This week saw us living full time on the road in our VW campervan- officially houseless and getting to grips with our early retirement master plan. Join us as we wrestle with the emotions of publishing our first YouTube video and coping with the unprecedented world response(!?!). We also take time out to plan our adventures for the next couple of months as our dog sitting commitments are come to an end.
Early retirement developments
After just over a week of living full time in the van we thought that it would be a good time to update you on our early retirement plans and reassure you (and ourselves) that there is defiantly a plan- we have not just lost the plot, sold up and gone off grid!
The story goes that after a period of intense trauma and loss in our lives last autumn, we made the decision to early retire this summer, giving us a good 6 months to put things in place.
We mapped it out financially, making sure that we had enough means to last until we can access our teachers pension at 55. We handed in our notice at work and worked through to the end of this academic year. As I type, we have just received our last monthly pay…ever!
We put our house up for sale, as part of our plan to relocate to the Yorkshire Dales- our happy place and spiritual home in the hills. Our house in Cheshire sold after about 3 hours! We knew that to be in a good position to buy we needed to let the sale proceed- which we did with the house sale completing last Tuesday when we officially became house less (not homeless!).
We have found what we think will be our forever home in the Dales and we are just waiting for the legal stuff to be sorted out. There is no chain as the house is empty, so as soon as the legal stuff is sorted, we should be able to complete. I say complete and not move in for a reason- the house is an absolute bomb and needs significant work to make it our dream home. We are not put off by this- in fact we are really excited as it is the first chance we have ever had to build our dream home, without compromises in an area that we adore.
YouTube updates
Oh this YouTube thing is not easy! There are so many new things to learn and skills to develop- from simply filming stuff, to knowing what to say, to not feeling like a complete **** when on camera. That’s just the start of it- try editing a video so that it doesn’t look like a child’s school project, coping with the technology that I thought I knew a bit about (how wrong could I be!) and then uploading to YouTube the finished product.
We tried to load a video when we were off grid to simulate our life in the future- it took so long that the laptops ran out of power before it was verified by YouTube so we had to start the process all over again. Looks like we will be finding a local Weatherspoons when we next need to upload a video for decent power, phone signal and copious amounts of alcohol to calm the nerves!
After all of this (non)drama, we hooked into Wi-Fi and the upload continued from where it left off which was a cheeky bonus. So after only a few minutes our first video was uploaded, checked and verified and published to the world. The interest in our premiere was unprecedented, with overnight viewing figures of 12, with 2 people subscribing to the channel- one of which was Jackie (the other was her Mum!).
Feel free to share our shame by having a look at our homework project on YouTube here. We love you all- be kind!
Living on the road
After a week of living on the road in the van, with an adopted van dog, we now know for certain that a full time van dog is definitely not for us. We love our time with Cali, and she has been a fab travel mate, but having her as part of the team is just very tying. We have to consider where we park, where we sleep, how we shop, how long we drive…Cali is at the forefront of every decision we make- particularly as she is not our dog and we know what a responsibility it is to look after someone else’s fur baby.
Cali has however forced us to slow down and take more time to do the quieter things in life. She is getting on a bit (sorry Cali), and isn’t a massive fan of long walks any more, so that has also curtailed our walking for a couple of weeks. Cali loves her bed, and retires pretty early in the evening- forcing us to have similarly quiet nights. In reality, it’s just like having a toddler again!
Jackie’s birthday
This week we celebrated Jackie’s birthday. It was a bit usual as we don’t have a house to entertain people in for any celebrations. We did however manage to spend a lovely night with our good friends who have also early retired this year- great company, quality food and far too much wine consumed!
Over the weekend we dropped in for a stay at Luke’s and enjoyed being visitors rather than hosts. It is so nice to see your children grow up well balanced, secure and happy with their lives.
Plans for the rest of the summer
We have been able this week to put some plans in place for the rest of the summer once the cat accommodation has finally been sorted out. We are so excited about what is to come - here’s a quick taster of what we have planned:
The cats get their final vaccine on 24th August and are booked into the cattery that day. We then hand over Cali to the able hands of Jackie’s mum.
We are then travelling up to Yorkshire to see Mum on the 25th which would have been my brothers birthday- we don’t want anyone to go through that moment alone. We need to be there for Mum and also for ourselves- family comes first.
We then plan to drive down to Dover overnight and get an early morning ferry to France the very next day. 2 to 3 weeks in the French Alps, dropping into Les Gets, Les Portes du Soleil, Courchevel, Merribel and Lake Annecy on our way home. The main priority is to spend the traditional September start of term in the mountains, a million miles away from school and our previous lives.
We will come back to the UK for a quick visit to see the family and check on the progress of the house purchase. We will then look to set off for another 2 to 3 week trip, this time to the Outer Hebrides where we want to take advantage of the late summer conditions on the deserted beaches that the islands have to offer. We hope that this will be a proper off-grid experience, with elements of Robinson Crusoe thrown in for good measure.
By mid October, we hope to have made some progress on the house purchase, so we will reevaluate then. The plan is to travel whilst the builders work their magic…once we have found a builder to actually do the work!
So that's it, another week gone, we cannot believe that we have got to week 25 in our early retirement plans so soon. In next weeks blog we plan to review where we are up to 6 months into our journey and share with you our thoughts on how things are going.
Have a fantastic week,
Richard & Jackie
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