APPLEBY farmer Gavin Bell has seen his diversification dream come true.

Three years after coming up with the idea, the Bell family have finally managed to launch their new business — Eden’s newest, or one of the newest — static caravan parks.

Limited to 12 caravan pitches, Gavin and wife Anya, with the help of parents Alistair and Anne, have worked through Covid-19 to get the two-acres site ready.

Newly launched in June, the site has already seen reservations made on some of the pitches and there is interest in the static caravan they have on site to buy.

Gavin is a fourth-generation sheep farmer but, with changes likely in farming, he has recognised the need to diversify on his 500-acre Langton Field Farm. Gavin said “We’ve spoken to static caravan suppliers and know demand is outstripping supply at the moment, so we were very fortunate to be able to get a superb two-bedroom, two-bathroom caravan in time for the summer season, with another on order for late summer. We commissioned good quality, wrap-around decking with glass frontage that wouldn’t spoil the views and have been busy planting grass seeds and apple trees to start our new orchard. By the autumn, we hope it will all be bearing fruit.

“When we began our marketing campaign – we set our sights on selling a number of plots and our first caravan in the first year. Within the first two weeks, we’ve had a lot of interest with numerous people registering an interest and one or two reserving their favourite pitches already. But what we’re really looking forward to is meeting the family who buy our first new caravan. It could be anyone, and the family has been speculating who they will be – we expect they’ll love walking, the Lakes, and the fells.”