_C’s house unfortunately has a height restriction, the curse of high-top campervan owners everywhere.

Yesterday we went to Cheltenham for a party. There were lots of musicians and spies there. Really. GCHQ is based in Cheltenham. I kept on feeling that people were watching me from behind trees and things but then that’s something I should go and see someone about rather than anything to do with Cheltenham. We did lots of driving but it was well worth the trip.

This morning we went to a very large church in Cheltenham. They sing lots of songs, have very comfy seats and we were made to feel very welcome. There again I might struggle to go there regularly as they don’t do any processing up and down the aisles in funny vestments. I love processing in funny vestments. I suppose there are more important things in church than processing in funny vestments, but it’s still pretty important.

This evening, having done some furniture moving we watched Top Gear. It’s rather fun, though it has rather turned into a platform for Jeremy Clarkson to air his views rather than anything much to do with cars. In tonight’s programme they went caravanning, which was quite amusing as they made everything they could possibly think of go wrong so as to make caravanning look really unfun. But it was so blatantly staged (crashed caravan into various things before eventually burning it down) that it made them look ever so slightly silly. The good name of caravanning, campervanning and camping in general was, I think, upheld.

Talking of which, this week I must decide the final fate of my campervan. I need to find someone to come and tow it (at a cost), mend it, MOT it and then I will need to tax and insure it and even then I will have nowhere to store it. Telephoning a scrapyard is beginning to look like the least costly option, though that would make me very sad.

I’m thinking of setting up a similar service as a cartoonist. I will sit in my campervan all day and wait for people to come and drink tea and discuss pressing issues of the day with me. Unfortunately the van still doesn’t go, so the offer is limited to my driveway. Actually, come to think of it it’s a bit warmer in the house, so we might as well meet there.

Independent Online Edition > Blair’s no-show causes defeat on hatred Bill
BBC NEWS | Politics | Ministers lose religious bill bid
The Times: Rowan Atkinson celebrates Government defeat
(By Ruth Gledhill)
and… ahem…
Mirror.co.uk – News – RELIGIOUS BILL BLOW

(That last one included solely for the line “One Labour MP said: “The Chief Whip will carry the can. She is toast.”” Mixed metaphors just appeal to me for some reason.)

In order to stay legal though I must now dash to the post office to get a tax disc for my campervan which currently lies rotting in the driveway. There’s still the slimmest chance it might see the open road again, who knows.

Update: Kerron Cross, interesting blogger with a Houses of Parliament pass supported this bill. There’s a thing.

Update 2: Don’t even begin to talk to me about the DVLA or Rayleigh post office. Pah.

I am starting a new ‘campervans‘ category on the blog in protest. That’ll show ‘em.

[I would like to point out that some of the people of Essex are very lovely. I was using a shocking headline as a cheap way to get more readers. If you have been enticed in by this headline please bookmark this site and come back every day, thank you.]