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Having just returned from our first Gobur Owners Rally at the Vale of Pickering we are prompted to share our experience as this outing was also the first opportunity we’ve had to use our newly acquired Carousel. We retired to the Eden Valley in Cumbria last year and had been thinking about getting a motorhome or caravan having toured in Canada the year before in a large rented camper. After that holiday opinion in our household was divided about the merits of camping. Deb loved the van, but I was less enthusiastic. When we resumed the discussion we soon got bogged down in the perennial debate about whether a motorhome or caravan would suit us best. At this point fate lent a hand when I spotted a private advert in our local paper for a ‘folding caravan’. Even in November the asking price of £475 seemed ridiculously low. Not expecting much we met the seller at a remote farm where the curious folding van was duly demonstrated. Well we thought it was marvellous, like a 1950’s ice cream van. Being total novices we struck a deal because we liked the sellers and liked the price. We learned the van had been purchased second hand from Gobur ten years previously and had more recently been used to visit dog shows. We didn’t even have a tow bar on our car so the owners kindly delivered the van behind their 4x4. The van was quickly reversed onto our driveway at home, and I was later to learn how difficult I would find it to repeat that simple manoeuvre. Deb christened the van ‘Chateau Collapso’ and we pondered what we had done. It was quite a surprise to later discover via the internet that modern versions of our ‘oddity’ are still being manufactured in Norfolk and taken far and wide by their enthusiastic owners. We decided to join the ‘Owners Club’ and sent off out deposit for the nearest rally which was in Yorkshire. The internet also put us in contact with a former owner, Terry Cole, who had a porch awning to sell which we eventually collected from Gloucester. Wanting to be sure the awning would fit our 10/3 model van I telephoned Gobur and spoke to Richard Moss, who I now know is the ‘top man’ at Gobur. I was very impressed when after asking me the serial number of our van Richard was able to tell me when it was made (1987) and that the original owner was a Mr M Cubby. With our awning collected and a tow bar and number plate fitted we were now ready to hitch up and head off to join other Gobur owners at the Pickering rally. After a cautious journey to Thirsk we met the caravan diversion at ‘Sutton Bank’ and promptly got diverted again due to a road closure. Finding ourselves down a single track lane with grass growing down the middle was not in the script. We eventually arrived to a very welcome cuppa from our hosts Norman and Joyce. Norman offered to show me our pitch and I was relieved when he said “just unhitch the van and we’ll push it back”. I later learned that many vans have ‘movers’ fitted but they hadn’t been invented when ‘Collapso’ was made. Nor was heating, it seems, and we were mighty glad of our fan heater as the biting cold wind from the east found every little gap in our joints. We weren’t the only ‘brown’ van on site, but we were the oldest. I’m sure reports of the rally itself will appear in due course, so I’ll not go on. Suffice to say that another ‘first’ for us was the ‘beetle drive’ on Saturday that Norman re-invented as a ‘steam engine drive’. The winning cry of ‘Sir Nigel’ will be an abiding memory of a happy time.
All the best
Howard and Deborah Bowron
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