How I came to be living in an old campervan down by the beach.

Way back in 2008 life was getting on top of me and I decided to quit the rat race and go travelling for awhile. Initially, a girlfriend I was seeing at the time and I intended to spend that summer travelling then we were going back to the rat race to resume our old jobs. That never happened of course, once you taste freedom there's no going back!

So what happened? Well we spent a couple of months travelling then found ourselves in Pembrokeshire in South Wales, we liked it so much we decided to stay. By the time October/November came around it was getting a little cold in the van and we were looking for somewhere to live. We both had part time jobs by now, I was working in a coffee shop by the beach where I still work today and my partner worked in an hotel. 

We were looking for a flat or house to rent but the prices were too high for our part time incomes. Just as we were thinking we might have to quit and move back to the city we saw an ad in a local post office for a static caravan on a farm near Strumble Head lighthouse. It sounded idylic and was unbelievably cheap at just £200 per month! We lived there together until September of 2009 when my partner decided to move back to her home town of Doncaster. She left and I stayed on and enjoyed another two and a half years at the farm.  

Eventually the van dweller life called and I decided to make it my mission to spend the summer of 2012 in my van. Everything was going swimmingly and I left the farm and started van life on the 1st of May. Unfortunately, before the month was over I had a heart attack and got rushed into hospital and had to undergo by-pass surgery. That kinda put paid to van life for the next eight months while I recuperated. After six months I gradually returned to my old job at the coffee shop by the beach and by the time christmas and new year 2013 rolled round I was hankering to return to the van life and live my dream.

Living in a thirty five year old classic camper is brilliant fun in the summer months but it's not made for winter use and keeping warm is trying to say the least. Fortunately I have a friend who lives in a great big house nearby who lets me park in their drive and plug into the mains electricity. So despite sub zero temperatures outside it's toasty warm in the van. I have an electric convection heater with a built in thermostat that keeps a nice even temperature, my fridge works, I have lighting and of course my laptop works. So living full time in my van is a real possibility at last.

I have plenty of photo's to share and I'll keep the blog regularly updated. I might ramble on a bit and i'm not very articulate but I'll just write what I'm thinking and take it from there. I hope you like it and thanks for reading.