With an amber weather warning being issued to the whole of Southern England, Wales, and the Midlands, Storm Eunice caused chaos when it hit the UK in mid-February.
An amber weather warning indicates there is a good chance that flying debris could present danger to life, roofs could be blown off buildings, and power lines brought down.
As a result of the storm, over 200,000 households were left without power, and the high winds brought about disruption. Showing the versatility of their campervan, one CamperKing customer sought solace in their van for 66 hours after being affected by this.
Here, in her own words, proud CamperKing owner, Lynn, tells us exactly how her Monte Carlo came in handy whilst fending off Storm Eunice.
“We are the proud owners of ‘Reggie’ a Monte Carlo by CamperKing purchased 18 months ago from Somerset Motorhomes (CamperKing dealer). We had previously caravanned for many years but having opened our own Caravan and Motorhome Club Certificated Location – a small 5 van caravan site – we found that we needed something more flexible for short stays and practical for day trips. Never had we anticipated just how practical he would be at home!
When Dorset Council advised all schools to close, we knew Storm Eunice was going to be bad. CL bins were stored, garden furniture packed away, and ‘Reggie’ safely parked out of the wind.
Working from home and homeschooling ended abruptly, about midday Friday, when we like a lot of homes suffered a power outage. The Power Track website crashed, then turned red with outages across the county. Living in a rural location we rely on electricity for cooking and to power our oil boiler, as well as all the usual lighting and electrical devices. We lit the log burner and expected the power to be back on soon, little did we know that we would be living off-grid for 66 hours.
‘Reggie’ who had been hiding from the storm, was brought to shelter as close to the house as possible. There was no chance of popping the top or putting on thermal wraps in the storm. Our van became our only power source and our only kitchen and dining room for the next few days.
The awning lights were hung up around the house. Thanks to the log burner keeping the house warm, we were able to sleep indoors.
Phones were recharged from Reggie’s leisure battery and our square Ridgemonkey kettle became my favourite accessory, there is nothing like a hot cup of tea in a warm van. Our diesel heater was a godsend, as it is so quick to heat up.
We felt very fortunate to be able to cook hot food on the hob in our van.
We have a Window Hood (Altitude Roofs) which due to the sheltered position and the strong magnets stayed in place, it was great to be able to have the sliding window open whilst cooking.
We have 2 Ridgemonkeys – and they really came into their own. The Compact Sandwich Toaster XL was ideal for our favourite all-day breakfast toasted sandwiches with bacon, tomato, egg, and cheese etc, whilst the Connect Combi pan and steamer set was used to cook gumbo turkey from our ‘Mindful Chef’ box, with our retro saucepan set from our caravanning days for the rice. The grill was handy for warming croissants etc.
We didn’t use the fridge as it was cold enough anyway, and it enabled us to preserve the leisure battery’s life (unfortunately, we don’t have solar).
We had hot water from the kettle, and at one point I did consider using our Colapz shower in the bathroom but we took up our friends’ offer for showers at their house instead!
As well as being a kitchen and dining room, Reggie van became a make-up and hair studio for my daughter to prepare for her dance competition, the warmest place and best light at 6am on a Sunday morning. He did a grand job, she looked stunning and danced beautifully, winning her category despite the hall having no power either.
Fortunately, despite having numerous trees on our land we suffered no damage.
Eventually, at 6.15 pm on Monday evening, the power supply was restored as suddenly as it went off. Thank you to all the SSEN engineers who worked tirelessly in difficult conditions to reconnect the thousands of homes without power.
This experience has taught us how flexible and practical our CamperKing campervan really is.”
