When we first explored Molly every cupboard was still littered with clues of bygone times; OS maps, a tourist pamphlet for Cheddar Gorge caves, McDonalds Happy Meal toys, story tapes, birthday cake candles, a bright pink canvas purse displaying ‘Siobhan’ in scrawled biro, china tea cups, orange floral camping chairs, a straw hat, shells and pebbles from various beaches, scrabble and backgammon, a whistling kettle.
The Canavan’s bought Molly in the late-80’s from an elderly couple called Mr and Mrs Picton-Phillips who lived in Beckington, near Bath, and who had loved and used Molly, the log book tells us, since 1974. The Picton-Phillips’ informed Charlie that the van’s name was, and always had been, Molly. And so it goes.
Molly enjoyed dozens of Canavan family holidays travelling the South West of England, parking by the seafront for a cream tea or sheltering from the rain playing Rummy. Until the children became teenagers and the camper was retired to the bottom of the garden to join her sister Dolly (so christened by a young Siobhan) in quiet repose for a decade.
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