(I’m a bit late writing this post so although it’s being published in November the actual pilgrimage occurred in October)

I’m not a very religious person, I’d probably say I’m more spiritual. I am also a huge lover of architecture and history which intersects and has been influenced deeply by religion over the centuries. I happen to think that churches and religious buildings are some of the most interesting and beautiful spaces created, and obviously always have interesting stories that live alongside them.

The British Pilgrimage Trust is a company that I was introduced to a few years ago by my godmother who asked if I’d like to attend their one day pilgrimage across London as a birthday present. As I’m always up to try new things I jumped at the chance and we had the most fabulous day, walking with a lovely group of people from the Tower of London to Westminster Abbey, stopping at many religious sites across London along the way. We had two brilliant guides, one a choral scholar who recounted and sung the religious history of the spaces as well as a history scholar who was able to give the wider social history context.

The best thing about the BPT pilgrimages are that you are encouraged to bring your own faith, whatever that may be and to embrace the spirit of a pilgrim, connecting with nature, those around you and to share stories and experiences.

Since the London experience my godmother has done a couple of other trips with BPT but most recently booked for us to do their one day pilgrimage to Norwich Cathedral.

I jumped at the chance as I’d never been to Norwich before. After a very full summer and the sadness of losing my grandad in August, a day to connect with nature and spirituality seemed like the perfect remedy.

My lovely godmother organised it all and collected me Friday afternoon. What should have been a 2.5hr trip actually took 5hrs due to traffic but we made it to our guest house and on the recommendation of the owner went out to the most amazing Turkish restaurant. An early night was had and before long we were up having a hearty breakfast and heading off to the train station to meet our guide and other pilgrims.

5 of us met at the train station and we found our lovely guide Dawn who organised a taxi for us to travel out of the city to our starting point and to join the rest of our group.

We started in a village called Surlingham and opened the walk in the site of a derelict chapel being reclaimed by nature. We were each given a hazelnut (as they hold religious symbolism in this part of the country) and asked to privately set our intention for this walk. You could be asking a question, asking forgiveness, asking for guidance, walking in remembrance or just simply walking for joy.

From the outset I could tell Dawn was a fantastic guide as her knowledge of the area, the buildings and the history was brilliant, but she also had so much knowledge about nature and was able to point out types of birds we were seeing and identify plants and trees and their uses. She also had a fabulous singing voice and gifted us with pieces of music related to the places and nature around us. There were about 15 of us waking in total. Mostly women spanning different age ranges and all of us coming from different areas of the country.

We trekked across the country side sticking to the public footpaths and only being mildly drizzled on throughout the day which was lucky. Our walk was about 10miles in total over the course of about 6 and a half hours (this included stopping for lunch and at various churches).

I found it really interesting that at the beginning of the pilgrimage when were in the rural countryside I didn’t feel the need to talk much, but preferred to be silent and listen to the sounds of the nature around me, however as we entered the city I had the urge to, and enjoyed hearing and telling stories with the other pilgrims. It felt so great to turn off my phone for the day and just be completely immersed in our own journey and thoughts.

We stopped at several churches walking into Norwich and had lunch at a beautiful country park. As we entered the city it was amazing to see and feel the landscape change so suddenly from agricultural to industrial. I loved the Tudor and medieval buildings that have been preserved. We visited the Julian Shrine, a beautiful little chapel, as well as the St Peter Parmentergate Church, a 15th C. church now turned into an indoor skate park!

Finally we ended up at Norwich Cathedral just in time for the evensong service which was a lovely end to our day of walking. What a beautiful cathedral it is and they have done a magnificent job of restoring historic parts as well as expanding and merging new architecture with old.

Fully exhausted after a lovely day, my godmother and I headed over to the Jarrolds department store in search of a famous cheese she wanted to buy, and found ourselves toasting the day in their restaurant with some wine and lots of cheese! We made it back to our guest house where we promptly lounged in our pyjamas and enjoyed some Strictly Come Dancing!

What a fabulous weekend away and I’ll definitely be looking forward to my next pilgrimage.

Monday

In London all day for work and video editing all evening. My first new video, posted last week, seems to have the golden touch as it’s already at 2.4k views and has doubled my subscribers. I’m a bit shocked really as my previous videos never really got more than a couple of hundred views. That does put the pressure on to continue to put out good content, but I’ve been enjoying trying new editing techniques and getting to know a software called Canva to make fun thumbnails. Guess I’ll be putting out weekly videos for the foreseeable and see what happens!

Tuesday

My friend Laurie has offered to help install the rest of the privacy film on Betty’s windows with me and that’s music to my ears, as the windows being quite large make it very tricky to negotiate the film with only one set of hands.

It’s a beautifully sunny and warm day and even Lemon joins us in the bus. We quickly find our rhythm and have a long overdue catch up while diligently cleaning the windows, cutting the film to size, peeling the backing off the film (the most painful part of the process), placing it on the window and then squeezing out all the air bubbles.

It’s an hour and a half of peace and calm in the bus and before I know it the sun is setting and we have finished all the side windows. I’m so excited that from the inside you can still see outside and the film still lets a lot of light in. From the outside it just looks like the windows are mirrors. As I was admiring our hard work I managed to catch the reflection of the sunset in the bus windows. What a sight! Apparently the opposite of a trigger is a glimmer and this was definitely the most beautiful glimmer moment.

Wednesday

Brought down by a cold, no Betty time for me.

Thursday-Sunday

Turns out the cold was a chest infection so no working for a few days.

Will try again next week!

An exciting day today, because I’m going on a work day out to the Historic Dockyard Chatham. I’ve never been before and you all know I love boats, so this is a great work day for me!

As expected it takes me an hour to drive out of London but once I hit the M25 its smooth sailing all the way to Chatham.

The first thing I notice is that the place is immense! Even now that it is no longer a working military dockyard, the trust itself takes up a huge footprint, and the surrounding areas which historically would have also been part of the dockyard have now be redeveloped into an industrial and commercial estate.

My first surprise of the day is that I see a lot of film trailers and signs. It turns out that Call the Midwife (long running BBC TV Show and a guilty pleasure of mine) films here regularly, and they are filming today. If my colleagues aren’t careful they’ll lose me to the film set, surely no one would notice an extra conservator supervising. I’ve got professional Bridgerton expertise I’ll have you know!

I meet up with my colleagues and we are greeted by Paul, a lovely man and friend who used to work with us. It’s brilliant to see him doing so well in his new role. We are given some background on the history of the trust and how it functions to this day. Like most historic sites that are run as trusts and have no financial support from the government, they rely on grant money, ticket sales and corporate events to fund the continued care of the buildings and collections.

I love the diversity and ingenuity of these sites, to stay relevant and be a part of the community. They rent out work spaces in the historic buildings, they have multiple museum galleries and ships for visitors to explore. They host private and corporate events, feature filming, specialty tours and I’m sure loads more that I don’t even realise. They have over 40 listed buildings within their site which must be a mammoth undertaking to care for.

We are given a tour of the Commissioners House which is about to be restored back to its Georgian origin. It’s got the most amazing panel painting mounted in the ceiling which is thought to have originally come off of a ship that was being dismantled.

The aim of this project is to re service the building and re implement some Georgian historical features that have been lost over the years. Obviously the best part of the tour was being shown the secret passageways and underground cellars built from ships timbers dating back to the 1600’s

After some lunch we had the afternoon to free flow around the site. I particularly loved The Big Store, a covered slipways which now houses all the boats and vehicles in the museum collection. I can’t say I was a fan of the mannequins though, stuff of nightmares! We then visited the commissioners garden and the rope factory.

It’s an amazing feeling to wander round a site and buildings that look virtually unchanged from how they would have been in the 1960’s/70’s . It’s like falling back in time and discovering an alternate universe.

Finally before we left we visited the temporary and permanent museum galleries and I was blown away by all the model ships. The scale of them was once gain so much larger than I would have expected and the details so exact. I was reminded that in the days before computer generated plans and software the only way to scale and create an accurate plan for a ship would have been to build a hyper realistic model. Gosh, the talent that these fabricators had was unbelievable.

I am exhausted and happy and my brain is full of new learnings. What a fabulous day. I’d say we only really scratched the surface of what was here to explore, I didn’t even tour any of the boats, or the SUBMARINE!

I will definitely need to come back. If you are looking for a great day out with entertainment for all ages you should definitely add the Historic Dockyards Chatham to your list!

A huge thanks to Paul and the entire team at the Historic Dockyards Chatham for your hospitality and time.

Now that I’ve finally cleared the back of the bus, I can see the space that I’m working with and double check the dimensions and flow of my interior layout.

Ever since I put the deposit down on Betty I’ve been working on my interior and services layouts. I’ve watched lots of different van and bus tours online and although it’s not completely set in stone, I’ve got a pretty good idea of what I want it to do and look like.

There are lots of cool software programs online to help with designing 3d interior models but after putting in a few hours trying to learn how to use them, and not being happy with the results I resorted back to the good old PowerPoint drawing method. Sometimes simple can be effective!

As this is going to be an off grid capable campervan there will be solar panels on the roof at the back as well as an extractor fan at the drivers end to service the kitchen as well as one in the bathroom. I would really like a pull out awning, also roof mounted, and I’m even considering installing roof mounted air conditioning as I plan to travel in hot countries and I want Lemon to stay cool. As you can see there’s a lot going on the roof so this will need to be measured out carefully and fully supported from the interior so the fibreglass roof doesn’t collapse.

I will have a large freshwater tank, a smaller grey water tank and an LPG gas tank mounted to the chassis of the bus under the floor. To facilitate this I need to remove all the original flooring to expose the chassis as well as removing the hydraulic wheelchair lift that is currently where all my tanks are going to go.

At the back of the bus will be a fixed double bed running horizontally across. It will be raised higher than normal to allow for garage space, the water heater and all the electrics underneath. I am also hoping to mount it on ottoman hinges so that it can be lifted up/opened from the back doors of the bus to access those utilities. Above the windows at the foot end of the bed will be small storage cupboards for clothes.

Running down one side of the bus will be the kitchen. Along the lower cabinets will be a sink, oven, hob and a fridge. There should also be room for some storage drawers and a small pull out pantry. There will be small upper cupboards to accommodate more storage.

Along the opposite side of the bus will be a small shower with a toilet inside and the rest of the space will be a dinette that converts into a sofa and a guest bed.

There will be two captain seats in the cab of the bus, and the passenger seat will be on a swivel so it can face the back of the bus.

There are lots more ideas for storage and amenities that I’ve got rolling around in my head but so far these are the main plans I’m moving forward with.

As for interior colour scheme I’m hoping to keep it quite clean and simple with a light oak vinyl flooring, white tongue and groove walls and ceiling. The kitchen will be a gorgeous sage green and the bathroom will have a dusky pink tile effect back wall, and white side panels.

I’m hoping to sneak some funky wallpapers in somewhere and I’m very excited about having bright coloured fabrics for the sofa covers, cushions, and window coverings.

What do you think? Have I missed anything and how much do you think the design will change over the course of the build?

Monday

I have the next two days off work as I knew I would need some recovery time after my weekend electrical course. In my mind this was going to be two full days of working on Betty, but things never work out the way you plan. Half the day is a torrential downpour, so I potter around and do house and life admin jobs. I then have an afternoon meeting with my accountant (who even am I? An adult?). Finally at 5pm I head over to Betty to see what I can do before the light goes. I successfully remove the two passenger seats (even I’m surprised at how easily they come out) and give the whole bus a good sweep. With an almost completely clear space I decide to measure and tape out my internal layout to double check the plans that I’ve been designing for the last 6months. I’m excited to find that the dimensions match and the layout feels fluid and not claustrophobic at all.

With that success I decide to regroup tomorrow to start tackling the installation of the privacy film on the windows. I’m surprised at 7:30pm when the replacement part for my boat steering shows up (2days earlier than anticipated!). Tomorrow is supposed to be dry, so hopefully I can do boat repairs in the morning and Betty in the afternoon. Fingers crossed.

Tuesday

So not the day I hoped it would be. Waited around for the internet engineers who never showed up and spent 4 hours working on the boat repairs. It’s not finished yet but hopefully a couple more hours tomorrow and it will be good as new. A bright spot in the day was that I had posted the two minibus seats for sale on marketplace and someone actually showed up to buy them off me! Now Betty is officially clear. Here’s hoping I get the boat finished tomorrow and can finally get back to Betty.

Wednesday

Finally some success after what feels like the last few days of everything breaking and going wrong. It’s a beautifully sunny and warm day and after a morning of meetings I decide to take the afternoon off work to get on top of repairing the boat and other house jobs. Part of having GAD (generalised anxiety disorder) means that when I get overwhelmed I need to regain control over what I can by finishing jobs that are unfinished and tidying and organising my environment, it’s a way of regaining order. Simon and I attack my boat, and after a couple of hours we have the new steering system installed. I feel se relieved to have my boat back!

Bolstered from the success of repairing the boat, I decide the finish the hot tub deck, clean the hot tub and get it all refilled and heating up. The weather is so lovely that I take advantage and clear all the flower beds for winter and load up the boat with the leftover deck boards.

These are mostly rotten and broken ends so I see another trip to the recycling centre in my near future. At 5pm I have a decision to make. Do I head over to Betty and squeeze in an hour of work, or do I stop for the day and take some time to relax? In the spirit of this project being a marathon and not a sprint I decide to shower, make a curry and enjoy some wine. Now that the major house jobs are done I really feel I can focus on Betty. Hopefully once I’m home from work tomorrow I’ll have time to get started on the windows.

Thursday

Back to Betty!! After a day on site at work I made it home by 5pm, so I had about an hour to work on Betty. I brought all my cardboard over and successfully made templates of all the side windows. This means that tomorrow I can cut the film to size and maybe have a first attempt at installing the privacy film. I’m a bit nervous as it’s not something I’ve ever done before. I want it to be functional and look good but I fear it might be like trying to put a screen protector on a mobile phone.

Another small success is that one of my neighbours has asked for all my leftover deck board. This is brilliant as it means I won’t have to load it all back into Betty and do ANOTHER trip to the recycling centre. They are going to take it this weekend and hopefully they use it all. Fingers crossed.

Friday

Work all day and pack to go away for a semi spur of the moment weekend. (Keep an eye out for a post entitled Norwich Pilgrimage to find out about my trip!)

Saturday

Norwich Pilgrimage

Sunday

I get home from Norwich in the morning and after doing some food shopping and unpacking I finally have some time to spend on Betty. I’ve been procrastinating putting the privacy film on the windows as I’ve never done it before, and I don’t want to do it badly. This is ridiculous as we all know that the first time you do anything new it will probably be bad, but how else do you get better without practice?

I start with one of the smallest windows and seem to make a decent job of it. I then move on to a big window and immediately get the film stuck to itself and have to scrap that entire piece. I start again and manage to get it on the window but there are quite a few bits of dirt and bubbles. I decide to move on to the next window, and I might even decide in the end to redo that first big one. The third one goes very slowly as it takes me forever to get the sticky backing off the right side of the film. Honestly I need to YouTube whatever the trick is to not go insane while doing that. When I finally find success and get the film on the window, it’s a lot better than the previous one. At this point I have run out of energy to keep going, so decide to continue this job tomorrow evening. I feel happy that it’s started and seems to be working. Fingers crossed I don’t run out of film. I bet I will….

A reason I wanted to undertake a camper van conversion is because one of my ultimate dreams is to buy a ruin of a house and restore it, mostly myself. Carrying out that kind of renovation requires a lot of knowledge and skills that I don’t have, but which I am hungry to learn.

In my mind a camper van conversion is a pilot project of a full sized house. Essential core skills needed are carpentry, electrics and plumbing. I know there are many others but these are the ones I feel ensure structural stability and safety of the camper van and its inhabitants.

I have none of these skills. I could be so bold as to say I dabble in carpentry, but let’s be honest it took me 10min the other day to work out why the drill wasn’t making progress, and it turned out I had it set on reverse. So I’d say I’m in need of some professional tutelage.

Electrics are the area that make me the most anxious and which I know the least about. I decided that this was the skill to learn early on in the build, as having a solid wiring layout and appliance diagram is key to the overall living plan. Also the wiring needs to go in as the walls are being insulated which again is early on in the project.

After a lot of research I found a place in Croydon called the Builder Training Centre. https://thebtc.co.uk

They run professional qualification courses through City and Guilds London, as well as shorter hands on beginner and DIY courses. They cover all skill sets in building but I signed up for a 2 day beginner electrics course. The courses are offered during the week and on weekends and are very reasonably priced. My weekend course is costing £245.

I’m up at the crack of dawn to drive the hour to Croydon before my course starts at 8:30. I find I’m nervous. What if I’m the only woman? What if I’m the youngest? What if I’m no good? I’ve heard the saying, you should do one thing everyday that scares you, and honestly that sounds exhausting!

It’s not a strong start as I drive by the centre and find there’s no parking. My panic increases as I drive further and further away from where I need to be and know I will end up being late (being late is my biggest pet hate!). Finally, I illegally park in a MacDonalds and run back down the road.

I reach the centre out of breath and find the door is locked. I knock and ring the bell but there is no reply. I resort to banging on the window to get the attention of some men in a classroom. They let me in and I enter a room with about 10 men staring back at me. I am very quickly told that I am in the wrong room and that my class is next door. As I make a dramatic entrance for a second time, I’m slightly reassured to see a mixed group of men and women staring back at me, all looking as nervous as I feel.

A jolly man named Mike introduces himself as the instructor and I’m relieved to see two more people arrive after me.

Straightaway I can tell Mike is a great teacher. He explains things clearly and mixes in anecdotes from his business experience. He loves a joke and immediately puts the group at ease. The course is 50% theory and 50% practical. For the first couple of hours we get a crash course in the laws of physics and energy. My brain is sluggish as it tries to take in so much new information, unused to having to work in this way since being in school!

Once we all look suitably bamboozled, we are invited into the next room and each given a workstation where we spend the next few hours wiring up various circuits. Mike is delighted to inform us each time we have died of an electric shock due to bad practice. By the end of the day I’m fairly certain we’ve all died at least 5 times…..

I’m intrigued to find that I love the logic and colour coding of the cables, and it feels fairly intuitive as to where each one needs to go once it’s laid out in front of me. By contrast, I have hard time getting a physical feel for the cables and tools, and at one point it takes me 20min to get one set of cables securely into a terminal. By the time class is finished for the day (5:30pm) we are all zombies, our brains completely overloaded. I’m in bed by 8pm and asleep by 8:30!

The next day I start off a lot stronger, getting to the centre in good time and not parking illegally! The subject matter today is domestic regulations and fault testing our systems. I’m shocked to find that overnight my motor skills seem to have finally synced up with my brain and I’m able to handle and change my circuits with fluidity and ease. So much so, that I constantly finish ahead of my peers. Most importantly I don’t die at all today!

Everyone is more at ease and we start to chat amongst ourselves. The class is made up of half women and half men and the ages seem to range from 20-60. Most people come from London but one man has come from Norfolk. People’s professions range from HR, IT, Physiotherapy, Property Management and more. Most people are here to gain the skills to tackle small upgrades at home, to know when to call a professional and to have enough knowledge to not be taken advantage of by the professionals. I’m the only one trying to tackle wiring an entire campervan.

By the end of the second day I am knackered but feeling confident and proud. I have hugely enjoyed the course and it has taught me what I was missing in terms of the work I am going to be undertaking. Mike was gracious enough to go through my electrical plan for Betty with me, pointing out the best types and sizes of wires, circuits and breakers to use. He even gave me his contact details in case I need more help further down the line.

I’d say this weekend was a roaring success and now I’m wondering which is the next course I should take….maybe plumbing in a couple of months time!

As if one major project is not enough, the imminent approach of winter and the current bad weather has prioritised some house projects. The biggest one being in the garden.

As those of you who followed my YouTube channel last year will remember there was always drama with the hot tub. Mainly because when the river (and my entire garden) flooded it damaged the hot tub control unit. Somehow, with some help, I managed to take it apart and get it running again. Impressively it lasted well into the summer, being quite heavily used. Sadly in July it died, and I decide to replace it with another of the same model. BUT with the idea that before winter set in I would build a deck so that both the tub and the control unit would be raised up high enough to give me time to move them if we were flash flooded again.

In keeping with my previous projects I wanted to see if I could do it for as cheap as possible, and as eco friendly as possible so I sourced 4 wooden pallets for free off Facebook marketplace as well as a load of deck boards (also free!). It is brilliant having Betty bus as it makes collecting materials so much easier!

After getting all the materials back to the island the first step was to cut the pallets to size and level them all out. I used the smaller pieces of deck board and off cuts of the pallets to shim each pallet to the right height and ensure they were all level.

The next day I start cladding the top of the pallets with the deck board. It takes some time as I need to remove a lot of old screws and I choose the pieces that are in the best condition.

Finally all that’s left is to clad the sides. By this point I’ve run out of long pieces in decent condition so I have to use the off cuts that I have leftover. As I’m losing the light this will have to be finished another day.

After a total of about 4 hours the deck is mostly built and all that is left is to finish the sides and order the foam mats that sit between the deck and hot tub. This provides insulation and protection from any errant screws or nails I may have missed removing from the deck boards. It looks amazing and I’m really happy with my completely FREE deck.

So happy in fact I’m thinking of ordering some round solar lights to inset around the hot tub for that added ambiance…but maybe that’s a job for the spring.

You know when you wake up and you know it’s going to be “one of those days”….

First thing I noticed at 6:30am was that I had no internet. It’s only been a couple of weeks since I last had the internet engineers out because of a broken fibre cable, and based on the angry red lights emanating from my open reach box I fear there must be some new damage. I naively ask my neighbours if anyone else has lost internet but alas it’s only me. Vodafone say there is an issue in my area that they hope will be resolved in 24-48hrs but if I’m the only person on the island with a problem then it’s unlikely to be a system outage issue…I can’t face Vodafone customer service this morning. My neighbour kindly allows me to use his internet for my work calls this morning and I get on with the day.

I collect the window cleaner from the car park and notice the Teddington RNLI cruising down the river. They say a rowing boat capsized and went over the weir. They are searching for a missing person. This is a very real reminder that while we may have blue skies and sun today, the river is running fast and high from all the rain and it is so dangerous if you get into trouble. I make some progress on building the hot tub deck over my lunch break and commiserate with the window cleaner over the fact that he’s managed to total his new car that he only bought 2 weeks ago. I have to kick him off the island as I have more work meetings to get back to.

It’s now afternoon and I still have no internet. I realise at 2pm that I’ve run out of dog food and the shop where it comes from closes at 3pm so am grateful when my meeting finishes after 15min and I rush off to the shop. As I’m on my way back I get a message from some other islanders reminding me I said I would collect them from the car park as they are just back from their holiday. I rush off to meet them and we pile up the boat with their suitcases. They live on the side of the island where the current is strongest and it’s a challenge mooring up to their house safely.

Once they are off I release myself and turn my boat around to go downstream. I have a moment of confusion as I turn the steering wheel and don’t understand why the boat doesn’t turn, I look down to see the steering cable completely snapped. Panic. Send out emergency rescue message on the island group. Manage to grab onto someone’s boat and tenuously secure myself. Luckily rescuers appear within minutes, but the current is so strong that their boats can’t pull up besides mine. I have to release myself back to the river and once I’m floating away they can come next to me and tow me back to my house.

My plans for the evening were to finish the deck, cook some nice food and relax before a big weekend. Instead Simon and I spend a couple of hours pulling apart the steering mechanism and the wheelhouse of my boat. I’ll need to order several new parts and it will likely take a full day to re install. That’s a problem for next week. Simon and Laurie generously lend me one of their boats for the weekend.

I finally get home at 6pm and I judge there is about an hour of daylight left. As much as I just want to crash, I physically can’t leave a job half done so I get back to working on the deck and manage to finish cladding the top completely. All that is left are the sides but that will have to wait until after the weekend. I feel sad that I haven’t had a chance to work on Betty in last few days but I guess sometimes you have to prioritise things.

7:30pm I decide to be an adult and call Vodafone before their customer services close and get a lovely, yet unhelpful woman who books an engineer to come at any point within the next 24-72hrs. She says not to worry as I won’t need to be around because they won’t need to access inside my house. Even though I try to explain that I live on an island and they will need to meet me to gain access to the outside of my house, the message just doesn’t land. I lose the will to live and give up. I put in a final hour or so of work to make up for the lost time this afternoon. Still using my neighbours internet I watch a tv show and go to bed.

I’m exhausted and it’s been just one of those days!

Monday

It’s a beautiful sunny and warm day. Clearly the weather hasn’t realised it’s October, but I’ll take as many more days like this as we get. I have a very full work day of meetings, and hanging over me is the task of removing all the deck board from the back of Betty.

I attack this job with a little and often mentality and after 3 sessions throughout the day I have transported all the deck boards over to the island and all that is left in Betty are the rotten or damaged boards to go to the recycling centre. Speaking of the recycling centre I really need to go and completely clear everything out of Betty. A job for tomorrow. To make my life easier I load up everything that needs to go and she is ready for tomorrow. At the last minute I get a message saying that someone local has some pallets available which I have been looking for, for the hot tub deck project. I jump in Betty and we do our first night time drive. All goes well except that the road where these pallets were located was a small residential road with no turning room. I had a slightly queasy 10 min trying to reverse Betty out, in the dark, with parked cars down the side of me. Luckily no cars, nor Betty were harmed in this adventure. We made it home with Betty filled to the rafters of things for the tip and some massive wooden pallets. I’ll leave dealing with all that until tomorrow.

Tuesday

Another full day of work meetings, not leaving much time to devote to Betty. Honestly this working malarkey really gets in the way of spending time on my projects! To combat this I get up early and decide to move the pallets from Betty over to my house before I need to start work. They are hugely heavy and I wonder what superhuman strength I had the night before that meant I loaded them onto the bus in the first place. I manage to woman handle them into the boat and then out again into the garden.

The universe must have been rooting for me as no sooner had I finished, than the heavens opened and we had a torrential downpour. About lunchtime one of my neighbours met me over at the bus to relieve me of some of the furniture inside of Betty which he hopes to up cycle. I feel happy knowing it’s going to someone who will use it. Unfortunately there is still rather a lot left in Betty that needs to go to the recycling centre and I can’t really move forward with the conversion until she is clear and clean. Another stroke of luck. Laurie says she is free to come with me and we get a break in the rain and my work meetings! It’s strange to have a passenger in the bus as up to now it’s all been solo trips.

We get to the recycling centre and I see all the same employees as when I was there a few days earlier. They recognise Betty right away and come over to help unload her. She is clear in no time and we head home substantially lighter than when we arrived.

I feel this is a big success and step forward. Frustratingly, I have to be in London for work for the next two days so Betty will have to wait until Friday evening to be cleaned out properly.

Thursday

There is probably only an hour left of daylight but I’m determined to use it and get the hot tub deck sorted. Once I’ve smashed out this project I can go back to focusing on Betty. As hard as I tried to get 4 pallets the same dimensions, I did not, and the next hour is spent levelling and shimming them up to create a level, flat base which will then be clad in deck board. I’m impressed at how much I get done and hopefully can finish it tomorrow. The weather is really starting to turn so I’d love to get the hot tub up and running so I can use it!

Friday

An almost complete write off (see blog post entitled Just One Of Those Days )

Saturday

Electrics course day 1 (stay tuned for a separate post)

Sunday

Electrics course day 2

Round Up

Not a hugely progressive week for Betty, but some big wins despite! Completely clearing her of all the furniture means that next week I can giver her a good clean and start installing the privacy film on the windows. This will stop people being able to see inside, but I should still be able to see outside when I’m in her.

I thought I’d found success with the door lock but it still needs some tinkering and there’s actually a bit of work to do on the door to ensure it’s propelled greased and opens and closes easily. I also want to address some small areas of rust on the door frame before they become a bigger problem.

With the bus clear of furniture an exciting step forward is to mock up my interior layout and double check dimensions.

Stay tuned for all of this next week!