By keef and annie hellinger, May 19 2020 07:52AM Blog first started in 2020 but it spanned 2 years of covid During this Coronavirus / Covid-19 Pandemic lockdown why not break up your day by doing my “Where in the World “ motorhome travels quiz…every picture is a place we have visited and can be found here on the website. Answers are applied after a while so you can check back. Thanks for looking We post these on both Facebook and the @KeefHWebDesigns you tube channel. If you want to look CLICK HERE In 2023 (post Covid but during the Covid enquiry) we used the super You Tube #shorts feature to promote the Where In The World Quiz for fellow travellers and here is a reel we used to promote the quizzes, enjoy! Happy Christmas... only applicable really in December #smile Below is also my take on what's happening, recorded for memories sake, troubling times, but it sure helps one focus on what is important and what & whom you miss! In future when this appears in my memories, I will look back on hard times and will hopefully appreciate what are the important things in my life. Living life in coronavirus times , which could be a while yet! Prime Minister Boris Johnson started lockdown on the evening of 23rd of March 2020 On the 5th April he was admitted to hospital after 10 days self isolating with the Corona Virus On the 6th April he is in intensive care with deteriorating symptoms The Queen addressed the nation at 8pm on 5th April Excel now known as NHS Nightingale and will be a hospital for up to 4,000 patients, most of whom are on ventilators. Similar venues being used in cities across the country. Opened by Prince Charles at 11am on 3rd April Community support groups established, to support the vulnerable, elderly, immunocompromised and people in enforced isolation due to exposure, in their community Petrol price close to home was less than £1… the first time since 2007, but when there is no where to go hardly surprising Schools closed on Friday 20 March. Remote learning in place either via Home schooling or BBC Bitesize Self-distancing measures required Don’t stand so close to me, i.e 2m Tape on the floors at grocery stores and others to help distance shoppers (2 meters) from each other. Limited number of people inside stores, therefore, line-ups outside the store doors Non-essential stores, pubs and businesses mandated closed People who can work from home should do, Boris decreed back to work 14 May 2020 for construction workers and folk who can’t work from home Parks , trails, entire cities closed or restricted to locals only in their bubble. Entire sports seasons cancelled. Olympics postponed to 2021 Concerts, tours, festivals etc cancelled Weddings family celebrations holiday gatherings even funerals cancelled, although relaxed to allow upto 9 attendees mid may No masses, churches are closed No gatherings of 50 or more, then 20 or more, then 10 or more. Now, Don't socialize with anyone outside of your home bubble , but rather confusingly from 14 May you can see 1 person from outside your household in an open space BUT if your parents are your cleaner or buying your house you can see both of them, confuseddotcom! Netflix, Amazon Prime, Disney+, and all other TV networks are on in every home daily now Children's outdoor play parks are closed Reruns of the Chelsea flower show. Have I got news for you and just about anything else done via Zoom or Skype. Everyones bookcase as a background is the new Claim to fame, especially if you strategically place Stephen Hawkings a brief history of Time. We are to distance from each other. Shortage of masks gowns gloves for our front-line workers. Both NHS and Care Homes. Care homes sadly an afterthought. At least a 3rd are dieing there. Very worrying. Government main priority to “Protect the NHS” NOT surprisingly to “Save Lives” PPE (new vocabulary along with social distancing) meaning Personal Protective Equipment Shortage of ventilators for the critically ill in many parts of the world. Refrigerated trucks for the dead outside hospitals in the USA Italy Spain China and more. Sadly mid May UK becomes 2nd highest number of deaths in the world behind the US and highest in Europe 35k by 18 May although ONS figures show 3k higher (never explained rationally) Panic buying sets in and we have limits on toilet paper disinfecting supplies, paper towels, staple foods (Eggs & milk become issues, definite supply chain issues as farmers say they are throwing away litres of milk) hand sanitizer Flour is hard to get because the packaging comes from China and borders are closed , interestingly not in the UK until 18 May announcement (and then not for allegedly selected countries Eire & France. Weird and inconsistent) Manufacturers distilleries and other businesses switch their lines to help make visors, masks hand sanitizer and PPE , Multiple hand washes per day becomes the “New Normal”, even allowing post to sit on the door mat for 3 days, the time for Covid19/Coronavirus to go from packaging Fines are established for breaking lockdown rules Initially £30 then increased to £100 although some debate about whether or not the police can enforce them Stadiums and recreation facilities overseas open up for the overflow of Covid-19 patients. Public Park areas turned into caravan parks for stranded tourists to self isolate Press conferences daily from the PM and other government officials (Chief Medical Officer Chris Whitty becomes bit of a hero, Chief Scientist Sir Patrick Vallance the opposite after his Herd Immunity idea). Daily updates on new cases, recoveries, and deaths . Initial idea in March was < £20k deaths good target , by mid May it was £35k+ Government incentives to stay home. Barely anyone on the roads initially by mid May almost back to normal yet the death rate continues to rise steadily People wearing masks and gloves outside . Mid May advice changes from probably not a good idea to YES it is a good idea. Especially on crowded public transport and narrow shop spaces Also took months to lock down our borders (mostly) and that was only for airplanes, ferries and channel tunnel still OK… Hmmm! Essential service workers are terrified to go to work with good reason Medical field workers are afraid to go home to their families , some great folk live in caravans in the front garden to protect their love ones. “Key worker” is another phrase to enter the English language. There is a national clap every Thursday evening 8pm for NHS & Care workers. Sadly teachers who kept schools open o mind the children of Key workers seem to have been overlooked. Also true of Boris’s 5% off for NHS & Care workers buying new homes in what he hopes will “kick start” the economy A 99 year old WWII veteran Captain Tom Moore raised £33 million for NHS charities walking 100 lengths of his garden before he turned 100. His target was £1000. People from all over the world donated to his cause. 319K deaths globally so far.(19 May 2020) This is the Novel Coronavirus (Covid-19) Pandemic, WHO declared March 11th, 2020. Why, you ask, do I write this status? One day it will show up in my memory feed, and it will be a yearly reminder that life is precious and not to take the things we dearly love for granted We have so much! Be thankful. Be grateful Be kind to each other - love one another - support everyone , and enjoy your garden and your grandchildren and families and friends everywhere We are all one! Despite what a US president may think! See our "where in the world" quiz slideshows below , with each questions, every answer is somewhere on our website but you may have to dig around a bit, good luck There are 12 to chose from, have fun

By keef and annie hellinger, Nov 1 2020 09:39AM Motorhome trip No 42 : Oct 23rd- 31st 2020 A KeefH Web Designs Travel Blog NOTTS->Waterloo Farm , Great Oxendon, Northants & Surrounds ->NOTTS 271 miles This was our second trip to Waterloo Farm, partly to self isolate and partly to give Craig & family the house to themselves for a bit. It being only our 1st trip away in the van this year, certainly gave it a bit of a run out, being autumn the weather was very mixed but we were able to get out and about every second day. Packing up the motorhome for touring is a doddle these days, we are experts Packed the van Thursday and then it was onto the campsite at Great Oxendon village. We had been there before in November 2018, see Blog 132 with our dear friends Pete & Joy, a very nice site site indeed, views and 3 services , water, leccie and sewage. It is definitely a fisherman’s paradise with 3 lakes. Spent a bit of time chatting to the guy next to us who caught a huge fish, 17lbs allegedly oh and it was this big ;) We walked both ways along the old disused railway track by the site as far in the Great Oxondon direction as the old lengthy tunnel but as we didn’t have a torch decided to stop at that point. Keef legged it up one of the slippery banks to an old bridge which was totally overgrown and surprisingly had a badger’s set in it with soil very deep probably built up since Beeching in the early 60s. There is also a huge badger set along this track nearer the site. For the first time we also discovered the village of Great Oxondon and Waterloo Cottage Farm shop, amazing cheeses, chutneys, chocolates and pork pies. Cheese wise Godminster (expensive) and Shropshire blue our faves. Apricot and ginger chutney is a must. So on the days when it wasn’t lashing down we visited amongst others Market Harborough Wharf, Grand Union Canal, Foxton locks, Pitsford water, Husbands Bosworth, Rockingham Castle, Kirby Hall (again), those two not being open to us as had to purchase tickets in advance. Deene Country park, Great Bowden, East Carlton country park (sadly minor damage to bumper grrr!), Cottesbrooke, Clipston, Kelmarsh, Hasselbach, Holdenby House, Althorp (only in passing), The Bringtons (lovely), Welford and the Kilworths, Lamport, Willougby Waveley,Both Peatland Parva&Magna, big names in Leicestershire, Naseby, Roundheads and Cavaliers, New Model Army, Ruperts views, Fairfax's view and we saw churches, farms, Halloween tributes etc etc All in all a very relaxing 9 days away in our lovely Wendy house. Looking forward to making and drinking the sloe gin, hic! #motorhome #motorhometravels #travelsin2020 #campsites #timeline

By keef and annie hellinger, Nov 10 2020 09:33AM Just in time before Flash vanishes at Dec 2020 I have remastered all our major holiday websites Motorhome memorabilia and fun Why not take a look, thanks, just click on the highlighted links below 2007-8 Our Gap Year after work 2010 Across Canada in a Motorhome 2013 Southern Hemisphere, Our 3rd Holiday of a lifetime ;) 2017 Back Downunder with our Good Friends Enjoy UPDATE 11/11/21 all of our major holiday sites are being migrated to WIX so that will need a bit of work (deep joy!) ;( they are very likely to look a bit different

By keef and annie hellinger, Dec 4 2020 07:29AM New Search Methods UPDATE 2nd May 2022 Completely replaced by Blog 179 A new BLOG TYPE indexing structure has been added to the site to enable you to use both a TAG cloud map and searches via Travel, Hints & Tips, Campsites, Recommended and Other , which features mostly Blogs by UK countries & England's counties To go directly to the TAG Word Cloud CLICK HERE, you can then download the associated file and use it to click on the words in the cloud to go directly to all the blogs associated with that word, have fun, it is secure and fully tested To go to the new BLOG TYPE and its associated drop down of menus or just click on the images shown under Blog Type just CLICK HERE, enjoy and thanks for looking motorhomers or should I say motorhomies #smile Note we first mentioned doing this back in Nov 2017 under BLOG 121 , i.e its only taken 3 years to achive, "good things come to those that wait" #smile UPDATED 11/11/21 replaced by new WIX functionality for TAGs across ALL blogs

By keef and annie hellinger, Dec 11 2020 06:13PM UPDATE 2nd May 2022 Completely replaced by Blog 179 1) a new search process alongside the TAG MAP and INDEXES to allow you to search by Year across all our Blogs. If you want to try it out, please CLICK HERE this makes it so much easier to find all the blogs that refer to a specific Year 2) a new search process alongside the TAG MAP to allow you to search by UK county, UK Country, all Blogs for the UK or Non UK Countries. If you want to try it out, please CLICK HERE this makes it so much easier to find all the blogs that refer to a specific UK county or country i.e England, Scotland, Wales or Northern Island 3) a Book of Blogs created to enable one to download the complete set of Blogs as an offline PDF so one can read it all at one’s leisure wherever one wants without the need for a broadband / wifi service i.e no need to be online Go directly to the new page on the site to get that download HERE Feb 2021: All images from Blogs 68-145 now available in responsive code, click HERE these facility were introduced to the website july 2021 but this blog is retrospectively included under the older style blogs i.e pre dec 2020 to 1) try out all the functionality of Moonfruit's Blogging code prior to swapping to WIX 2) because I believe it is a useful search facility and I wish to see how it is embraced when migrated to new code in 2021 3) if you wish to peruse blog tag’s after 2020 please click HERE, thanks thanks for looking do hope it helps UPDATED 11/11/21 All of these search facilities are now superseded by functionality within WIX to use both search and TAGs across the whole set of blogs (i.e 1-158) the first time since I started the blog both combining the 2 sites (.net & .co.uk) and creating Blog categories to show automatically by year

by keef & annie hellinger 30 July 2021, 15.28 Travel again, Yippee Motorhome trip No44, Blog 155 : July 27th-30th 2021 A KeefH Web Designs Travel Blog NOTTS->Victoria Farm, Claybrooke Magna, Leicestershire ->NOTTS 161 miles Hooray although costly our lovely “Wendy House” has been repaired, the whole top half of her engine has been “redone”… to include valves, pistons, gaskets, cambelt / timing chain, fuel pump belt etc etc… basically a whole stack of stuff that I don’t understand which Don Amott’s (our yearly motorhome service providers for the last 9 years) tell us is MY RESPONSIBILITY to have known about. Since I foolishly entrusted the health of our lovely motorhome to these “alleged” experts and they totally let us down we will not be using them again. Slim at Borrowash service garage is now our entrusted hero and he has done a great job! Anyhow, rant over were ……….. Some Leicestershire village definitions for you, Magna and Parva simply mean big and small in Latin, while the Sheepy part comes from the Anglian words for Sheep, “scep” and island, “eg”. Eg didn't necessarily mean island in the middle of a lake or ocean, it could also refer to dry land in a marshy area. So we decided to have 3 days away locally to check out everything was tickerty boo before any larger and longer trips. We don’t know Leicestershire, the rural heart of England, very well even though it has been on our doorstep now for almost 30 years now. Booked a Caravan and Motorhome Club Certified Location site because as a CL it seemed to have fairly good facilities, unusual for CL sites in our experience. We were not disappointed. They have 3 fields accommodating 5 CL vans in each, loos with showers (£1 a pop via meter), Elson point , dish washing stations , electric hook up , gas bottle purchase (should you need it) and a lovely friendly reception. There are a few “permies” on site but all very quiet and friendly. Indeed the owners are avid motorhomers themselves so understand what is needed. Although the weather wasn’t great (thunder and lightening and lots of rain) we enjoyed ourselves. The Leicestershire round leading into the fosseway runs along the back of the site and I did quite a bit of this on my lonesome (sadly Annie’s knee isn’t great at the mo) until the heavens opened and I had to make a quick scarper back after about an hour. Luckily I had a brolly with me and discovered a short cut thru back to the bottom field of the site. #motorhome #motorhometravels #travelsin2021 #campsites

by keef & annie hellinger 19 July 2021, 7.29 am Hopefully a useful and helpful Hint & Tip Sadly whilst we were away on our ill fated Scotland trip , until the engine gave up (see blog 152, now rather costly repaired but we would never give up on our trusty Wendy House) the waste water tap would not drain away properly. Overall it seemed to be a trip of multi repairs ;) beside the roof not staying open, the fire came off the wall after a heavy bumpy road and the sat nav broke free from its mouting on the dashboard. As they say these things are sent to try us. Anyhow getting the old tap out wasn't too bad. The Motorhome company had put this one on in the past and it has always had too narrow a channel. It seems after all these years the inner flow channel had been clogged with gunge etc. All you have to do was remove the outer edge sealant, rotate the tap anti clockwise, it fits into a screw channel inside the waste tank. This unscrewed quite freely, when examined it was full of what looked like congealed fat, which despite pouring hot water down the sink on numerous occasions obviously hadn't worked. Having drained off the waste water from the tank, 2 bucket loads I then used a pressure hose to completely clean out the system from both inside (both sinks) and underneath directly into the tank. This worked a treat. I completed the cleansing operation finally with boiling water in through the sink. Happy all ok and clean I attached the new wider channel tap (£4 via ebay - I note that Don Amotts charged me £80 last time the tap was replaced, what a rip off!) by rotation, screwing into the internal thread, making sure it was seated in the grooves properly. When attached I then applied 3 succesive securing layers around the outer edge of the tap to ensure no leakage. Each layer 24 hours apart to ensure true bonding. 1st Gorilla glue (a plastics super glue). Then no more nails for hardness when rotating the tap and finally white silicone. As they say the "jobs a good un". I'm happy, much cheaper, I learnt something and hopefully good drainage for years to come, fingers crossed Thanks for looking.

by keef & annie hellinger 18 July 2021, 4.50 pm Hopefully a useful Hint & Tip Sadly whilst we were away on our ill fated Scotland trip , until the engine gave up (see blog 152, now rather costly repaired but we would never give up on our trusty Wendy House) the roof would suddenly not stay open on full. Lesson Learnt : re cambelt failure never entrust a Motorhome company to warn you your cambelt may go, mine is every 4 years or 80k miles, Don Amott' general manager told me that sort of stuff was the customers responsibility not them who I have entrusted our vans engine health to for 9 years. Not sure I will again. The gas had gone from the gas struts that generally hold it open. I guess they eventually give up, they have been working fine for 18 years, anyhow I have 2 spare so set about replacing. Not as easy as I had expected, just could not work out how to get the plastic caps off to remove the old one so I asked the ever helpful Auto Sleepers Motorhome Owners Forum (see our Blog 91 - join if it suits) Besides getting sent the full repair instructions I found a very helpful person who had exactly the same problem as me, what a great idea screw in an appropriate screw then use pliers to pull out, hey presto, success In the meantime I had cut 2 thin pieces of wood to keep it open to its full extent. I attach the full script of my help, others may find this forum useful, I do hope so, share and share alike, just click on the button below to download the full transcript as a "secure" PDF If you would like repair instructions for the full roof vent please CLICK HERE Thanks for looking.

by keef & annie hellinger 20 June 2021, 5.20 pm Motorhome trip No 43 : Jun 14th-19th 2021 A KeefH Web Designs Travel Blog NOTTS->Birnam Perthshire Scotland ->NOTTS by 3 relay transporters (boo!) 497 miles This was to be our 1st true motorhome trip outside of lockdown for a month to Scotland taking in the North Coast 500, Harris and Lewis and pals on Mull. Sadly it didn't end as well as we had hoped but we did have a fun few days in Glasgow beforehand. MENU Intro Diary Slideshows Travel Blog Routes Retro Scottish Travels The End COMMENTARY / OVERVIEW / DIARY Sadly this was not the best trip to Scotland we have ever had but I include the travel blog anyhow but we did have a good few days in lovely Glasgow first before disaster struck!. INTRODUCTION After all the meticulous planning and wrestling to get campsites on the heavily overbooked NC500 sadly we only got to do 6 days , but what lovely six days visiting pals Mandy and Colin in the Lake District, staying and visiting Coniston Water, an interesting Caravan and Motorhome club site in the Coppice woods with now 350+ pitches (we stayed on pitch numbers 302 & 194, they also have glamping pods) with a lovely walk down out of the site across a farm to Coniston Water, revisiting reunion site at Threlkeld, and 3 lovely days in Glasgow staying at the Strathclyde Country Park (pitch 99) and using Park & Ride from Belshill to get into central Glasgow, a city we dearly love, the highlight of and there were many 2 days on the trot in Mrs Cranstons Charles Rennie Macingtosh’s art nouveau inspired Willow tea rooms. Class plus some fab art by his wife Margaret MacDonald (esp. the gesso panel on the stairs) and the Mad Hatters tea party was a true delight, plus the Kibble glass house at the fab Botanic Gardens , in our humble opinion a true competitor of Kew Gardens. Go to MENU DIARY We endured / listened (quietly to hide our accents) the Tartan army ready to travel to Wembley at the Central station and again in George Square, very loud of voice but happy and well behaved (maybe?) with liquid food (Tenants) for the journey. Anyhow SADLY because on the way up to Inverness on the A9 to start the NC500 after seeing now both Perth’s (Scotland and Western Oz) our lovely Wendy house started to make the most incredible noise from the engine and power slipped, we pulled off on a side road sign posted Birnam and stopped it. I have had an experience with an old Cortina years ago where the engine timing belt snapped and knew it could damage the engine. We contacted the insurance folks who sent out a mechanic from Blair Atoll who said it’s the timing chain. Sadly no garage in the Highlands could do it and after ringing around getting it fixed in Perth / Glasgow would have meant up to 2 weeks in a B&B / Hotel, no fun so reluctantly we decided to get transported back home. Bad news, but no one is hurt, we will get the van sorted locally (hopefully it doesn’t need a new engine but who knows) and will redo this trip next year. If you would like to see slideshow of our “limited” fun please CLICK HERE, thanks PS we now LOVE French Earl Grey tea, give it a whirl if you can find it PPS the first transporter driver from Blair Atoll quipped "I love nothing better than deporting the English from Scotland" ;) plus remember after the England / Scotland 0-0 draw at Wembley in Euro 2020 (played 21 because of Covid) the Scots TV station played Braveheart ;) Thanks for looking, folks. PLEASING UPDATE: 14/7/21 after 3 and 1/2 weeks in major surgery our beloved Wendy House is now back on the road and as recuperation we took her out for a 40 mile spin to put the engine under pressure, I am pleased to say all OK so can now start planning a few local trips to continue her rehabilitation ;) Go to MENU SLIDESHOWS #motorhome #motorhometravels #travelsin2021 #campsites It may have been bad but at least we can say it wasn't this bad, taken in arisaig scotland around the same time Go to MENU SCOTTISH TRAVEL BLOG ROUTES Here is a set of videos, reels and shorts showing all out Scotland travel blog routes graphically, enjoy Go to MENU RETRO SCOTTISH FAMILY HOLIDAY VIDEOS Recreated these in 2023 , enjoy my utubeo videos Go to Menu THE END

by keef & annie hellinger 20 Feb 2021, 9.24 am Technically speaking Flash vanished at the end of 2020 at least for Google & Microsoft browsers, moonfruit have found a clever way around this via Firefox so I've been able to copy back all my hidden images, so I'm very pleased with that. I've managed to put all the images that are associated with that middle set of older blogs (i.e 68-145) into a batch of slideshows. They are also available via each of the those blogs directly from the indexes in the dropdown above. If you wish to look at the full picture slideshows take a look below. Thanks for looking, folks. UPDATE NOV 21, after migration to WIX all of these videos are attached to each the blogs numbered 68-145

by keef & annie hellinger 17 Feb 2021, 13.39 pm Technically speaking Flash vanished at the end of 2020 at least for Google & Microsoft browsers, moonfruit have found a clever way around this via Firefox so I've been able to copy back all my hidden images so I'm very pleased with that. I've managed to put all the images that are associated with that set of older blogs into a slideshow. They are also available via each of the older blogs directly from the indexes in the dropdown above. See the full picture slideshows below. Thanks for looking.

by keef & annie hellinger 11 Feb 2021, 18.02 pm In order to help provide an additional facility for perusing our Motorhome travels blogs, which due to changes in technology are now still over 3 different construction mechanisms I have created a new page and button to allow them to be looked at in approximately batches of 5 which will allow "inline" reading. The much older blogs which by nature are smaller in content are roughly in batches of 10, these are my blogs numbered 1-67, the rest are in batches of 5. I do hope it helps. Let me know via the comments feedback box here on this blog any suggestions, like, dislikes and I will look into it, many thanks. It is worth noting that blogs 1-67 were constructed using v6 blog code, 68-145 next generation of Blog code and from 146 onwards the new responsive code. Thanks for looking. UPDATE 10/11/21 It is worth noting that because of the hugely greater functionality for Blogs on WIX I will be retiring this facility as soon as the new motorhome-travels site goes live New Search Methods UPDATE 2nd May 2022 Completely replaced by Blog 179