Dr Mark's Tardis

Preserved lemons At home just before Christmas,  The simplest recipe in the Easy Tagine Moroccan cookbook, preserved lemons , what can go wrong? Well recipes are not exact, we all know that. So when it said cover the salted lemons completely with lemon juice, that's what I did... almost. Three weeks later:

Hex driver to 1/2" square socket adapter A neat adapter from ebay ( not sure how long the link will work ) that turns my electric drill into a spanner. Ideal for wheel nuts once they are loose. Great in places where there is not much room to turn a spanner. Most benefit on long studs with fine threads. It comes as a set of three sizes. Here it is with a 1 1/16 (27mm) socket for wheel nuts. The torque limit on the screwdriver setting saves my wrist from breaking.  

Savernake Forest 28 October 2013 Postern Hill Searched for Autumn colours, Found mushrooms and chestnuts.

All back together. Pumps up to 8 bar easily and holds pressure over several days. Really pleased. The bits All back together New bush New releif valve Tank

Clutch boot which one? Finally decided to replace the old clutch boot where the lever joins the bell housing. I'd been put off a bit by the prospect of disconnecting a perfectly adjusted clutch cable. Old and new rubber boot: Only that's not right. part number 93808673 (£6)  fits all clutch housings from 3.5t to 5.9t. But I've got a clutch from a 6.5t and needed a different boot (the hole in the housing is oval rather than rectangular). The new part, number  99479450 is actually smaller and cheaper (£3): Looks good: I could easily remove the clutch cable, but I never managed to work out how to remove the nobly bit - I just stretched the boot over it.

October 2013 Oil 8ltrs used - slightly above the |max| mark 2994057 oil filter 16508460 sump washer water 5ltr of concentrated 5 year red antifreeze. diluted about 50% Fuel filters changed.

28/29 September Stratford on Avon racecourse A chance for a get together look at other vehicles that are even madder than our own Refresher on preparing a pigeon, rabbit and pheasant and now ready for road kill venison. Tagine cooking together: Mark and Karen: Tardis Brian and  ? Deep Purple Rich and Lisa Yellow Also at the show: Animal carvings Bear and boy Parrots, yes Parrots And vehicles: A quad bike: every motorhome should have one. Big enough? Russian nuclear disaster reconnaissance vehicle - the perfect camper?

Bromyard 13-15 September 2013 Bromyard Folk festival A small folk festival with its own character.

I'm aiming to renovate the pneumatics, fix all leaks have two sources of compressed air because I need it for tyres and suspension have an air supply for air suspension seats which need 90 to 120 psi regulation and adjustment for the air suspension. All clean and serviced. Progress so far. I've cut it back to the bare minimum  Found a cracked fitting The tank now holds pressure with negligible loss. Made an adapter to connect the handheld compressor to the air system. Next to do find the filter on the onboard compressor and clean or replace it. done take out the air tank clean it and paint it. done connect up a seat and test it out.  Add a regulator for the suspension and a pressure switch to control the compressor. ready to fit Add valves to use the airbags for leveling. almost ready

Shrewsbury 24-26 August 2014 Shrewsbury folk festiva l Bank Holiday weekend, our top-of-the list folk festival Tagine practice I Potato and beef recipe Karen learns the Ukulele and goes on stage. I dismantle the pneumatics (but that's another post)

yes I did get round to a version II made of UPVC. In practice it works well for us. We can fill at the sink and empty into the sink, which is efficient for us.

Rhossili bay Gower Peninsula 10/1 August 2013 Camping at the Beach. Hillend campsite Camping with Simon and Mariya. Zoe joined us - but we made the children sleep in tents.

Just fitted a new acrylic mirror in the bathroom. From A&D acrylic mirrors on Ebay. Its amazing. As clear as glass, light weight and safe too Expert tip: Put more glue on the edges than the middle and press down firmly in the center until the glue hold sit firmly. The result is a mirror with a slight curve to it. Very flattering. I've dropped two dress sizes!

The fuel hose from Pollack valve to engine was showing deep cracks, everywhere I looked, generally on the outer of any curved sections. Just like on link. I bought a new length (3m was just right - a bit closer than I'd intended) bought from eBay: apparently the standard specification is SAE 30 J6, I used SAE 30J9 which is higher specification, though I doubt that makes any difference. I wanted more durable, but the  J9 is primarily better for biofuels because of is less permeable.  http://www.volksbolts.com/faq/fuelhose.htm  is a helpful site. Note that steel outer braiding is not recommended as it can hide potential problems and small leaks. In brake hoses an outer braiding adds strength to with stand the high hydraulic pressures. One finished I dissected he old hose. it is three layers: An inner (rubber or Nitrile tube: braiding of some sort: outer rubber tubing. The cracks had penetrated right through the outer tube, but had stopped at the braiding. The inner s...

Much Wenlock 20/21 July 2013 Festival at the Edge Story telling at a beautiful location.

we wanted a better sink: With a bowl we could fill from the kitchen sink Smaller than he fold down shallow sink Out of the way when we have a shower The design uses a wardrobe rail cut to size and shelf brackets that just slot into place behind the rail. the bowl lifts out, but is quite stable in the cut out shelf. what a brilliant design concept !! The rail Removal shelf ... plus the bowl. That's the prototype ... I'll finish it off later. Perhaps much later.

I took the easy option with the good shower room walls and decided to just cover them with vinyl wrap (sticky back plastic) Blue peter would have been proud. Well proud of the idea. Two attempts later, and after getting advice from the Internet, and it's not going too well. Dr Mark's tip: get someone more skillful and careful to do it ? more...

Photo from McDonald's car park. These are the times we we are glad to have an Iveco Daily camper. It's as large as can be and still use around town.  ...but the grass verge did help !! ...bike rack closed. !!

Gower Folk festival  14-16 June 2013 The greyhound at Oldwalls N51 36.354 W4 11.172 Not exactly near a beach, but to the North were extensive saltmarsh and to the South a small hill topped with Authur’s stone (he must have been something of a well-travelled stone collector before he built the round table). We were not here for the views, or the beautiful weather (so no disappointment there). Instead we came for the music. Well one of us did. But there was more than just music: Zoe joined us on Saturday evening. Karen tasted Gower Gold which “did not taste like a bitter” her half pint token used up, she then went off with a one pint token - surely that was mine – to get some more. And… Karen fell over. A nasty fall as the motorhome steps on the rough ground gave way. A few bruises that lasted a week or so, but no real harm done and a great weekend at a beautiful spot. We must of course be absolutely clear that there was no connection between the beer drinking an...

Ferry crossing, 14 April 2013 How did we get on? 1) Sunshine:   one hour/ all day / too hot / sunburnt We soon got an hour of sunshine, a full day had to wait until Sagres, but before that I got a sunburnt face at the secret beach . And the warmest time was Santander Port queuing up to go home… Ahhhh 2) Almond Blossom. No, we don’t think so. This suffered from a lack of research we did not know what it looked like or what the season was! Not much hope here. But the huge variety of fragrant wild flowers, herbs and fruit trees was glorious compensation – so we declare this a success. 3) Waves:  Bigger than me/ Bigger than the Tardis Yes, bigger than me. 4) Religious Procession. Yes, on Maundy Thursday in Salamanca . 5) A vehicle that is stuck: any other one/ ours/ one we help Yes, yes and yes, sadly. We helped some Portuguese men, who had their bonnet stuck, by lending tools. We came to a stop near  Aguas de Mura  when t...

Here are a list of stopping places, some we stopped at others we spotted - most are mentioned in the blog. Bear in mind the dates: we were travelling March/April so you may get a different experience in the height of summer. On our route from Santander South through Spain Santillana de Campos : A new, large and very welcoming service station, off the A67 N42 21.787 W4 23.198 Fromista A small very basic municpal Aire (includes waste disposal and water) off the A67 See the Blog (Fromista is interesting in itself) N42 15.891 W4 24.791 Salamanca Free parking in the city centre, by the river and near the historic town centre. Next to a Lidl No facilities, but seems to be well known. It is a car park for a municipal office, so no idea what it is like during the day. N40 57.458 W5 40.585 Banos de Montemayor A parking space / picnic place off A66. Flat plenty of space. No facilities N40 19.477 W5 51.697 Leon On our way back up. Free motorhom...

Coimbra Thursday 11 April 2013 The motorhome park in Coimbra was next to boathouse on the river Mondego. Early evening and the boats were out: mainly rowing boats and some marathon kayaks, and one single canoe polo kayak. So I went down to show that I recognised a canoe polo boat. The language barrier prevented any long discussion, in fact it prevented and discussion at all. We managed: “I play canoe polo in England” and he replied “I play canoe polo in Portugal” I went away content having established that we both played polo in our respective countries. Then I went back to the Tardis and looked at his rash vest in the photo I had taken:   

Journey home 11/12/13/ April 2013 What do Coimbra, Chaves and Leon have in common? Well for us they were all stops, with a hint, or stronger, from the Internet that we could park. And so it was; a common pattern of a city centre parking space at the side of the river in a park/sports/ recreation area. I really do mean in the centre of the cities, you could not have wanted a better place to stay, even if you had booked an expensive hotel. In all cases, close to and overlooked by the old part of town. It was the same pattern in Salmanca, and in smaller places or those without rivers: the Rossi, or market squares, made a similar offering at Estremoz and Evora. Coimbra we parked by the boat houses at a River Thames sized waterway. At Chaves it was a small car park near the hot springs where we tested the hot water on tap and I used the swimming pool for a shower. Chaves parking was unofficial, not recommended by the tourist information, but we had a friendly wave from the police....

On the way to Fatima Wednesday 10 th April 2013 You may be sceptical of the title, but I’ll tell my story away and you can make a judgment. From Sagres we had a long days travelling ahead, to Fatima. The motorhome guidance for Fatima hardly encouraging but we had a potential parking place identified on the map. Late afternoon, with 120km still to go and the truck exploded – well not quite an IED, the exhaust had dropped and was hanging down acting as an unwelcome brake. I tied it up and drove a couple of km to a service station. Surprising how little noise it made without a silencer – could we make 1000km to the port? We stopped the night at the service station, not quite what we had planned and they helpfully directed us to a mechanic in Aguas de Mura just a kilometre further. There we met Chico Barros, who spoke not a word of English (exactly the amount of my Portuguese). Together we worked on the exhaust, I removed it and he measured it six times before making a new ...