Our story?
Hello all
Where to begin huh? our story is probably much the same as many no doubt but to us it is a "work in progress" plan without no real planning so to speak. Sat here now I don't really know what to write apart from I have an idea to get in our motor with the van on the back, my other half and the dog and just get gone.
Having worked hard and played hard and seen a fair bit go on around me i've got to a position where I can either carry on working at a job i'm sick to death of, continue to feel the resentment of having to jump forever higher to pay ever increasing charges and deal with red tape, laws and silly regulations...OR I can walk away from a lot of them and hopefully lift a lot of stress from my/our lives. We're choosing to walk, well more drive away and see what happens!
Maybe it will all fall flat and be a mistake but from where we're sat now we think it's a gamble that needs to be taken and we're now looking at sooner rather than later.
I have my own small business, house, cars and various "toys"...boy have I had some toys but now I want to rid myself of all of that and simplify things as much as possible. So what's the plan??
Renting the house/rooms out. All sorted apart from our room which we will rent nearer the "off" date...flexible but looking around March.
De-cluttering and selling off everything that we don't need....PLENTY!
Getting paperwork, accounts and tieing up all loose ends/outstanding business and any other rubbish that gets thrown up along the way. Ensuring adequate insurance covers are in place, medical, vehicle and anything else that crops up. Plenty of other things but they'll be done by our offski date..........GO!
We've got a rough idea where we're head but no plans set in stone. We want to go to anywhere that looks interesting be it a city, village, festival or anything that we want to go take a look at along the way.
I've nearly always fallen on my feet and I've been lucky all my life. We've had it with London and the "dirty" areas around us and having been born in Croydon which was the scene of much of the riots last year you can probably understand why I/we want to get away from this place.
I've always been around caravanning and I can "rough it" easily. I can take the rough with the smooth and so can Aggy so we're going to crack on with our idea and just do it.
Having experienced a few situations that should've finished me off i'd be a mug not to make the most of my life so with that in mind we're going to grab this time in our lives and get out there and live!!
Phil, Aggy and Dougal the dog. 
Comments
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Hi
Your story sounds great and very adventurous. You should keep a blog of your trip as its what most if us want to do when kids have grown up, and work is less important, and the time is there to do a trip such as your one. It would be at least another 20
years before my husband and myself could do such an adventure so would be great to hear how someone else could fair doing a trip such as yours. I know it sounds like I'm looking for tips but you know, we all work hard to live our lives as we can and when something
like your trip comes up people are interested to hear how you get on. I certainly would follow your Blog as I am sure others would. Have a great trip and would love to hear about your adventures.0 -
Hi Blim3y
It's all in the throws of taking shape although we've been talking about getting away on a trip, change of lifestyle and adventure for a long time. My sons 24 so not exactly needing daddy around anymore although I still keep an eye on him....still my little
baby all 6ft4" of him. He's moved back in with his GF so i've now got him as the "landlord" when i'm not here and he can deal with most issues that may arise. We also recently rented a small bedroom out so the only room left is our main bedroom...that'll be
rented about 3 weeks before we aim to set off with any luck.Finance wise it's a bit of a suck it and see. Rental from the rooms will more than cover ALL bills so that's not a problem as long as we've got them all rented. My business is doing OK and I can make a nice little wage from it but if I want to do this project
at my present age, 48, then i've got to just walk away from it. Being a slave to the system will never allow me to live my life and I will forever be scratching a living here in the UK unless I just take the plunge and go for it.Too many people conform to the norm and get stuck in a rut...i'm much the same probably at this moment but circumstances for me are looking in my favour to just do it so we've done the rough sketch/plans for what we want, the rest is a suck it and see approach.
As for tips I don't think i'm qualified for that yet. All I know is that when I speak to people they say it sounds fantastic and they wish they had the guts to do it. It feels like the right time to go and nothing brave in what we're doing....OK i'm walking
away from a business, my home and its comforts, our comfort zone and "routine" but that is all part of the buzz!I spoke to a fella yesterday. He was/is self employed and much the same age and position in life. He has Cancer....big time. From one day he went from normality to game over. His treatment is making him so ill and he tells me that he never realised that
it would be so tough mentaly and physically. His life is on hold and he can plan nothing. Hearing his situation and having recently lost a friend in a car crash I know life is very fragile. Been there, very nearly saw the pearly gates on more than one occasion
but got away with it.I'm not very good at doing blogs but i'll try and post here and there or answer questions if I can. I've got a rough idea of where i've got to go with sorting things out but I like to think it's all falling into place quite nicely.
Thanks for showing an interest and I hope that my posts may help anyone that maybe thinking about dropping out the rat race before retirement age. It may be a big mistake but unless I go for it i'll never know. What could possibly go wrong?
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Just a quick update and a test to see if uploading a picture on here is succesful? Over the last few weeks/month we've been busy sorting out the house and redecorating...rebuilding more to the point- our bedroom so as to rent that out. All sorted now and looking good. The garden has been cleared out and new sheds put in to replace the rubbish self build thing that was an eyesore and falling down. We've bought 2 new bikes and i've made a "prototype"...read as bodge, dog carrier for our little fella Dougal. He's only got little legs so we needed to sort out a way of getting him about seeing as we intend to do a lot of cycling around places. Hopefully this link will work??[IMG]http://i269.photobucket.com/albums/jj69/pikeyphil/photo130.jpg[/IMG]
All falling into place nicely and all being well we are off around March 16th 2013......nothing definate but that looks about as good a time as any!!
(edit) Seems the link doesn't work....will have to have a sniff about to see what i'm doing wrong.
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Hi Phill i hopeyou and Aggy +dougal are getting ready to travel my wife Joyce andi where in same position small business i am now 74and in may this year we coverd eight countrys and in may 2013 we are of for another 2 months we have worked ENOUGH i hope
we mite meet on a site in eu we have a poppy for dougal have a great adventure0 -
Back again, been a while but still chipping away at sorting out a few probs that need to be resolved before we can get going. It's proved to be a bit harder finding the right people to rent our rooms to but we seem to have 2 decent peeps sorted now.
Caravan is about ready, has been for months! Tow vehicle all sorted apart from a final oil change that i'll do just before we set off. Sold off most of the clutter and the bare bones of what we need is still in the house ready to be transferred to the caravan
or binned. Business is just ticking along and I can't wait to see the back of it to be honest.So in the next few weeks it's a case of check paperwork, insurances and other bits and bobs, hook the van on and go
...................We
may have a run around the UK for a bit to see how things are with towing the van, any probs with the motor etc...better find them here in the UK than abroad. Get the feel of the van and cooking etc, make sure all is still 100% working. After that and barring
no probs at home...we're outta here!I'll stick any updates on as and when but for now that's about where we're at. Getting there, just a bit slower than we thought
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Okay, just sticking my face in and saying hi all, quick update.
Done....basically. All the bits we had to sell off have gone, tidied up all loose ends, sorted house, business, friends and family and now we are about to go off on our travels.
I "retired" on the 15th May. Paid my mortgage off yesterday 3rd June and done the oil and filter change, checked brakes and tinkered a few bits on the truck....SORTED!
Caravan all packed, just a few things to take from the house as we walk away and a bit of shopping at Sainsbury's before we bimble off this Sunday, 9th, for a overnight stop near to dover port. Ferry booked for Monday and from Dunkirk we head to Poland.
We're basically "on the road", travellers and free to wander at will....happy days.
I may only be 49 but as far as I am concerned there's far too much to see in the world to keep working and getting a big bank balance but not LIVE. So, we're outta here. Suck it and see, play by ear and see what comes up along the way
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