TRAGEDY has struck Warren Kurth for a second time in two months after his new caravan went up in flames on Thursday night.
Warren had taken the new caravan on its first road trip to Newbridge for a four-day break following the passing of his wife Cathy after a three-year battle with cancer.
“I had just turned on the inverter to heat the hot water, put out the campfire, sat in the chair and then I heard a pop, looked around and  a saw a glow in the caravan,” he said on Friday morning as fellow campers on the Loddon River at Newbridge Recreation Reserve continued to check he was okay.
One had given him a one-person swag to sleep in after three fire brigade units had extinguished the fire just before midnight.
“It was the first run with this caravan. I only picked it up on December 30,” he said.
“I arrived on Thursday ahead of a mate coming on Friday. We try and get up to Newbridge every three months or so.”
Despite the setback, Warren and his dog Bodhi were joined by others in his camping group on Friday.
“We’ll still stay until Sunday as planned and do what we would have done,” he said.
Warren said other campers at the reserve overnight Thursday had given good support and the fire brigade had arranged for him to collect food and drinks from the town store.
The weekend’s caravan trip had been to have the portable home ready for a trip to Queensland next month to attend Camp for a Cure - a camping experience combining the power of community, music and caravanning and camping to raise funds for cancer research.
Warren said he was unsure whether he would still make the trip north to Gootchie on the Sunshine Coast.