After the failure of last year’s Christmas expedition, this
year I decided not to go too far away from home. While rain and snow are not
much of a problem for me the wind is a different matter. The design of XOXs roof means it catches the
wind so this trip I planned to make use of the shelter you get when surrounded
by trees. And having one of the biggest forests in the UK only 2.5 hours away
from home the Galloway forest park was an obvious choice and as a bonus it is a dark
sky area, I think the only one in the UK
.
I had a problem finding a campsite for the first night out
as most of them close for the winter so I ended up 30 miles away from the
forest, but it gave me somewhere to aim for, so after a lunchtime start on the
Tuesday before Christmas I arrived at Garlieston camp site before it got dark,
after a most unpleasant journey with the rain lashing down, the road side
fields flooded and a lot of surface water. Even the campsite was awash the
owner having to run pumps to keep the water level manageable.
But XOX had no problems and Ash and I settled down for a nice
night, until the gas ran out!
Now on an ordinary camper or caravan this is not
a big deal right?
Just go to the gas locker and change tanks. Not so easy on
XOX. The gas is carried in a sort of U shaped bracket behind the nearside back
wheel and the bottle has a webbing belt to hold it in place. Now as you can
imaging all the !ӣ$%^& from the wheel gets plastered all over this belt
and the bottle so getting it undone and the replacement one fitted is a gloves
and swearing job at the best of times, add that to doing it standing in 2
inches of flood water, in the dark using a head torch to see what you are
doing, and with the rain poring down, made it a proper sod of a job to do. But
I managed and the kettle was soon boiling away again.
Up and about quite early on day 2 meant all the chores where
done, Ash walked and we were on our way by 10 and I was experimenting using
Google maps on my phone to do the navigating with.
Bigish success,
Google maps works very well indeed, but the 12 volt USB charger I have is only 1/2 Amp so it
could not keep pace with the battery drain, it kept going flat, not too much of
a problem this time as I left it on charge while walking Ash and going to look
at things that interested me.
Red deer where the first attraction, the forestry commission
has a feeding station and they have a hide close to the road that you can watch
the deer from. There were only 4 when I was there but they looked as nice as
they usually do even when butting heads.
Then a drive to a forest track and a
short walk took me to the “Black Loch” that has a very odd looking, sculpture? folly?
Thing?(see photo they are all clickable BTY)
But this was a good place to have brunch (I know how to
upset people with the smell of bacon and eggs wafting out over the forest lol) and
them off again to “Ken-Dee Marshes nature reserve”
Nice place with 2 hides
although I only went to the nearest one as it was quite a long walk from the
car park. I did manage to see a Red Kite on my walk there and lots of small
birds on the feeders that I will need my mate Malcolm to identify for me as I haven’t
got a clue about 2 of them.
By the time I was on the road again the light was starting
to fail so it was time to find somewhere to spend Christmas Eve. A small
forestry side road was just the job. Trees on both sides but not to close (no “widow
makers” I did look) so a nice and sheltered spot to spend the night.
Well!! spend the night is not quite right, as it was 3ish
when I stopped so what to do with the rest of the afternoon and evening? An
early evening meal, some audio book time (off to a galaxy far far away) and by
then it was dark enough to get the camera and tripod out for some star shots.
By the time the battery ran out in my inverlometer (posh word for timer) it was
10ish and a good time to open one of my x-mas presents.(the shape gave it away)
That turned out to be one of the nicest malt whiskeys I have ever had (thank
you, You know who you are).
A very wet night with hail stones bouncing off the roof hard
enough to wake me up at 3.30 but for all that I slept until after 8, some tea
and then opened the rest of my presents, Thank you Sheila I tried it out by walking
Ash down the track with the hood up, and Sue the hat is great I had it on all
the way home.
Then all packed up we went exploring again, I had to detour
around a flooded road to get to Gatehouse of Fleet and then on to Kirkcudbright
and a viewpoint called “Solway view”, even though it was X-mas morning there
were a few too many people about for me to be comfortable with, so brunch was Marmite
on toast with tea of course, in a lay-by and then I decided to head home.
My water carrier was leaking, (unknown to me) so the carpet
in the back of XOX was wet and the power problems meant I could not use my toys
properly and that was very frustrating as I wanted to see the images I had
taken over the last few days, so home and a shower sounded nice.
It was a good trip all together. The weather on Christmas
day was lovely and as usual I learned a few things.
If you have toys you
want to use you need the proper power supplies to keep them working. ½ amp chargers are no good for smart phones or
tablets.
When the leisure battery is down to 11.8 vaults, (I had a proper
volt meter with me this trip to keep an eye on it) Then 30mins with XOXs engine
running on tick over will put it back to 12.2 volts (why do wild campers need a
generator?? Just run your engine) and water containers don’t last forever buy a
new one.
Well that was my latest trip for 2014 apart from some
daytrips around the lakes between now and New Year. Thank you for taking the time to read this and I
hope it has given you a taste of what life is like for me. Have fun and all the
best for 2015 make it a good one. I intend to one way or another (there is a
song in there somewhere time to watch “Coyote Ugly” again I think).
Richard
No comments:
Post a Comment