Couple, one child, one dog, which van?

[audiosculpture]

Hello everybody, and what a wonderful forum.

We are a couple with a 4 year old, and aspirations for a dog.
We'd like a california to function as our bigger car, with a small suv/hatchback as a primary runaround.

But...we are tying ourselves in knots a little around which edition.
Older beach is ruled out as my wife can't do the manual roof.
The new beach manual roof is fine.
But we are at a bit of a sticking point around storage and kitchen facilities.
I think in combination with a better storage system instead of the removable seat, the new ocean with an outside hob could be pretty good.
But not sure if a beach, with an inside cheap gazpro, possibly with storage/table system instead of an internal seat, could be better, when specced with a larger leisure battery than standard ( e.g. Battery 380 A (68 Ah))
Both of the above to rely a little on a third party company coming up with a solution, but it seems like an obvious need to me (?).

We aren't massively attached to cooking all the time - but i do think there is value in being able to hunker down when you arrive at the campsite in the rain, and offgrid possibilities.


Then there is the old ocean - which looks great, and is tried and tested - but i am v attracted to the more refined drive & 'fancy' trims on the newer model, and suspect newer one would work better as a regular drive. Maybe this is a red herring.

We are thinking short weekend getaways along sw coast area, and longer weeks trips up north and across the channel.

It feels like this would be a great time in our lives to get one, and would also ask if anyone can comment on the feasibility/factor of getting a campervan with our small family and possible dog.

Really, any thoughts welcome here!! everything will help come to a decision.
Thank you.

 

[audiosculpture]

i meant to write 'would also function as our bigger car when needed'. dual purpose rather than hierarchical.

 

[BenCar]

Well my tuppence:
We have a T6 Ocean and a convertible Mini as our 2 family cars. One teenage daughter, dog and me and the wife. I think it's the perfect 2 car garage (and so do many of our peers).

90% of the time we're in the mini, the camper van gets used for those longer or special trips. To that end we decided on the ocean as its tried and tested and we keep it stocked and ready to go so we can be spontaneous if we want to head off for a night or weekend away at the beach. UHT milk, teabags, water tank half full and sleeping bags ready stored.

However, the T6 drives like a posh van, I gather the new T7 is more of a MPV to drive so that may swing it for you. Depends what percentage of the time you're driving what car. We did France and Spain in the Camper last year and I couldn't think of a better vehicle for the purpose.

Ben