The Custard's New Camper

Although we are still a very young company (in terms of time we have been running not sadly in reference to ourselves!!)  things have been going really well here.

Delia has already been on lots of trips, she started with a New Year weekend trip and since then has been down to Dorset to celebrate Valentines Day, and plenty of other trips frequently visiting Southwold.

I have spent the last month discussing with Mr Custard (he hates it when I call him that so Dan it is from now on!) whether we should invest in a second campervan.  I have already had to turn down quite a bit of work as Delia was unavailable, so it made sense to at least look at the options.

We decided to throw caution to the wind and find a friend for Delia.  A loose budget was set, finances juggled and soon every evening was filled with scouring the internet for a suitable camper.

I had it in mind that I wanted another tax exempt bay window, prefably a crossover model like Delia as these have the charm of an early bay but some more modern aspects like better brakes of a late bay.  The problem is lots of them look lovely and shiny but can hide a load of horrors underneath.

I soon tracked down a very pretty yellow Australian import, perfect for a custard camper, but it was miles away which made viewing difficult and Dan was less enamoured with the colour than me.  He then found an burnt orange early bay with updated brakes, which he loved but still we weren't sure if it was the right one.

Then some rather beautiful splitscreen campers caught our eye, at first we hastily looked the other way due to the cost but after awhile talks were back on, and it was agreed to up the budget and purchase something a little bit special.

So trawling began once more, we went to look at one that was lovely but was just above our budget and I didn't love the colour.

Then as happened with Delia, the van for us found us more than we found it.  It was our mechanic who suggested we purchase it as he had been looking after it for a friend of his who lived abroad.  We had looked at it when we first thought of getting a second camper but had discounted it as it needed respraying, and a new interior fitting.  It also had a more powerful engine than we needed.

However it was suggested swapping the engine for a standard one, which would reduce the price a bit leaving money in the kitty to respray and refit.  So here she is;

Ok so I know she's no beauty queen, but she has her very own charm and is a real retro bus.  She was born in 1967 and is a Westfalia conversion.  Inside she is smaller than Delia but has plenty of seating and at the moment has a wardrobe, two bench seats and a fridge.

This will all be coming out, ready to be sold on to someone after an original interior.  We've already been planning a gorgeous new interior.  There will still be plenty of seating but with a new rock and roll bed, gas hob, new upholstery, flooring and headlining.  Plenty of quirky touches and this girl will be ready to strut her stuff once again.

But before all that, she is off to the bodyshop tomorrow for a full bare metal respray....a colour has been agreed, Dan choose and I gave in on my dreams of a gorgeous purple and cream splittie.  

Today was spent cleaning her out, taking off the roof racks and generally admiring our new purchase

To find out what colour she's going to be watch this space.....

Kerry x