Darn it!

We were originally going to meet up with our friends Derek & Irene, but poor Irene has to go and have her dodgy knee replaced tomorrow so we thought this weekend would be a good opportunity too attempt to erect two awnings AND try out a new barbeque.   Two awnings?   Well we were going to try again to put up the full-size one (now known as Flash) so that when we go to France in a couple of weeks, we'll be well used to erecting it and the boys would have somewhere to sleep that wasn't going to collapse on their heads halfway through the night!   However, we have also purchased a small porch awning for when we are away at weekends and we were keen to put it up; I mean, we've had an air awning before, how difficult could this one be?

Our favourite weekend campsite is just 32 miles down the road although it does mean tackling the M25 on a Friday evening; we arrived at about 4.30, plenty of time to put up the new porch awning.   Ha bloomin ha!  Who am I trying to kid?   Well to cut a very long story short – because I’m sure you’ve all been there – we gave up and threw it in the back of the car!

We’ve had some glorious weather over the past couple of months. Today, despite intermittent showers (pouring rain) and the odd thunderstorm (or two), we decided to have another go, it appears the awning has a problem - it wasn’t just us – and her inflatable trunk has a bad kink in it and it just won’t straighten!   So, Ellie (as she is now known) has been returned to her box and we’ll be contacting the supplier on Monday morning.  

The idea of putting up Flash has been panned... get it?

Oh yes... Flash?  - because it is red and we put it up in a thunderstorm and Ellie? Because it has a wonkie air-tube!