Divine Timing
Isn’t it amazing how things happen!!
Lotta (the campervan) broke down on her second outing with me right on the bend of a very busy junction (the Rackstraw Cross Roads near Marks and Spencer in the Meadows Camberley).
Three hours later the AA arrived – what a nice man, a very, very, very nice man. And he said it was the Distributer Hall Chip. Next day off she goes to the doctor ….. A VW specialist and two days later he phoned to say as far as he was concerned he couldn’t find the problem that it had been running fine for the whole time.
So I picked her up and went off to Norfolk (I had booked a camp site on the coast to ‘try out’ the fridge, cooker etc., before going off overseas.
5 miles from my destination at 2200hrs she broke down for the second time …. so what to do ….. close the curtains, put the bed up and go to sleep. Next morning she started first time only to travel another mile or so before stopping. So the AA was called and diagnosed the Distributor Hall Chip again and ‘Lotta’ was loaded onto the AA transporter and delivered to Mark in Reading (if you are reading this Mark it would be nice to have a photo of you – my hero!).
Meanwhile as you know I was going off to the Monastery in Wales for a week ….. just at the ‘right time’ a friend of mine was going abroad for a month or so and said here take my car ….. I drove to Leicester to meet up with Sky (Shekina Kumara Yamine) the lady who was going to Skandavale too.
My week at Skandavale was interesting to say the least!
We had planned to arrive at 1300hrs to be able to join in with the 1330hrs Pooja and arrived at 1350hrs!! We were told to have lunch and then to check in at Reception. Lunch (Dinner and Breakfast is rice).
After lunch we were shown to our accommodation – a wooden chalet with three rooms all with bunk beds, a heater three coat hangers and one hook on the wall. Sky and I decided to orientate ourselves and walk around the beautiful grounds (over 100 acres – not that we walked around the lot!) then met up with some people who told us we had arrived at an interesting and very commercial time …. Shambo the bull has been threatened with slaughter and so they had put the bull in the temple, started a petition and were waiting for the media (BBC/ITV and Radio 1,2,3,4 etc etc etc) to arrive …. (www.skandavale.org) so what was meant to be a quiet, peaceful, soul searching time to connect – had peculiar interruptions!! One afternoon I came back from a walk to find Nuns and women guests digging a trench with pick axes to house the cable for the web cam they wanted to install in Shambo’s Stable/Temple!
I have to say apart from the commercialism I had some very beautiful experiences and some very emotional experiences, met some lovely people, a beautiful buffalo named Leo and had a wonderful conversation with Vali the elephant.
Tell you what – when it rains in Wales it really does rain! On the last day the sun came out ….. Divine Timing?
I dropped Sky off at Bristol train station and drove to my Daughter’s home because she was off to Austria with my Granddaughter for 5 days ….. somewhere to stay ….. Divine Timing?
Mark confirmed that Lotta was ready and that she had been running without a hitch so I arrived at the garage and put the key in the ignition – she started – off I drove for three minutes and she stopped ….. back to the doctors – I was beginning to rationalise that the reason this 1990 VW campervan only had 43,000 miles on the clock was because it spends most of its time on the back of a transporter …..
I just wanted to cry.
That was Wednesday – on Friday I popped round to Roz’s (the amazing Fairy Cottage Web guru) to post the Shewee (www.shewee.com) (I bought these amazing contraptions because they are ideal if you are caught short and there isn’t a loo around!) through her letter box but it was too big to post so I knocked on the door. Roz was in a tis because she had booked a week’s holiday and Fluffy (one of her cats) had been run over and needed to be looked after ….. somewhere to stay ….. Divine Timing?
Mark called to say Lotta was fixed – REALLY FIXED so off I go again to pick her up and Y E S she has behaved ever since.
At the end of the week my Daughter was off to Wales for a week so I have been staying here in Caversham just running around to check that the wonderful home on wheels was gonna behave and she has …..
So I am at last putting the plan into action of heading off to warmer parts ….
By the way I am going to re-name the campervan because I think Lotta is not the name for her (Lotta trouble!)
Any ideas ??
