Dawn Punter

Six more days of work.
Eighteen days of planning.

… And then we were meant to wave goodbye to England from the back of a ferry and head south through France and Spain on the very first leg of our adventure.

In theory.

In reality, the final weeks looked more like constant decluttering, repeat packing, nervous laughter and the slow realisation that you cannot actually take your entire life with you in an aging Ford Mondeo.

Everything had to go. Sold, donated or carefully stored at my mother in law’s house. Just a few essentials kept back for a possible future return. A winter coat, boots and some photographs. Proof, I suppose, that we once belonged somewhere colder.

The car became something like a carefully organised challenge from the TV programme The Krypton Factor. Camping gear squeezed into every available space, seats folded flat to accommodate everything.
Four hand luggage sized rucksacks tucked into footwells. My husband’s bike was dismantled and fitted perfectly into any spare crevices inside the car. Colin was adamant that his bike came with us, which, as it turned out, was very fortunate given what was about to happen next. Mine was to follow later by courier.
We told ourselves this meant we were travelling light. It did not feel light.

By then my mind was already racing ahead. Our plan to spend two weeks camping our way down to Andalucía. My first crepe in France. A night parked beside a chateau. Tapas in Spain. Cold Cruzcampo in the sun. The romance of it all was doing a lot of heavy work packing up.

And then suddenly it was departure day.

We pointed the Mondeo in the direction of Portsmouth with the kind of nervous excitement that makes your stomach feel fizzy.

The goodbyes were done.
The hugs were longer than usual.

And somewhere between the last wave and the first motorway sign, a strange mix of anxiety and freedom settled over us.

Before boarding the overnight ferry, we sat on Southsea promenade with a vegetable pizza & two beers balanced between us, staring out at the sea and trying to properly understand what we were doing.

Our first real stop would be our holiday home in Almería/Murcia border. That would be our base from September to January. Time to decompress. Time to breathe. Then, after that, Central America awaited.

But first, we had to leave the shores of England.

We set off at 10 pm on a clear and beautiful August night. I stood up top and watched the lights of Portsmouth and Southsea gradually disappear as the ferry pushed us forward on our adventure.
Leaving behind our lives for 12 months, I somehow knew it would be something more life changing than just a gap year.
A sense of calm enveloped me as the waves gently lapped the sides of the ship.

By morning, we had arrived in Caen and rolled off the ferry with our hearts full of hope and excitement. A fresh start, the old life behind us, a new one waiting.

…. But by the end of the first hour on the road, we had learned a very important lesson. Adventures rarely stick to the script.

Somewhere between Caen and our first planned stop in Pornichet, we noticed a strange noise. A sort of low grumble that then turned into something sharper, a squeal. By the time we arrived, the grumble and squeal had become a full orchestral performance. Then came the final dramatic clunk.

Two tow trucks.
Two garages.
Seven hundred euros.

The verdict was a wheel bearing, which would arrive, hopefully, by the following Tuesday.

It was not the smooth beginning we had imagined. But it turned out to be oddly perfect.

Stranded in Pornichet, we suddenly had time. Proper time. The sort of time you never seem to find at home. The town itself felt like it had been designed by someone who adored butterflies. They were everywhere. On the beach. In tiny gardens on street corners. Fluttering lazily through the air as if nothing in the world could possibly be urgent.

We found ourselves a small, welcoming campsite where the couple who ran it quickly became our temporary guardians. They helped with phone calls, advice and general moral support while our car sat in pieces somewhere down the road in town. We rescued what we could from the Mondeo, set up the tent and created a surprisingly cosy little home.

The houses around us looked like individual castles, each one more dramatic than the last. And every evening brought a sunset that made us stop whatever we were doing just to stare.

My best pre travel purchase revealed itself quickly. The humble camping stove. Night after night it produced improbable feasts from very limited ingredients. Proof, if ever it was needed, that you can build a life almost anywhere if you have a pan, a flame and a bit of stubborn optimism.

We planned to move on Tuesday, car permitting. I already knew I would miss this unexpected pause in our journey. The butterflies. The sunsets. The kindness of strangers.

I would not, however, miss the stuttering owl in the campsite woods.

T T T T toowoo.

Some adventures announce themselves with fireworks. Ours began with pizza on a late summer promenade, a broken wheel bearing and an owl with a speech impediment. And somehow, it felt exactly right.