Auto-Sleeper Berkshire (2009)

Auto-Sleeper Berkshire

PARK up for anything more than a quick lunch stop and you’ll want to wind down the rear steadies, for when you walk from the cab to the Berkshire’s lounge – roughly equivalent in distance to walking from Windsor to Reading – you’ll feel the vehicle moving about gently on its suspension.

After an almost endless diet of firmer-sprung Fiats, I’d rather forgotten that motorhomes can do this. You’ll soon forget too, for the over-riding impression of the Berkshire is not one of wobbly suspension, but of space.

Like the Home Counties, the Auto-Sleeper Berkshire also has a certain British predictability about it. You just know that a motorhome like this will have a rear lounge. What you won’t expect is for it to be quite this enormous.

The settees each measure over 6ft 8in in length, and the generous width of this motorhome means there’s room to go ballroom dancing between them. Enormous windows on both sides and at the rear – plus a wind-up Heki sunroof above – only add to the feeling of space.

Needless to say, the two of us had plenty of room in which to stretch out, and we never regretted that decision to leave the tent at home! Auto-Sleepers, meanwhile, completed our comfort with matching armrest and scatter cushions, plus the obligatory cocktail cabinet (with crystal wine glasses).

Bringing things up-to-date, below the drinks cabinet the Berkshire has a 15-inch flatscreen TV mounted at a comfortable viewing height (and hidden behind a tambour door) – not that we could realistically watch this when original Ford GT40s were blatting past only 100 yards from our pitch.

The three gas burners and one mains hotplate cooker is just part of a domestic-style slot-in unit that also includes an oven and grill. Alongside, the stainless steel sink and drainer has a Chinchilla Glass lid (suitable for chopping on) and next to that is a huge expanse of uncluttered worktop, an expanse that gets even bigger when you pull out the extending part of the galley.

Don’t park with the vehicle sloping to the nearside, though, or the extension just slides straight back in again!

A similar silver tambour door to the one hiding the television hides an eye-level microwave, and there’s fitted crockery – real crockery, not cheap plastic – and a spice rack on the wall.

The fitted waste bin isn’t so impressive, but at least they fitted one. Which leaves the fridge – whose 88 litres capacity and lack of AES disappoint.

The table – once extracted from the wardrobe – is not of banqueting proportions, however. It’s free-standing, which is a bonus, but it’s rather narrow to be reached comfortably from both settees at once.

The washroom may be woefully under-equipped with storage space, but the rest of the vehicle has more cupboards than a three-bed semi. There’s so much under-seat storage space that you’ll run out of payload (435kg for the standard model) before you run out of room for duty free on the way home.

A full version of this review first appeared in the November 2008 issue of Which Motorcaravan. To subscribe to the magazine, click here.

Typically British motorhome with a pleasant U-shaped lounge and the benefits of a Mercedes base vehicle. The small fridge disappoints, though