Towing vehicle

Just like the Jayde we looked at, the Ray, with an ATM of 1595kg and a towball download weight of 120kg is well within the reach of most medium-sized four-wheel drives. It's worth mentioning that while a lot of manufacturers give their medium-sized vehicles decent tow ratings, more often than not, once you're hitched up you'll soon learn the maker was being optimistic. Choose wisely when buying a new car to tow with, otherwise your trip could be slower than a hot summer's day.

On the outside

Like the Jayde MkII, the Ray is built using the same vacuum bonded walls which offer excellent heat and cold resistance. Not to mention they look a hell of a lot neater than those corrugated aluminium flanks.

The windows are all double-glazed but the front boot has the same problems encountered on the Jayde. Not only do you have to lean right over the drawbar, you'll bang your head on the boot lid, it just doesn't lift up high enough. Longer struts would help this out no end.

What I like most about the Ray is the back-end and the slide-out bed. This means, that when the caravan is all folded up and ready to be towed, its dimensions are drastically reduced making it very friendly for first timers.

Day into night

This is my kind of interior, step inside and immediately on your left is a comfortable looking, pillow-style u-shaped lounge. It's perfect for reclining in or enjoying a few sundowners, I could sleep on this lounge.

From the lounge you look straight into the guts of the caravan, the kitchen is on the left and the dinette is on the right, the slide-out bed is directly, no duh, at the end. The café-style dinette, like the one in the Jayde, is definitely just for two, you could possibly squeeze in a small child, but it'd be tight.

The kitchen has everything you'd expect to find; a four-burner stove and grill, and a 90L three-way Dometic fridge. There's more than enough bench space and storage space is excellent too. Opposite the kitchen is a wall-mounted Herron 2.2 air-conditioner which is a cost optional extra fitted to this model, I didn't get the chance to run this unit and it probably doesn't make much difference given it's such a small space anyway, but I'd think a roof-mounted unit would be better. But I'm open to being proved wrong.

At the back-end is the bed which once you've undone all of the catches simply slides out. The great thing about this is that the walls are solid, not canvas, which makes this a friendly all-weather, all-season caravan. This happened inadvertently but it's worth looking at the two other slide-out bed toting caravans we've looked at in this issue: Rapid and Expanda.

Australian Caravan + RV Magazine, Issue 8.