Supermarket Parkups #4 - STEALTH Parking Van Life at ASDA!
If you’re a regular here, or you’re an avid watcher of my Youtube channel (thank you!), you will know I make videos and articles all about finding urban park ups.
Basically, I take you along with me and show you how I find park ups in all sorts of places, from supermarkets to fast food drive-thrus.
If you’re not a regular, welcome! I’m Darran and I’ve lived in my motorhome, full-time in the UK for over 6 years. As the name ‘The Urban Motorhome’ suggests, I predominantly park urban and very rarely stay on campsites.
Can you park overnight in a Supermarket?
In a previous video, where I stayed at Dunkin’ Donuts, my original plan was to park up overnight at Asda. When I got there, however, there were parking restrictions and I had to change it up.
So, in this video from my supermarket park up series, I tried again to do an overnight stop in Asda. I’m determined to answer the question, can you actually park overnight in a motorhome at Asda?
Above is the link to the video if you want to watch it. Below is the transcription from the video. Enjoy!
‘What's up guys, welcome back to another park up video. In today's video, I'm going to try to park up at Asda. Again.
We'll see if that's successful. I'm in Corby and I am currently in the ASDA car park, well it’s a big car park, there's loads of shops.
But what my idea is to do now, because I want to stay in this ASDA because I tried to do ASDA a few weeks back but I ended up in Dunkin Donuts instead. If you haven't seen that video, the Dunkin Donuts was pretty cool.
So yeah, go have a watch [of] that one once you finish with this I want to use ASDA as the base, I want to park in ASDA tonight.
But, my idea is to now go for a little drive around the surrounding area, go scout a few others, do what I would normally do, like show you where I would park & where I wouldn't park and see if we could find a few more.
I am new to the area, I've driven through in my truck but nothing other than that. So yeah, let's just get out of here and now go have a little look around and see what other places we've got, so we've got a few backups.
I thought this would be a bit of a good way to start because I do want to do a few other episodes in this series of finding park ups, where I just drop a pin and I've got to find a park up within like five miles or within 10 minutes or something like that.
And ASDA has been one on my list for a while and it's not, it's not the easiest in this country because I think they have an agreement with the ANPRs [cameras]. A few people said ‘ just cover your plate’. No way! I'm a professional driver, my licence is my livelihood and my home is on wheels.
I'm not going to do anything to affect my licence because not only will I not be able to work, I won’t be able to move my house! It just makes sense. Some people are funny!
If you guys have got any places you want me to try and park, drop them in the comments below. I'm always up for trying somewhere different, trying somewhere weird and wacky. If there are some ones where it's likely I'm probably going to get a fine, then so be it. I’ll be the guinea pig, we’ll give it a go.
Round here, I can park anywhere around there, where these vans are parked there, where this lorry is parked up on the right, I’d park in front of that or behind that but make sure you give enough room for them to get out.
Again, you don't want them waking you up. And there's no yellows there so yeah, I'd parked there, easy. See industrial states, if you can't find somewhere on an industrial estate either one, it’s a really, really, really small industrial estate or two, you’re just not trying hard enough.
So here, I’d park here, definitely park in front of that recovery truck. I might park, it is hilly to be fair but if it wasn't, then I might park along here because it's not one distinct house, it's like a block. Ah there, I’d definitely park there. They've got these little pull-ins, so little lay bys, I’d park in them all day long.
These little lay bys, you have to remember this is a bus route like we could see the bus stop there so you're going to have buses coming along but they're not going to be tearing around because it’s got speed bumps.
Right here where this car is sticking out a little bit, I’d park there. I could park there quite easily and sleep there, and on the other side, I’d park there. They're pretty good. Now I quite like them like this one here. Yeah, I'd do that one as well. Because they're not outside a specific house so you're not taking a specific person's thing [space].
Is that a bus stop? It is a bus stop, but is it actually marked as a bus stop?
Here's an end of house, can we get on the end of that? Yep, I’d park in front of this little Honda, Hyundai, Highlander. Whatever it is. I’d park there. Not a problem. And this, this is my primary area, this is bungalow area. This is quiet, should be nice and quiet.
This, I wouldn’t park around here. Not this bit. I’d park on that end of house. But this bit here, now, this is too hairy. [The] streets not big enough and you're going to be, yeah because they are all parking on curbs. I'm not going to park on a curb, not at all, so I’d give that area a miss.
Right where this Peugeot is, I’d probably.. can we? Yeah I'd park where that Peugeot, right here, I’d park here. It is quite close to the front of the road but i'd park there.
Let’s have a little look shall we because, you could get, you know, you're not blocking the driveway. Not right outside the house, you're outside their garage and there's plenty of room for people to turn in and turn out. Yeah, I'd park here not a problem.
See, there's loads of little places people! As long as you don’t stay there for more than a day, in the streets, and then you know mark it down on your little Google Maps, or however you keep note of places. He's very kind, letting me go, thank you very much! As long as you mark it down and you know, you can you build up a list of these places that you can park.
See, right in front of me, right there. That looks like one of those little laybys again. I'd park there, all day long. Looks a little slope-y but not a problem. I’d park here and where these three cars are, I’d park there. What's that opposite? Broad Horizons, I don't know what that is but, is that a school or something? I think, yes, it's a school. Maybe I wouldn't park there, because it's a school.
I'm not sure. If you, you know, needed to park up at like seven or eight o'clock at night, maybe because, you know, the kids are obviously gone, they’re not at school. But obviously they'll be out in the morning. I’d park right here, in front of the postbox no problem.
Yeah, so like I say if you just make a list of all your little park ups, put a pin in the map and save it to park ups that you've done and whatnot.
Look right on the end here where this BMW is, I’d definitely go there. That was perfect.
And these look like pretty okay areas. They're not rundown, they look alright. If you've got a nice list of parkups, which you can then refer back to and then once you've got 10, 15 of them you can go down you've always got somewhere that you can go to. This is if you are in one area, lets say.
If you’re constantly on the move around the country, then maybe you're not going to need to take note of them that much, because you're only doing one night here then moving on. But if you are going to be doing this in an area local to you because you've got work or whatever, then making a note of these little places really will help you and will allow you to park up without annoying anyone.
See I’d park here where this Jeep is and where this Beamer is, sorry Merc, where this Merc is. They look [like] perfect spaces.
You’re only staying like 8 to 12 hours, 14 hours. There's no real biggie and then as long as you don't return for you know, like a week, two weeks you're not gonna have any problems.
Yeah I could probably go on the end of this house here, if I could. It’s a little bit [of a] tight road but yep. In these little laybys, I could go in them quite easily. They are quite direct outside of houses so I’d go in between houses. Or you know, try and not be outside one person's [house].
Oh, look at this, outside a field, I’d definitely go there! You can park up there all day long. Let’s have a little look. Yeah, park up here easy. Look at this!. Right, so this is definitely one of the failsafes, if I need somewhere to park.
Yeah, 100% this is, if I need somewhere to park, I'll come back here. Obviously, every area is different. I experience that all the time. Some, there's tonnes and tonnes of park ups. Others, there's [only] a few. But you will always find one, you'll always find a park up. So don't stress too much. You’ll be alright, you’ll be alright.
When you start stressing, that's when, when you start making [mistakes], you know, and you are driving so don’t drive when you're stressed. And when you're trying to make, you know, trying to find somewhere and that just take, take a breath, you know, pull over, get Google maps out and start going around on street view and see what you can find.
That way you're not going to do you or the van, or anyone else, any harm by stressing out and having a potential accident or anything. And you'll find somewhere and you'll be a lot [more] chilled for it.
Let's go directly over and have a look at a new estate, because that's a new build. I don't think I'll find any where around here to be fair, and I think I'm gonna get lost in here as well. These new building estates, they're just not built for big roads, big parking, anything like that.
They have little car parks for like, one per house, or one per apartment or flat or whatever they are. But apart from that, parking is atrocious, that's why they park on curbs left, right and centre. It’s worth a look, but you’re not going to get anywhere. You're really not. Not in my experience anyway, I don't think I've done an actual park up on a new estate. Because you just can’t, there's nowhere to park.
More little shops [there]. Thing is if you're outside the shops, and they're all shut, I mean, it’s one of them isn't it, and they just don't, it looks like you're going to be in it. Because the shops will shut so it's not as if you're shopping. But if you're outside of a house, or in a street, you could it could belong to one of the houses or [you could be] visiting one of the houses. So that's why they're parked there. So you might not be in it. It might that's why people will probably leave you alone.
I think we’ve got a few that, if I have to go find somewhere [I could]. I mean, there's massive industrial estates in Corby, as you've now found out, and there's there are some reasonable markups that I could use if I have to. So I'm going to head back to Asda now, and we'll find a little park up in Asda.
Here on the left, I think I'll be right in there but let's go further down this way into the car park at the end. I think this is now going to be parking controlled and have restrictions, I believe so, let's have a look. ‘That's what she said!’.
Right, let's go down one of these, I mean look at all the space you've got. I mean I could park over there and not bother anyone, not bother a dicky bird.
I can't see any signs. What does that say? Mother and Child and disabled so yeah, you got to abide by them. I wouldn’t park in them anyway. Not at all. Oh sh*t, have I gone the wrong way here? I might have gone the wrong way around that car park. Ah well, we live and we learn.
Well, I think I'm going to find a little space, down here somewhere. Maybe somewhere here? It’s a nice old, big old car park. This will do.
Okay, so this is the park up. There’s ASDA, as you can see. It says it there is well. There's the motorhome, there’s the ASDA the petrol station and just over there is all the other shops. There’s McDonald's, the food warehouse, there's loads of stuff over there. So yeah as you can see I'll walk back a bit and there's the motorhome. Don't she look pretty, so pretty.
I might move closer later on, not too sure yet. Got a little time lapse going there as you can see, there’s a camera trying to get a little sunset, a time lapse you know, make it a little bit beautiful.
So what's the plan for tonight? I'm going to chill out on the sofa for a little bit while the time lapse takes place, and then I’m going to make some dinner. And tonight is going to be a meat feast beyond meat feasts. Chill out in the evening, download all the footage that I've been recording today about doing the park up. Yeah, probably whack some TV on, chill out, see what happens really.
Just another day, it’s just another day in the life.
*Time Lapse*
Time to start some dinner. So, I'm nowhere near going to finish all this, I know that for a fact. It's not going to happen.
The steak shop sent me this, look at that. I mean, I think they call it Chile? Chile steak. So like, the steak is like 15 years old. Not the steak! The cow is like 15 years. Would you look at the marbling on that, it's just incredible. So yeah, I got that. They also sent me some barbecue wings. And I had some prawns, so I'm only going to have a couple of these. So I thought I'd have air, land and sea! Why not?!
I'm going to cook all the wings and I’m going to cook the steak. I don't know how I'm going to cook the steak, it’s too big for my pans. Look at this monster of a steak, look at my pan. The size of it, so thick. I mean, this is not your everyday average steak. If this is your everyday steak, then adopt me. I'm definitely up for adoption if these are everyday steaks.
Wings are in the oven and I have cut the Porterhouse. Now I know this is probably sacrilege to a few of you, I shouldn't have done that. But, it’s just not going to fit [otherwise] ‘Thats what she said!’.
In other news, I'm going to try and put it in the oven for about 20 minutes because I haven't actually got a meat thermometer. So, I'm going to have to try and wing it to cook the outside, cook a bit like a reverse sear. And then I'm going to pull it out and put it in the pan and on a real high, high heat to sear across the outside. Then take it off and let it rest and hopefully we'll get a medium rare. We will give it a go.
Right, so I've put a little bit of olive oil over the steaks, put a bit of salt and pepper on them. Prawns are ready with their butter, there's a little bit of steak fat here, ready to go in the pan. And I've got all these chopped up and then I've got a bearnaise sauce ready to whip up. That'll be pretty cool. And yeah, that should be it.
Wings are almost done, and then I'm going to put these in the oven now. I don't know if that’s right, I don't know if I'm going to get it right or not, so it's just a bit of an experiment for me and fingers crossed, it goes alright.
Alexa, set a timer for 15 minutes. Alexa, stop. Time to get the steaks out and hope for the best. Alexa, set a timer for two minutes. Prawns are in, the veggies are in, they’re resting. The bearnaise sauce is in, ooh it’s all go
Get a load of this, there we go! Land, air and sea and veggies in the middle, veggies! Beautiful bearnaise sauce as well. Yes! Look how perfect I got, that, oh yes! That is something else.
Time to try, look at that! It just melts in your mouth, that’s a happy Darren. Wings! I’ve got to try the wings. Jesus! As you can see, the guys at the steak shop, they know their steaks. So if you want to check them out or anything like that, I've got a 15% discount code, which is ‘urban meats’(no longer valid). All the details will be in the description below. Go check them out and get yourself a juicy steak. It’s got to be done!
Right, it is quarter past eleven and as you can see, all quiet no one about. [The] store shuts in 45 minutes, 12 o'clock. There's the motorhome, all locked up. It’s all in, I know it’s a motorhome and I get flack for this, but it’s in stealth mode so all the curtains are down, all the the blinds are down so you can't see any light.
There is no light as you can see, I've got the camera at the front you'll see that. That's not as bright as what is shown on the camera, same as that one, same as the one down there.
Yeah, there’s ASDA, it seems as though they’ve shut already. I got told they shut at 12, but it looks like they’ve shut already. So, it’s all quiet, nothing's going on. So I'm just going to stay here tonight. If I get any knocks or any problems, then obviously I'll record what goes on.
[The] petrol station is still open. Now, I’ll now show you from this side and then actually open the door and jump in. See you still can't see the lights, but as you can see, the lights are on, lights are on. Right, let’s jump in.
As you can see from that, you can't see any of my lights on the outside. If you look really closely, you will see the infrared on the CCTV cameras. I don’t think they’'ll be any problems tonight to be fair, I think it'll be nice and quiet.
It’s a big old carpark so even if there are some boy races or something, they've got masses of space and I'm right against the bush, and the bollards and all that so they're not going to be wanting to get close to that even, if they are going to be boy racing.
A lot of people think that when you park up like this, you can't do your normal everyday life. I do, I have done and I will continue to do. I cook, you know, I have the window open, there's still a crack at the moment. I had the big, big roof [vent] open and the air vent, the Maxx Fan, pulling out all the, you know, the smoke and that from cooking the steak.
I'll be watching TV, I'll be talking on the phone, I still get on with everyday stuff. You know, it's not an issue. I don't, I'm not going to, you know, live a half life [just] because I'm parking in a car park or some urban area. I'm not offending anyone. I'm not harming anyone. You know, and as long as you're polite and respectful, then what is the problem?
I don't know. I don't understand it. I'm not, I'm [only] taking one space. I'm not in anyone's way, I’ve parked politely. I put my rubbish in the bin. I've gone in to ASDA today, and I bought a few things so I'm still a customer.
It's an easy life. It really is. I love it. So unless anything happens through the night, I will see you guys in the morning.
Good morning everyone. Right, lovely peaceful nights sleeping in ASDA’s car park. No interruptions, no one messed [around], no one knocked on the door, no boy racers, not that I heard anyway so that was all good. I've been up a few hours now, go up about half of nine, had cup tea. I haven't had any breakfast because that steak and them wings last night, ooooh!
If you guys want ever want a decent steak then, like I say, details are in the description below (or here) and yeah, it's the steak shop. I couldn't recommend the steak from them enough, that was, what they sent me, was incredible. I’ll leave all the details in the description below (or here) along with a discount code (no longer valid) so cheers guys at the steak shop!
Everyone’s out and about now, it’s all busy. No one bothered me all night. No notes, no fines, no clamps, it's all good. I mean, you couldn't get much closer to the store. I mean, I could go over there but I thought, it's always best to go near [something that] blocks a side entrance. That's why I go there, you know, because it blocks my side door a little bit and it's not foolproof, don't get me wrong, but you know, it's better than nothing, I suppose. Right?
Park up at ASDA, done! If you've enjoyed the video, click the thumbs up. If you haven't, why you still watching it?'
End of transcription
If you've got anywhere you think I should park up next, drop it in the comments below. Take it easy!
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If you guys have got any places you want me to try and park, leave a comment or drop me a message on social media.
I'm always up for trying somewhere different, trying somewhere weird! Famous last words I’m sure.