Pastures new

Ok, then, here it is and here is Gareth, imagining himself off in some remote place, with all that he needs packed into the tin can that will soon be ours:

That’s the first piece of our ‘living differently’ picture. Believe it or not, it's a 17 year old vehicle in mint condition - less than 900 miles on the clock. The story is that it was bought with loads of extras but the guy’s wife wasn't keen on motorhoming so it sat on the driveway for years. 

There is a little snag - it's left hand drive. Mind you, that will be an advantage when we finally get to travel abroad. We pick it up in a couple of weeks and then who knows where we might show up!

You'd think that having finally found this key to freedom we'd be excitedly planning our adventures and rubbing our arthritic fingers together with glee. Instead we are fretting over whether we've made the right decision! It's another item of stuff requiring practical and financial upkeep. I'm tempted to paint birds and daisies on the outside but Gareth is conscious of the need to keep it in good resale condition. Sigh! He's right, of course. After a bit of travelling in it with two dogs under foot we might decide it's not for us after all, and it would be nice to get some of our money back.

Anyway, that's one decision made. The next is to find a house and we are very likely to repeat the process of buying something that didn't fit the criteria we shortlisted (we never intended buying an old van, or one that is LH drive…..or one that isn't automatic……) House hunting today turned up an interesting little property that we are very tempted to put an offer in on. Again, you'll have to wait and see what comes of it.

Our time in Mumbles is coming to an end as we head up to Lincolnshire on Saturday. My sister Jen and her partner Wayne live in a converted railway carriage on what is now a hobby railway sidings. They run a little motorhome park business and also have a cabin that will be our home for a couple of weeks. They have a small motorhome too so you can guess what the topic of most conversations will be when we're with them. “The Sidings”, Ludborough is a fab little place just below the Wolds. Jen and Wayne have done a lovely job of converting their railway carriage and the site is gorgeous. We are looking forward to our annual visit and so are the dogs, Bess and Pwdin. There are lots of rabbits there while there aren't many in Mumbles. They are certainly not the sedate sort of dogs that happily abide in apartments!