After months of planning it was time to head off to The DalesBridge in Austwick to meet up with a lovely bunch of peeps for the first Camp Gadget.
The weather was absolutely perfect, crisp and clear and barely a cloud in the sky – sure it was freezing cold but wrapped up warm with the camp fires planned we thought it was a very good start.
We got there in good time after driving through some gorgeous Yorkshire countryside with lots of cute little new lambs jumping and frollicking through the fields – that didn’t help John much with b-roll or any filming of us talking to camera as as soon as i saw them I started squealing!!! I LOVE spring and especially cute fluffy baby animals.. I just can’t help it.
Thankfully we were first to arrive although I do think we saw a couple of familiar vans parked across from the entrance – we checked in and found Ross who offered us a choice of corners that we could use and chose one furthest away from other people so we could have fun without worrying about spoiling anyone else’s weekend (have you seen us on camping trips..? Haha) we decided to line all the vans up in front to keep the noise in, leaving the communal space for fire pits and general frivolities behind. Turned out we couldn’t keep excited youtubers in one place long enough..! Hurrah..!
Kirsty, Purdy and Kahlan (van life with Betty boondocker) arrived shortly after us and lined up their van, shortly followed by Darryl and Keith (campervan tales) and Kev (wondering Womble) then Dave, Jo and Louie (one man and his whippet) Mevi (ermmmm Mevi..) Colin (Colin tonkasdad) and Darran (urban motorhome).. I thought we looked pretty fab with the set up and everyone greeted everyone else and brought out their chairs and fire pits.
A little bird had told us that morning that it was Kev’s birthday so we couldn’t let that pass without a silly hat, some cake and a good old singsong with a fire extinguisher handy as there were a fair few candles on that cake – haha.. he seemed nicely surprised even with all the off-key singing (John.. family joke it seems..!) so we all had a cheeky slice of cake and tried to keep warm.. we did notice that Colin had an electric bike on the back of his van so he very kindly let us all have a go, I decided I’m too accident prone so left it to everyone else..! Everyone ended up a little hangry by then so we decided to do the Campervan Tales Pizza Challenge – whoooooooop..!! It was absolutely brill and lots of delicious pizzas were made but I do have to say I was the ONLY one who cooked on the open fire so I should get extra points for that 😀 nice mix of ready rolled dough, packet mix dough and 2 ingredient “magic” pizza dough – John didn’t want to miss out so he cooked the “control” pizza, straight from the cardboard box streets of Chicago.. We scoffed our food and drank some beer then decided we were all going to go to the bar on site to warm up a bit as it was mighty cold..!! The bar was lovely and cozy with a wood burner on the go and radiators on full which was lovely. They had a comfy corner with books and board games with squishy sofas too, we stayed till we were all ready for bed and off we went into the cold and back to the vans. It was funny when we got back to the van as most of the others have diesel heaters and it sounded like an assortment of small jet planes taking off.. haha
Saturday morning dawned bright and clear with beautiful blue skies so not even the slight chill in the air could keep us inside.. after brekkie everyone was out and about chatting and decided it was too good an opportunity to miss for all 5 blokes with drones to give them all a good fly around so John, Keith, Mevi, Darran and Colin stood in line and had a right laugh and play, flying through gaps in trees and using the “follow me” function (Mevi..) and running round like big kids. Mevi was kind enough to let Purdy have a play with his drone too.
Bellies started rumbling again so we started to get ready to have a lovely walk into Austwick where we had been assured was a lovely dog friendly pub and a shop. We set off at a variety of paces and even saw a cute little field mouse as we were leaving the site, it kept following Darrans feet, bless, proper tiny it was..
It was a lovely 15 minute walk into the village, very cute and quaint and we headed for the Game Cock (so many jokes..!!) and saw Ken with Stompy nicely settled by the fire. We needed a bigger space so found a lovely private little side room where we all squoze in nicely and ordered some really good food – it was a pleasant surprise to see a french menu in such a small village but when the lovely chap came to take our order and was very french indeed it all started to make sense.. mushroom stroganoff, poulet a la moutard and many others were eaten with gusto..! We settled up and decided we would head to the shop then make our way back to the site, after an aimless walk around and a nice chat with a local villager we found the shop had closed so we walked back in the sunshine – such a lovely little road between the Site and the Village and the fields were full of horses and sheep and a little steam meandered through them with ducks and a heron that we saw 2 days in a row, it is such a gorgeous little place.
When we arrived back at the camp it was time to get ready for the Live stream with the Boondockers to get them over the 1000 subscribers mark..! Lots of mini live streams were underway to try and drum up viewers for the actual stream – Mevi was on form running round the camp giving his viewers a tour and showing off the local sheep and generally being high on life 🙂 it was hilarious to watch, especially as he was answering questions as he went along. Time for the live stream was approaching fast so it was time to set up. Unfortunately due to some new rules by YouTube, you can’t live stream from a mobile device unless you have 1000 subscribers so thankfully Kirsty has a laptop which was set up on the table outside and linked up with our wifi so we were good to go – a few of us watched the live stream from our phones so we could read out the questions so none were missed (Apart from Liam messing with everyone and making us look for his question.. The ratbag! haha) Technical issues were had and mostly overcome and in the end after live stream number 3 they were left with a decent count over the 1000 subscribers!! Whoop! A success all round..
It was then time for tea so I decided to cook something small but use the camp fires to cook again as I didn’t want to be stuck inside – no matter how much warmer it was in there.. Haha.. So rustlers BBQ pork ribs and bacon crunchies were cooked in the ridgemonkeys (I love those things!!!) on the fire, leaving them both a bit scorched in the end. They turned out well and were devoured pretty quickly. Purdy and Darran then borrowed the Ridgemonkeys to cook their burgers too – it’s such a fab way to cook and still be social – I know loads of people will be saying that cooking on a fire is normal and done all the time but i was incredibly excited as it was my first time and i also didn’t burn anything!!! Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay!!
As day turned into night the fires grew bigger and bigger we thought we would keep up with a little something we started when went to Keith and Darryl’s meetup in Biggin – YouTube faves on the projector!! This time instead of rigging up our spare bedding we decided to use Mevi’s van – he’d been ever so nice to clear all the bird poop off it in the day so it was a lovely clean white screen. The Boondockers, Darran and Colin all chose their favourite videos and we watched while huddling closer and closer to the fires (not even the beer was helping with warmth at this point…!!) Kahlan thought the big screen was cool and watched her 3rd birthday video with her twice her normal (itty bitty) size.. We moved Colin and Darrans vans a bit closer to try and make a wind break too, not too sure if that helped or not – we were frozen at that point!
We watched the fires burn down to embers and had in depth conversations (the kind you can only have late at night round a campfire in the cold) about cheese.. We love cheese and it seems so does everyone else – I love that part of the vid, it’s so typically random!!
Bless John – he felt the responsibility of keeping a group of people entertained (those who wanted to be anyway..) and was relieved on the Sunday when everything seemed to have gone to plan – we’d had a fab time and had laughed so much so we hoped everyone else did too.
Darran had to leave early so he had gone by the time we emerged from the vans, Kev wasn’t too far behind, Mr Stumpy hadn’t been too well over the weekend so he decided to head home as he had a bit of a drive ahead and literally popped his head in to say goodbye. We all packed up our things ready to visit The RibbleHead Viaduct, leaving Keith and Darryl at the site with Darrly’s son who’d popped in to see them (lovely bloke – spitting image of his dad!).
It was decided as we were leaving that food was required – Dave suggested a lovely Climbers cafe in Ingleton so we headed there first. We took over a good portion of the cafe with people, bags and dogs and had a good ole fry up. Ingleton is absolutely lovely with little shops and gardens and an old viaduct spanning the valley which is no longer in use. We need to go back for a bit longer next time we are in the area I think.
We packed into the vans again and drove the short way to Ribblehead Viaduct and managed to find parking quite easily for the 5 vans left. MY goodness it was windy!! Not quite Portland Bill Lighthouse kind of windy but windy enough – no drones out there today! The dogs all had a good run around and Kahlan was leading the way. It’s a lovely place to visit with big wide paths and plenty of space. It didn’t take too long for us all to decide it was time to get out of the wind and head home. We all said goodbye by the roadside and promised to meet up again soon.
Blimmin fab weekend!! Bringing life online to real life is way more fun than I thought it would be 😀
EDIT: The following Sunday we sadly found out that Kev’s lovely old boy, Stumpy had been put to sleep. Stumpy had been with Kev for 20 years and it was heartbreaking to learn he had lost him. Here is the link to Kev’s videos about the little guy. God bless you Stumpy.. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KUJbKYtX6ak&t=0s
A HUGE thanks to the following people for making the weekend such a great event;
Mevi – https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC66SZm1av6A5B8ordMmicig
Dave, Louie & Jo – https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC0EqsSt8blONVOH4b-PzJrQ
Daryl & Keith – https://www.youtube.com/channel/UClsXDNpqDfvEInhXLJmP86A
Darran – https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCBnF7q4L-h4aP440PylsQYg
Kev – https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCtNfG2vn1I259EE_QihrT7Q
Colin – https://www.youtube.com/user/tonkasdad100
Purdie & Kirsty – https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCskQqaP9kuWuMAuZCbUbzBg
If you liked this video and its contents please share it on social media and give it a thumbs up as it really helps spread the love.
Are you interested in the Gear used to produce this video? Here’s a link to all my tech I use to record and produce my videos…
https://www.johnandmandy.uk/filmmaking-gear/
Thanks you very much for watching our videos and for your support. Follow us on Instagram @GadgetJohnonTour
