After paying the final balance on our caravan, and watching a load of videos on YouTube in an attempt to learn how to operate everything  from the toilet to the water heater, and from towing to charging the battery, we decided we needed a “shakedown” to try everything out. I’d never towed a caravan before, and had only just had the tow bar fitted a couple of days earlier, so we definitely wanted to go somewhere relatively close!

I’ve occasionally stayed in hotels where there is paid (or sometimes free) internet access. Typically this is provided via an Ethernet port in the room, which is intended to be hooked up to a laptop. These public networks typically present the laptop with a “splash” page at which you must sign up, provide payment details, and / or accept terms and conditions etc. After logging in or submitting the required information, your internet session begins. The MAC address (physical hardware address) of the laptop you are using is recorded, and usually this is the only device that is permitted to use the allocated time or credits.

To be able to share hotel  internet access between your devices, such as a smart phone, a tablet, a games console, laptop or media streamer etc, you can use a basic Ethernet wireless enabled router. Once the session is “activated” the MAC address of the router (rather than laptop) would be recorded by the hotel, and all your own devices which then connect to the router would be hidden behind a NAT. This works well, and allows you to create your own private wireless network, to share the hotel connection you have paid for.

I have often wondered how this could be achieved if the internet access is provided via WiFi, rather than Ethernet. This is certainly becoming more popular, and in my specific scenario, whereby I have just bought a caravan for the family, I will find that the internet access supplied at caravan and camp sites is WiFi based.

I have an Apple TV which I would like to use whilst in the caravan, for movie rentals etc. There are other media streamers on the market too, such as the Roku device, all of which are WFi enabled. These devices cannot “activate” the internet access on public WiFi networks as they do not have a web browser, so despite being able to join the usually unsecured network, they are unable to display the splash screen at which login details are collected, therefore using such devices on a caravan site, or in a hotel, would require some kind of bespoke solution. Typically families have multiple devices these days; I can foresee us going away for a break in the caravan and taking an apple TV, a couple of iPads, a couple of iPhones, a Kindle, and possibly a laptop (for when I am on call at work). 3G data networks are often quick enough that WiFi isn’t required these days admittedly (I can tether on my mobile), but in rural areas 3G can be poor to none existent, so I would always like an option for WiFi, even if only as a backup.

So back to the point of the post then; how to take a public WiFi signal, and redistribute it via another private (WPA encrypted) WiFi network, using standard NAT routing to hide your internal devices behind the single “WAN” I.P. address provided by the hotel / campsite / etc.

One solution I thought of, which is slightly cumbersome, is to connect to the wireless network using a laptop. Using a Wireless router connected to the laptops Ethernet port, the internet connection sharing feature of Windows or Mac OSX can be used to create a “soft” router, effectively sharing the internet access from the wireless interface over to the Ethernet interface, which in turn can provide internet access to the router’s WAN port. From there, the router does it’s thing, and your devices connect to it via WiFi.

A more elegant solution, I recently discovered, is to use a spare Ethernet router (a home router with an Ethernet WAN port, often referred to as a “cable router”, as opposed to an aDSL router, which has an aDSL modem as the WAN interface.  On this router you can install the amazing DD-WRT firmware, which unlocks all kinds of features and functions your router had never dreamed of being able to perform!

Of course, a cable / Ethernet router can easily share hotel Wifi which is presented via Ethernet out of the box, but to take WiFi, and share via WiFi, you need DD-WRT to create two separate WiFi channels on the router. Now that DD-WRT is running on my old D-Link device, the primary wireless channel acts as a client and connects to the hotel WiFi. The hotel see this as just another laptop, and record it’s MAC address, thus permitting that device access to the internet. The clever bit is that a second WiFi channel is created on the same router, which is secured with your chosen WPA key. I called mine “Wireless Repeater”. I connect my apple TV,laptop, iPhone, iPad etc to that network, and they are all assigned an IP address from the routers DHCP scope. The IP address assigned by the hotel is taken by the routers WAN port, and in this arrangement the router is doing what any residential router does by design, it performs NAT /PAT, and all the internal devices appear to be using the hotel connection from the single IP / MAC of the router’s WAN port !

Of course, the access must be activated by visiting the splash screen, either to provide payment details, or to re-supply existing logon details. This can be done by any device on the “inside” of the router, so long as that device has a web browser. any smart phone would do. As long as the DD-WRT enabled router is the client that connects to the hotel WiFi, and not your other devices, it will work, as it will be that router’s MAC which is recorded, and all traffic will be seen to originate from that device.

Check out http://www.dd-wrt.com for full details of this powerful firmware, and for router compatibility! The guide I used is here

For the past few years we have been debating getting a caravan, or a camper van, or even a house tent. Finally this month we decided to go and view a few “starter caravans” after I had spent a few days looking at examples on Ebay, AutoTrader.co.uk as well as other places.

A “starter” caravan as far as I’m concerned is something to introduce us to owing a “van”, without spending, or more specifically borrowing, huge sums of money.
We wanted something that was clean, reliable, practical and safe, without being over the top for our basic needs. After all, if things didnt work out, we wouldn’t want to have lost a load of cash.

We went to a caravan storage site at Fence Houses in Co. Durham as they have a number of used vans for sale. We saw a 1994 Compass Reflection Merrit 430 (4 birth) which had recently been accepted as a part exchange. We instantly knew it was perfect!  We agreed a price of £1800 which was to include a full service and valet (i.e. all “systems” were to be fully working, and repaired if not) and also all related accessories for the first trip, such as electric hookup cable, Aqua Roll water barrel, waste hog container, water pump, step, gas bottle, regulator, etc, would be thrown-in.

We paid the deposit, and whilst we waited the week for the van to be readied, I arranged for a removable swan neck tow bar to be fitted to the 5 Series, by a reputable company in Seaham. We picked the van up a week later, and paid the remainder of the balance, as well as paying £65 for a new leisure battery, and £100 for an Al Ko stabaliser to be fitted. A bargain if you ask me. We had a look around the van, and it really was mint. Besides a small amount of mildew on the shower curtain (which has subsequently been replaced by a bright colored curtain from Ikea!) and the obvious old-looking A-frame and tow hitch, it really was incredibly tidy for the age. The couple who own the storage yard gave us a comprehensive demonstration of how how to use the water, water heater, gas, toilet, etc, and we were good to go.

The Reflection is a 4 birth van, the front making a good sized double out of the two side sofas, and the rear “L” sofa makes a pair of small bunks. It has a “wet room”  with hot shower / toilet / washroom with skylight and wall cabinet. There is hot running water (electric or gas boiler), a 3 hob gas burner, grill, gas fire, and 12 volt lighting. There is an Electrolux fridge which can run via the towing vehicle, gas, or 240v. There is obviously electric hookup, which runs x3 240v sockets, charges the leisure battery, runs the water heater (optional) and runs the fridge (also optional). There is a cassette toilet also. There is also a 12v socket to tap into that system, which can be used to run a 12V TV or to charge a mobile phone etc, in the event of setting up on a none electric site.

We are very happy with the new purchase needless to say, and after various trips to Ikea, and a load of purchases on ebay, we are about ready for our first “shakedown”