Converted caravan meets wine bar

A mobile wine service right to your door in the shape of a Kiwiana caravan bar. The stuff of dreams.

Well yes, but a dream come true for Blenheim couple Krystal and Jeremy Beal.

The Vino Van is a caravan bar that serves up your favourite plonk wherever you want, as well as beer and designer cocktails.

Since opening in July last year, the married couple have been working flat tack for weddings and events. And their new jobs suit their adventurous hearts, just fine.

‘‘We found the caravan in a paddock in Grovetown [north of Blenheim],’’ says Jeremy. ‘‘It took a lot of work to get it up to scratch. It was three months of every night and every weekend working.

‘‘Then we were trying to decide what to do with it … [we] wanted to do something a bit different,’’ he says.

Krystal says she has always wanted to fit her own business in around her family life.

‘‘Then we came up with that idea [for a wine bar], and we had a ‘Google’ and found actually there were quite a few.’’

But none in the top of the south, from what they could see.

So the deal is this: get your own wine, or beer, or the ingredients for your favourite cocktails, book the Beals and their Vino Van for your event, and get cool beverages all day long ... with a smile.

‘‘They supply all the wine, beer, and we serve it … So it’s a big saving to the customer,’’ Jeremy says.

‘‘There’s the personal contact as well,’’ Krystal says.

‘‘It also keeps things a bit more controlled,’’ says Jeremy. ‘‘What we were finding was at places where it was ‘Go for it’ with booze, in the morning there are always half-filled bottles of wine lying around everywhere. Plus, if someone has had too much to drink, we can monitor that, we can be like, ‘Here, have a water’.’’

Since they are not selling or supplying, they are not really a bar per se. The Beals say they are simply a pair of super friendly mobile wine lovers.

‘‘We’re almost like a glorified trestle table,’’ laughs Jeremy.

‘‘People love the look of the caravan, the retro style,’’ Krystal says.

‘‘We’ve served in all sorts of places, and you get to meet some great people along the way.’’

Like the time they got stuck in the mud and sand on a beach in Riwaka at 1am.

‘‘It was after a torrential downpour at a wedding, 1am in the dark, on a beach in Riwaka. Trying to drag it out. It absolutely bucketed down. A storm came through and we got out of there just before they closed the road.’’

‘‘The bridesmaids’ shoes were covered in mud,’’ Krystal says.

But what’s next for the Vino Van?

‘‘We’d like to expand with another caravan,’’ Jeremy says.

‘‘We also haven’t done anything down in Kaiko¯ura yet, but we’d love to.’’

continues his mission to visit all of Marlborough’s food trucks.

DAVID JAMES/STUFF Jeremy and Krystal Beal serving up cold beverages from their retro caravan.