Wednesday, August 30, 2006

Scotland: Staying in a Caravan

I've set a mental note to myself to post differently from Puan Mama Sarah's posts on her own blog www.nisakzin.blogspot.com, just so that readers would have two different perspectives on our stay in Scotland. My posts would be slightly out of sequence as well, so bear with me my friends :)

To me, our stay in Scotland was made ever more interesting by the fact that we were staying in Caravans. This was actually Auntie and Uncle De's planning (which is why I love travelling with these two people, they always have bright ideas on how to make the journey alot more interesting). They were at first urging us stay in a cottage, but due to the Bank Holiday Weekend, all nearby accommodation were all fully booked.


Our caravan site. At first, I was quite apprehensive about staying "in a caravan". I imagined living like gypsies (nothing wrong with that), in very cramped accommodation with limited amount of water that we have to share between us. I didn't even dare to imagine about toilet matters...


First step. By the time we reached the caravan site, we were nearly-to-tears tired. I had my share of carrying the 15kg Sarah, and we were walking for miles and miles along the hills and valles of Edinburgh city centre - in very bad weather, too! All we wanted was a good place to stay. Apprehension was building while we took our first steps towards our caravan.


Inside. I was blown away, and became so excited seeing the innards. It was like a small apartment. Above was us after uploading all our luggage into the caravan. True, space was slightly limited but as you could see:

Still inside our caravan. It was like inside a small apartment. Everything you could imagine inside a small apartment was available (from left to right): a small kitchen complete with microwave, our shower and toilet, a single bed, even a kitchen sink, a TV, heating, a stove for cooking food ourselves, a room with a double bed, and lots of small cabinets to stuff our things into. Cool!

The caravan had one living room with the tv and a small dining table, one room with a double bed, and two rooms with two single beds (i.e one small bed, and 4 single beds). If you had come KKL, there would have been plenty of space for you to sleep in - seriously. Probably with room to spare for Nnydd as well!

Happy smiles. Our expressions probably indicates how much we really enjoyed the trip.

All of us, outside. The space outside of the caravan was not too bad either. There were lots of open green areas between the rows of caravans, enough for our Amar and Sarah to run around in, the very second we open the door! Amar would run in one direction, and Sarah would run the other leaving me having to chase after both of them (before they reach the street). Safiya and Emyr were MUCH more behaved, though. Probably because their parents did this:

Locked in.


Evening.

Night. The day expired quickly, and Uncle De and I were left to hunt for food. Conveniently, there were chinese take-aways nearby, where we ordered Prawn-everything: prawn with cashew nuts, prawn crackers, prawn with chinese vegetables and spicy prawns. Prawns were the only thing we could eat (that's halal)! No one complained though, as I thought the meal was delicious, especially in such a special place.

Dozing off. The little ones soon fell asleep, and all of us settled into our seperate sleeping rooms. Auntie De described it as "sardines" in a can, and (LOL) in the middle of the night we heard two *BUMPS!* followed by cries of pain as *two people* fell of their beds! (LOLOLOL). I'm not saying who they were ...


Breakfast (Spot sapa tak mandi?). All of us woke up relatively early the next morning, ready for our next adventure (surely will be posted in next updates). Breakfast for me were Frosties and toast.


Ready for another adventure.


Fascilities around the caravan site. Within the compounds of our parked caravans, there were many fascilities for visitors: (left to right) an entertainment arcade complete with swimming pool, a laundry, a grocery store, a fish and chip shop, the fish and chip lady pouring lots of malt vinegar on my scampy and chips, and Amar and Sarah competing in a Daytona match.

Amazing. We only had to roll out of our beds to get food, and having a swimming pool nearby was truly great. The price for staying at such a place, to me, was not that expensive. Infact, staying a week for two families could be as little as £200 (i.e less than £70 a night or less than £35 per family per night).

Oh, did I mention the caravan site was near the beach?

The Beach

More pictures to follow dear readers...

PS
The only thing I was greatly missing: an internet connection!!!!!!!!!!!! ;(

18 comments:

Anonymous said...

Wow, I didn't know caravans could be so much fun. I, like you, have always pictured caravans as accommodation for gypsies and carnies.

Anyway, I was looking at the "spot the one who hasn't bathed" picture. The answer I guess is .... everybody?? :D

Missing an internet connection while on holiday, Uncle Mynn? A sure sign of chronic internetius addictus! Hehe!!

Mama Sarah said...

bby!!! i punya lah i 'berahsia' pasal caravan tu. dlm my entry i tulis 'our accommodation'. nak tunggu final day baru nak reveal. pecah rahsia.

Anonymous said...

Thank you for the kind thought, but I had the weekend planned - for almost a year - already.

Next time anyone goes to Edinburgh make sure you go to the city's beautiful mosque, itself was a Fringe event #48. They had a world-renown Chinese calligrapher giving talks and exhibition. The mosque kitchen serves good food (as excellent as Kushi's!) And plenty of halal restaurants in the mosque area too. None sells fried Mars bar though.

Anonymous said...

nnydd, we did go to the mosque area on sunday, but only to search out for some food as you recommended. we settled for kebab mahal. it actually lived up to its name, the portion was quite small for such price.

Anonymous said...

Teehee, initially i wanted to dine there too when my friend persuaded me to try the mosque kitchen. Pukul berapa you all went there? I was at the mosque from 'Asar until nearly Isya'.

pycnogenol said...

That's one thing I've never done - staying in a caravan. Sounds wonderful. I know of a site in Kuantan where you can stay in a caravan. May be I'll do just that the next time i'm there. ;)

Mama Sarah said...

bby, the whole caravan (3 bedroom) was £249 for 3 nights. (not a week)

tapi on a more quieter season - boleh jadi lagi murah.

Mama Sarah said...

bby penting ni. dato L(andlord) nak datang. tapi i kata you balik lewat. So dia nak datang after 6. Bolehke you siap $$$?

Hampa gas pulak dato tu nanti.

sorry, terpaksa contact melalui ni - your fone apasal buat hal? tak de battery ke?

Anonymous said...

Ya Allah, I tergelak besar bace pasal ade org jatuh katil tgh2 mlm. Haha sape la yang malang tu? I guess it wasn't u n Mama Sarah cause u used 'we' in the entry. Or was it u? ;)

Mama Sarah, kelakarnye nk ckp ngan husband kene leave a comment in his blog!

ayumi said...

Salaam..

Staying in a caravan looks really nice (that is, if the caravan is exactly like the ones you stayed in).

So, siapa yang jatuh katil tu? Hehe.

Anonymous said...

next time i am determined to get a nice cottage! was quite gutted tak dapat dok cottage hari tu. but the caravan was quite good fun! haha, tapi rasa cam nak runtuh bila the kids lari dung dang dung dang..

mmm.... off season ni cottages murah lagi ke..? ;) (tak sedar diri, padahal dah pokai!)
dato L, dato L L L, hehehe

kalau KKL join hari tu mesti lg meriah kan ? :D

Anonymous said...

auntie de, you rs kalau kkl dtg hari tu,mesti dia pun tobat tak nk anak gak?

mynn said...

Ajab booboo, your guess was not too far off. The only things washed at that time were just the kids' bums (perhaps not even those!)

PMS
ala, the demographics of your readers are different from mine bie, and not many of your readers read my blog so I'm sure you could still surprise them.

nnydd
if i had visited edinburgh much earlier that this, i think probably would have arranged yearly visits too! Pity we didnt get to eat the fried mars bar we hear so much about.

Uncle De
Kebab mahal, the literally Mahal pizza was not even nice!

Pycno
Make sure the wheels of the caravan are break locked. You don't want to sleep in Kuantan but end up amongst the monkeys in Taman Negara!

Bie
Sbb tu I tulis "could be as little as £200". What I meant was the price during non-peak seasons.

Naja
this blog is our sms....

I teringin nak cerita panjang pasal sapa jatuh katil tu.... boleh ke bie???????????????

Ayumi
I'll tell you guys about the Jatuh Katil incident one mama sarah approves (you know, being rahsia rumahtangga and all *LOLOLOL*)

About staying in the caravan, i think staying once for the experience would suffice for me. I'd prefer a comfortable chalet on pulau kapas any day! (but that's me!)

Auntie De
Jom, nanti cottage pulak ... kat St Ives lah (Cornwall) or Brighton, nak??

MS
ala ... i nak cerita bahagian "tobat tak nak anak" tu nanti lah bie!

Anonymous said...

heehee.. kalau anak macam i punya, mesti dia tgk je nak sedozen setengah. so watch out dato OK! :D

(in the background: dato OK, dato OK OK OK ..)

mm.. nak sampai cornwall tu, i rasa budak2 muntah 20 kali one way trip kut. mm.. nanti la lepas i finish my unfinished business ni.

Anonymous said...

i remember having a caravan holiday when I was younger at the lake district. We drove from Aberdeen in an old car which broke down when we arrived. When we went back we were in a brand new car..hehe

mynn said...

auntie de
i wonder berapa ribu anak O-K and KKL are planning to produce nanti. prepare the assembly lines!

o-k
what i remember most about your stories of you & your family while you guys were here was how you had a LARGE freezer, and you said you used to buy months worth of meat to store in the freezer. can't believe i still remember you telling me that (must be more than 10 years ago)

Anonymous said...

We bought the freezer in norway as it was difficult to get halal meat. We had to drive for i think 2-3 hours to a farm where we would slaughter 1 cow, a few sheeps and dozens of chicken for two families.. All this meat is then frozen in our huge freezer..

when we moved to scotland, halal meat was more readily available so the freezer was only used for storing meat and fish like a conventional freezer, though the quantity was not as much as in Norway.

Broke own in malaysia though after maybe 10 years in operation...

Anonymous said...

OK - bila anda telah pernah bersepara-mastautin di scotland? ...maybe KKL belum sempat bercerita

good..everyone hv been talking about Scotland lately..tapi tak singgah juga Glasgow, even to say 'hello or babai' (read:salam n salam again :-)..(takpe la, Glasgow takde apa2 pun yg menarik)