COUNTRY DIARY:

With a bit of spit and polish, a grand old lady of a caravan sitting in a wildflower meadow is ready to offer a warm welcome to Christmas guests.

a rejig for the holiday caravan

For many years our family Christmas holidays were spent in a little old 1968 caravan in the Bay of Plenty. My parents had their caravan next door and we’d all set up tents and awnings and sit by the ocean in the summer having a lovely time with friends and family.

We’d have swimming races across the estuary, I’d make pizza bread and get my youngest daughter Pearl to deliver it around the camp and in the evenings there would be wine and beer and barbecues.

Some of our favourite family memories are from those Christmas holidays. The time I made jam from the wild blackberries. The time our dog Shirl chased a possum and it ran up my leg and sat on my head thinking I was a tree in the dark of the night. The time everyone got into rigging up satellite dishes to their TVs and had them all neatly placed on the lawn next to their caravans only to find that my husband Paul on New Year’s Eve thought one of them made a very comfortable chair to sit in.

And the time we arrived down there to find about 20 teenagers – friends of our children – looking a bit the worse for wear after a big night. We set about cooking them up a big meal of pizzas and sausages and salad, using the tiny kitchen in the caravan, only to be asked as it was served, “Do you have anything gluten-free?” I pointed at the cupboard and said, “There’s some rice in there, you’re welcome to cook it.”

My father and I picked the caravan up from a farm in Kawhia, where it had been used to house shearers, and towed it across the island to the Bay of Plenty. Halfway there we stopped and Dad had a look under it. “Crikey, I hope those wheels don’t fall off before we get there,” he said ominously. Rust was, and always has been, an issue with the caravan.

Once we got it there Dad went home and I set about renovating it. My solo mission involved ripping up filthy carpet to discover some classic sparkly lino in mint condition, sewing calico curtains for the windows and fondly painting the interior.

One thing I always loved about that caravan was that it was made from steel, so could withstand the worst storms. I also loved opening its door after our long drive from Auckland because it always smelled so good… like an old bach full of memories.

When we bought our property up north in the Hokianga we thought about leaving her behind in the camping ground but in the end we just couldn’t do that. So we paid a man with a truck a lot of money to lift her up on the back – those wheels would not entertain another road trip – and had her placed at the top of our wildflower meadow where she has a tremendous view of the harbour. And there she has been for the past five years, with only the very occasional guest, as most people have stayed in our cottage.

Paperbacks and puzzles

But this year, my parents are living in the cottage and it appears our caravan will be very busy again.

The other day I opened her door for the first time in months, and there was that lovely old bach smell. My dad and I had patched a few leaks last summer so she was dry and warm and full of family nostalgia… the shelf of paperbacks, the drawer filled with jigsaw puzzles and the cupboard full of shampoo and soap I had forgotten to empty.

So I embarked on another solo renovation project. The lino has been nourished with a mix of 1 cup white vinegar, 1 cup turpentine and ½ cup raw linseed oil, shaken together. You rub it on, then polish with a clean cloth and it comes up shiny and remarkably youthful. I’ve sewn new striped curtains in green and blue, which have given her a very bright interior, and the beds are made up with vintage stripy sheets I have been collecting for years.

Dad and I dragged out the blue and brown striped awning from the shed, where it has sat gathering dust for the past five years, and rigged it up, ready to take camp beds if needs be.

At the grand old age of 50 our caravan is spick and span, ready to create new Christmas memories.