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TV review: Mel missed on Sue Perkins’ Big American Road Trip

© Paul MailmanSue Perkins’ Big American Road Trip.
Sue Perkins’ Big American Road Trip.

I don’t want to yuck anyone’s yum but I’ve never seen the appeal of caravanning.

Perhaps it was a trip to Portpatrick in bad weather in my teens that did it: the mild gale sounded, from the inside of our poky metal can, like the Horns of Jericho were blowing on the other side of the paper-thin walls.

It seemed to me the “when the caravan is a-rockin’, don’t come a-knockin’” sign on our berth neighbour’s motorhome wasn’t innuendo but instead revealing how they simply wanted peace to cower in their flimsy tin coffins.

Scotland’s west coast obviously has a different climate to the USA’s which is probably why Sue Perkins went there for her new series in which she experiences the dubious joys of caravan life.

In her Big American Road Trip she is touring Colorado and California to meet people who have swapped their homes for #vanlife.

These are young and diverse communities featuring the likes of Instagram couple Blix and Bess, two San Franciscans who are fuelled by social media likes as much as Calor Gas cylinders.

Perkins is personable and nerdy with a line in jokes taken from the Dad’s Book Of Cringiest Zingers.

“You could surface the M6 with this,” she mutters Partridge-like over her campervan breakfast granola.

These gags are wasted on her own. Where’s Mel?


Sue Perkins’ Big American Road Trip, C4