We were driving in our Volvo onto the slip road at junction 8 on the M25 heading West, and Paul groaned, ‘oh no, the road’s blocked solid again.’
We were taking some clothes and provisions to our brand new motorhome in Reading. Or, as we liked to call it, Our Pension Fund for Eventual Retirement.
The traffic was crawling in all four lanes and didn’t look like it was going to be any different for the next fifteen miles to junction 13 at the M3 exit, our first opportunity to get off the road and head towards Basingstoke. We accepted that we'd be stuck for a while, and joined the traffic. It was seven thirty on a Thursday morning in March, on the dreaded M25!
Poor Paul had been doing this journey three days a week for the last two years, leaving at six am every day to avoid the traffic. So it must have been frustrating for him being stuck in it now.
It had been a bit of a tough time for both of us. I’d been trying to come up with lots of story ideas, I’m a writer, to earn enough money for us to take some time out, and Paul had been working on a large IT project for his company, which we knew would end in April.
We’d talked about what to do when the job finished. Paul was sixty-one and thinking about early retirement, as job opportunities for an IT specialist of his age where very few and far between!
We’d put some money aside from the sale of our home the previous year, but the economic climate was terrible. Interest rates had plunged and although we now had some savings for the first time in our lives, the income from them was negligible. Added to which, the banks were in severe difficulties, and there was some scaremongering from the media about certain banks going bust.
All in all, not a rosy future to look forward to.
As we crawled along, the traffic began to clear a little and I saw the signs coming up for the M3 exit.
‘Are we going via Basingstoke then, or will we push on to the M4 exit?’ I said.
‘Let’s skip off now and we’ll be able to get a bit of a march on at least.’ Paul replied.
So we fought our way to the nearside lane and carved off the M25. Thank God, I thought.
At last the traffic eased, and Paul put his foot down. He’s always been quite an aggressive driver and we’ve had one or two differences of opinion about how fast he drives. As I looked across at the speedometer, I noticed it was creeping up beyond the 80 mph mark and I said, ‘watch it, you don’t want to get a speeding ticket do you?’
‘Don’t worry,’ Paul said, ‘I’m keeping an eye on it. Remember this will be the last time we’re in the fast lane, from now on it’s life on the inside lane for us!’
***
We’d had a pretty rough couple of years.Paul’s job was under constant threat, not helped by the fact that the company decided to move premises. Paul was already doing a daily round trip of ninety miles. But they then decided to relocate somewhere that would add another half an hour onto the journey.
So we sold our house, and rented a property in Reigate where the relocated office was situated.
Things were going okay. I loved the area we lived in, with its abundance of wildlife in the garden, and we had fun going out on our motorbike. Then, I got up one morning and noticed that the left side of Paul’s face had drooped, in particular, his eyelid.
To cut a long story short, after many tests and an MRI scan, the conclusion was that he’d suffered a dissected carotid artery in the left side of his neck, which resulted in the severance of the nerves that control the eyelid muscles and the sweat glands on the left side of his face. It wasn’t totally uncommon, but is usually associated with a whiplash car accident, and was most probably caused when he lifted something or twisted awkwardly whilst moving furniture during the recent house move. The prognosis though was good thank God. Paul would always have the lazy eyelid and non-active sweat glands, a condition called Horners Syndrome, but with a treatment of Warfarin for six months to avoid any blood clots, the damaged artery would repair itself.
What with this health scare, the uncertainty of the job front, and the economic climate also getting worse, we started to think about Paul taking early retirement and maybe doing some of the things we really wanted to do. No-one knows what’s around the corner; we wanted some adventure before it was too late.
I wanted to do crazy things like a tandem hang glider flight, or to go in one of those vertical wind tunnels where you can skydive. I also wanted to visit Italy and see some of the fabulous architecture. I’m not one for travelling usually, but Italy is the one place I’d really like to go to.
Paul wanted to race cars, but reckoned he was too old now. He also loves travelling and wanted to visit Italy, France, Spain and Portugal.
Then for some reason, as we were talking, we remembered staying with Paul’s sister in Lincolnshire the previous year.
On the Sunday, we’d been out driving with the intention of stopping at a garden centre or somewhere, when his brother-in-law Ted said, ‘oh I know something interesting we can do. Leave it to me!' We didn’t ask him where we were going, but after about half an hour we pulled into this large site full of caravans and motorhomes.
We then spent about an hour looking at them all. Some were really expensive, up to £120,000 for the bigger ones. I’d never really seen the inside of a caravan or motorhome before and was quite surprised at how well equipped they are. My only experience of camping had been in a tent many years ago, never to be repeated, but I muttered something about probably being able to put up with staying in one of those.
Anyway, back to the present. After being off work for a month with his illness, Paul went back and we waited to see what the future would bring. The economy got steadily worse, and the company announced that as the IT project he was working on now involved a lot of people at their Newbury offices, it would be better if Paul worked there.
Oh bloody great! So, we’d sold our house and moved to Reigate because it meant Paul didn’t have to do long daily journeys, and now it would mean travelling every day on the dreaded M25 to Newbury.
Paul got rather depressed about it all and even looked at other jobs. Finally though, the company agreed a compromise. Paul could work Monday and Friday at Reigate and the middle of the week in Newbury when the traffic was a bit lighter.
A few months later, the company announced that the IT project would end in a year’s time in April 2009. There would be no job after that, and not much chance of getting something similar at his age. Great!
We’d booked a summer holiday in the Lake District, so we went on that and tried not to think about the future.
One day in the autumn, Paul said, ‘In April the company will have to make me redundant. Maybe I could persuade them to bring that forward, and we could buy one of those motorhome things with the pay-off I get? We could travel around in that for a while. We could go to Europe, and maybe stay with my sister in France for a bit too?’ I thought about it and liked the idea. It would be an adventure, something I’d never done before, but it was also a bit scary as I’m not a risk taker, and I like my home comforts.
Paul said the motorhome would be an investment if we bought a new one, and some of our money would be tied up in it and not at risk in the bank. We could do a bit of research and find out about it all.
So we started looking.
He joined a website called MotorHomeFacts, which was full of useful information, and the forum had really friendly, helpful people of varying levels of experience. We looked at motorhome magazines and tried to decide which ones we liked. At weekends, we travelled around to dealers and looked at lots of different brands and models. Gradually, we narrowed it down to what we needed for a long trip and what we could practically afford.
We set a budget and focused on some must haves. We had to have a fixed bed; we couldn’t be arsed folding the bed away during the day, and having to get it all out again at night. I wanted a fully equipped kitchen so we could cook our own meals, I’m not a fan of foreign food at the best of times. A fridge, must have somewhere to put all the cold white wine, and plenty of storage space. After all we’d be living in it for several months, this was no two week holiday!
We went to a motorhome show at the NEC and as we entered the main hall, we saw Gerry, the manager of one of the dealers we’d visited. He was very friendly and asked if we’d found what we wanted yet. We said we’d seen something that fitted the bill, but it was too expensive. Gerry asked what we were looking for pricewise and we told him. He told us to go and look round the show and come back in a couple of hours. We visited other stands, got some insurance quotes, saw some other models of motorhome we hadn’t seen before, had some lunch and then went back.
‘Okay I’ve got you the deal you wanted. The van, dealers call them vans, is at our Huddersfield depot and I can have it shipped down to Reading for you before Christmas.’
We were both surprised and looked at each other in excitement.
After a quick chat we said, ‘Okay let’s go for it!’ We signed the paperwork, left a deposit and then fretted all the way home in the car.
‘Have we done the right thing?' I asked.
‘Who knows?’ Paul said with a laugh, ‘But we’ve done it now. It’s a once in a lifetime adventure, let’s make the most of it.’
So, on 16th November 2008 we visited Gerry in Reading and saw our lovely new Swift Voyager 685FB.
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| Our Swift Voyager 685FB |
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| Pleased as Punch! Our New home for the next six months or more! |
The next thing was to actually stay in the van overnight, so we booked a weekend stay on a Caravan and Camping Club site in Devizes. The weather wasn’t too cold so we thought it was a good time to experiment.
We took our bedding and some food, parked the car at the dealers and off we went. We arrived at the campsite early afternoon and sorted ourselves and the van out. Paul drove it onto ramps to level it out, plugged the mains power in, filled the tank with water and put the heating on.
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| Reigate - packed up and ready to go! |
It was all very cosy. We set up the digital TV and our Nintendo Wii, which I’d wanted to bring for something to do, and settled down for a lazy evening. At bedtime we closed all the blinds, brushed our teeth and got into the comfy double bed. Surprisingly although it was a cold night, we were as warm as toast.
We woke the next morning to a frosty misty campsite, and were rather pleased with ourselves. We’d lasted a whole night, which, as neither of us liked camping, was quite an achievement. We would be able to do this after all. I think we were both a bit worried as to whether we’d be able to live like this, but after only one night we were certain we’d survive.
On the Sunday afternoon we drove back to the dealer in high spirits. We left the van, collected our car and arrived back at the bungalow late in the evening. After unpacking, we fell into bed and dreamed about our forthcoming adventures.
***
We had a few more bits done to the van, and everything was ready. We now needed to know exactly what was happening about Paul’s job.
The company had said that he’d know what the redundancy deal was by mid January, but January came and went with no further news. Paul was getting very frustrated and considered just jacking it all in, but was told if he could just hang on, the financial deal he’d get would be better. February came and went, still no news. We needed to give notice on the bungalow and sort out putting our belongings into storage, so we were getting worried about the timing of everything, when Paul was finally told he could leave at the end of March. Whoopee! The financial deal was better than we’d hoped, so it had been worth the wait.
With firm dates now in our diary, we gave our landlady notice, contacted a removal company to arrange for our furniture to go into storage, and fixed a date for when we’d set off on our grand adventure. The big day would be Monday 6th April 2009.
So, that's why we were on the busy M25. We were en route to our new home on wheels. We were going down to pack it with some of the things we felt we needed for our trip. We'd put some essentials in it now, and then the following week, we were going to bring the van back to the bungalow and load it with the rest of our stuff.
We’d sold our motorbike, and the car was a company car, so Paul could leave it at the office down the road from the dealer.
The only sad part of it was we’d had two cats, Fluff and Kitty. We couldn’t take them with us, and because Fluff was elderly, just over seventeen, and not in the best of health, we couldn’t find a home for her, so made the heartbreaking decision to have her put to sleep. It was one of the most awful things I’ve ever done, and I felt so very guilty. I felt that we were killing her just because we wanted to go off on our adventure. We did find a nice lady to adopt Kitty, who was younger at thirteen, and she’s still with her as I type this in March 2013.
The 6th April finally arrived. The removal men had packed up all our belongings for storage, and we packed the final few things in the Van. We’d booked a campsite in Bognor Regis for our first night away so that we could say goodbye to our friends Sandy & Tony. Later that week, we’d go down to Devon to say goodbye to our family and then set off on our grand adventure!
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