In March 2020 we returned to the UK from three weeks in Poland where we had repairs/modifications carried out on the truck at Camperspol in Poznań. Then COVID-19 struck and we found ourselves in a lockdown situation as the UK was grappling with the global health crisis.
We lived on a four acre smallholding with two of our four daughters, their husbands and children with plenty of space for us all. In 2019, before leaving the UK for Morocco we had just about finished the build of our new house and our youngest daughter had moved in with her husband and their baby daughter. We were now living in the truck which was parked in the drive alongside the house. We were due to leave the UK in late April 2020, travelling with the truck on a cargo ship from Liverpool to Halifax, Nova Scotia. Lockdown stopped all our plans.
The weather was wonderful in spring / summer 2020 and we had lots to do by way of finishing off the new house and garden as well as preparing the truck for the next few years’ travel. One of the more important jobs was to weigh the truck fully loaded. I had calculated 14,000 kg gross but we needed accurate measurement. We used a weigh bridge at a Portsmouth scrap metal yard and found we had 9000 kg on the rear axle and 3000 kg on the front, so better than I anticipated . This then enabled us to apply recommended tyre pressures albeit these would be altered subject to ground conditions but it did give us a starting point.