karen2205 | *blush*

Oh shit - that's nowhere close to being big enough.

Erm, it's the size of a big van, it's the classic van of 'white van man'. I'm not sure what's bigger than a Ford Transit but smaller than a lorry...

Iveco Daily? Mercedes Sprinter?

(Hit Google Images for pics, though many of the Sprinters seem to be minibuses rather than vans, i.e. designed/converted for carrying passengers rather than freight.)

I've driven a Daily before.

Are you planning on driving it? If so, are they aware of your age and how long you've had your licence? (And be aware that many experienced drivers find driving something that size quite intimidating,
particularly because you have much worse all-round visibility than in a car.)

No - I've no intention of driving it, and even I felt able to I can't because of the insurance - 4Rent won't let me drive it.

My Mum's driving it on the way out (she's been driving things much larger than this for a while now), and one of my adults will drive it on the way back.

For me, driving a transit isn't intimidating*. Driving a 7.5 tonne truck isn't intimidating. It's parking them and turning them round and backing them into narrow driveways with big walls that's intimidating.

*Well, not for more than about 5 minutes anyway. That's about the point that you realise that everyone is giving you a million miles of room.

Yeah, it was those situations and getting through narrow streets that I was thinking of.

It did take me a little while to get used to the lack of rear vision, too.

For me, driving a transit isn't intimidating*.

No - Transit sounds posivitely luxurious after a 7.5 tonne lorry! I'd be intimidated by the lack of internal mirror and by not being aware of how big I was - if that makes any sense, but I'm not driving it! I don't particularly like 7.5 tonne lorries for passenger comfort though - the radios don't work properly, the seats aren't particularly well designed - so it's squishy when you've got three people in the front, they're noisy and don't go very fast - just about getting up to 60 on the motorways....

It's parking them and turning them round and backing them into narrow driveways with big walls that's intimidating.

God yes! We got a tape measure out to check that the gates into the back of the shop were wide enough for the lorry to go in, and we found that there was plenty of room - then my Mum tried to reverse it in and couldn't, 'cos the road wasn't wide enough - you need space when dealing with a 7.5 tonne lorry.

I think you need a special bit of license to rent something about 3500kg Gross Vehicle Weight. Transit must be close to that.

Yep, unless you passed your (car) test before 1st January 1997, as my Mum did.

I nearly asked for provisional entitlement for HGVs and PCVs, but couldn't be bothered to go to my doctor for a medical report.

As, in fact, did I. I want an HGV, to be honest.

Umm why? They're slow, not particularly comfortable and difficult to park.

I don't want to park it, I want to drive it. You can earn lots of money for driving. Look at the weather today. Lovely.

I don't know how much the situation has changed since I got my license (mid 1990s), but I only took the car driving test and I'm licensed to drive (and have driven) up to a 7.5 tonne laden weight non-articulated lorry, which is WAY bigger than a transit. And a minibus. But probably not at the same time.

People with newer licenses can only drive up to 3.5tonnes, and there are restrictions on the circumstances they can drive minibuses in. But getting something like a Luton is still no problem, AFAIK.

<pedant>

a licence - the noun
to license - the verb

</pedant> ;-)

Sorry :-) I do know the difference, but I just didn't think.

http://www.dvla.gov.uk/drivers/vehicle_cat_desc.htm explains it all - personally, I'm quite scared that I could go and drive a 3.5 tonne vehicle with eight passengers right now and I think the new rules are, in principle, much more sensible than the old ones.

That said, it's been very handy for my Mum that she passed her test so long ago.

Even a LWB (Long wheel base) Transit is miles away from the limit; you can get a Luton which will hold _much_ more and still be within the 3.5tonne limit (possibly unless you _really_ load it).

Transits are pretty BIG. And fun to drive! How many peoples worth of camp equipment are you carrying?

Umm - I don't know final numbers yet, but there's four Young Leaders (all aged 16) and four (possibly five) adults, then there'll be around twelve Guides - maybe a few more/less.

But you wouldn't believe the amount of stuff we need - we're going to an empty field that has nothing but a water supply, so we need sleeping tents (ours are heavy-weight canvas), toilet cubicles and toilets, wash cubicles, gadget wood, oil drums and corrugated iron to build our fire (for cooking), a store tent, a first aid tent, two large mess tents and Lord knows what else (well I do, but I'm not listing it all here!)

That does sound rather a lot, depending on how much is collapsable, and how much is rigid etc. The biggest that you can drive on a regular licence is a 7.5 tonne (laden weight) truck, which fits so much stuff in it's untrue.

I know - my Mum regularly drives lorries with tail lifts - and they're enormous. I don't need something that big for camp, but I need something somewhere in between the two!

While we're pretty good at packing - eg. packing things inside the toilets, not leaving any wasted space, we do need to take a fair amount of equipment with us.

I've not driven anything since passing my test - my new licence arrived on Tuesday and I went all 'ooh shiny':-)

Wouldn't worry about it too much - a transit van really does have a startling amount of space.

We recently hired one to go eventing, taking with us 7 out of character tents (most of which were just dome tents, but there was one bulky ish frame tent), 5 3mx3M gazebo's, 1 21ft medieval wheel tent (2 segment 7 ft centre pole, and 'spokes' going out of it), a roulette table and wheel, a patio heater, assorted in character camp kit (sheepskins, clothing etc) 4 2x2x3ft wooden boxes filled with 'stuff' and 'misc kit' for 12 people.

We filled about half the van. OK, so it wasn't easily usable space, but we could have easily taken half as much again with a little more creative packing (and putting things away 'properly' when we broke camp).

I remember having the whole 'no way are we going to fit all that in there' moment, and was surprised to find that all I ended up with in my car was munchies and drinks for the passengers I had. (oh, and a LARPs sword that someone forgot to stash in the van).

Incidentally you probably want to check if you have a long or short wheelbase transit - they come in several sizes:
http://www.ford.co.uk/ie/transit/-/-

Umm - what's an out of character tent? I understand what OOC means in relation to role playing games, but not how you can apply that description to an inanimate object.

I'm thinking a Luton van is the way to go - in addition to all the stuff I've listed above we're going to have bags and bags of food to take as well. And yes, I know I could order it online and have it delivered to me/the site, but I couldn't cope with possible random substitutions for camp.

We're also going to have programme materials.

An OOC tent is one that is where you sleep, stash things like sleeping bags, and things that don't really sleep. You tend to have an 'in character' camp, and a separate 'out of character' camp that 'isn't there'

Transits come in three different lengths, and four different heights......so asking how big one is - well it's a bit like asking how long a piece of string is!!!

Sizes of each varient can be found at
http://www.ford.co.uk/ie/transit/-/-

blush

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