Strange place for a van...

At the Marina
Originally uploaded by chicken.loop

This is where the BWV is living. I needed to clarify to many faithful readers where the van is in relation to me - the answer is that I've discovered another whole area of human activity of which I'd previously been ignorant: van storage. All over the country, there are large tracts of gravel set aside for paying customers to leave motorhomes and trailers until they need them, thereby avoiding the need for people to have BWVs parked annoyingly outside their (probably somewhat smaller) homes. And there is a story that thieves know that you're out when the van's gone.

I was reluctant to take the BWV to London, mainly because it presents a large, tempting, white surface for local youth with spraycans (some of the graffiti is amazing, top marks for typography, but I don't want it on my van). So: for a small sum (and it is surprisingly small), I get a parking space in a compound near Daventry at a rather nice narrowboat yard with a chandlery and cafe and a very good petstore nearby for those little 'oh-no-we're-out-of-Markies' emergencies.

The cafe serves good, honest cups of tea in good, honest white china mugs to thirsty boatspersons, as well as home-made cake and a rather cracking cheese and onion sandwich. It's run by two large chefs in clogs. Next door to the cafe is a fantastic shop that sells rope, chains, brass things to screw onto your narrowboat, maps, snacks, waterproofs, candles, electric flex, bilge pumps - indeed, anything a person might need and then some.

When I arrive with the car I can leave it in the space where the van lives, take the van away, and swap them over when I come back. There are several posh vans, but many more posh trailers, and some decidedly non-posh examples of both - things that look, frankly, like they haven't moved for a decade, and probably now can't move at all. But this illustrates the value of tourer as fantasy object: their owners are probably sitting and dreaming of the time when they may just give it all up and go off in the van. It's probably worth the money.