Thursday, May 20, 2010

Road trip 2



My second campervan destination is Port Dickson, just a little bit further than Bagan Lalang. I found a wonderful public beach where I can park my campervan for the night. The place it is right next to Admiral Cove resort, water supply remains a problem, my solution is to carry extra water with 40 litre container. It fits nicely into the compartment meant for gas tank. What I didn't count on is the increased water demand due to the children having their dip in the sea, salt water and sand need extra water to wash off! By the time it is the forth member of the family to take her shower, we have ran out of water. A quick trip to the nearest petrol station is needed to fill the water tank.

With the campervan, the freedom of staying at the spot you like at the beach is simply great. You get to wake up at the same place as well, right at the beach! There's no check out time to worry out about, we stay when we want to, we move when we want to. Fantastic!

Wednesday, May 19, 2010

Road trip 1

My first road trip with the camper was kind of like a test run. I decided to take my family to Bagan Lalang. This place used to be a sleepy fishing village, but the building of Gold Coast Resort has destroyed its old charm. There used to be an amazing colony of hermit carbs at the beach, but they disappeared once the resort building work started. In their place was swarm of red tiny crabs that seems to take over the whole beach at low tide. Clearly the ecological balance was distrubed.

The camper performed without any hitch, except for a rather smoky exhaust. A can of STP smoke treatment seems to reduce the problem somewhat, but I think it will need a proper top over haul to fix the problem.

We found a place at the beach side to park the camper. It attracted attention everywhere it goes, there were a group of campers in their tents nearby, the place seems safe enough for an overnight stop. The great thing about having a campervan is that there is no hotel reservation to worry about, you see the place you like, you stop and stay there, no check in time.

At around evening time, I fired up the generator and turned on the aircon. The Electrolux unit works very well, in fact my wife and the kids were complaining that it got too cold later in the night! Another problem I discovered was the water supply, the size of the water tank simply do not allow the same water usage habit that we were used to at home. If you take your shower like you do at home, the water supply will only be enough for two person and there are five of us in the family...

We stayed for only one night, but it was a good first run of the campervan, my wife and the children enjoyed it immensely and they can't wait for the next excursion.