What I learned from selling EVERYTHING and living in a motorhome for a year…with a baby
In April 2022 you could find me most days of the week out walking in the Peak District with my 7-month old or selling ALL of our furniture online. In a few short weeks we would leave our house, pack up a few remaining possessions into boxes and move into a motorhome - full time. With a baby.
Most people assumed we were mad.
Most people were probably right.
We would often hear the phrase ‘you can’t do that!’ in an incredulous tone as we shared how we were going to spend the remainder of my potentially indefinite maternity leave (I was facing redundancy along with the entirety of my company) travelling around the UK and Europe in a not insignificant 9-metre motorhome. With my partner being self-employed there were not many things stopping us other than fear - and life until that point had taught us nothing if not that a life ruled by fear is not a happy one.
How did we do it? And why? Did we hate each other by the end of it all? Would we do it again? Would we recommend it?
Let’s start with why. We did it because why should we not? We decided long before becoming parents that we did not want a traditional life of living for our weekends and a few token holidays here and there. We are both passionate and purpose-driven people with a very clear understanding of what we are here to do. For me I knew that meant stepping out of the comfort of a corporate cocoon to set up We Are The Antidote full time; for my partner it meant expanding his exquisite joinery work to encompass project management ( no one else can see an end result and build it in such a clean, efficient and stress-free way). Plus we both love adventure and travel. In 2021 when my dad passed away very suddenly only a few weeks before our daughter was born, we felt even more certain that a change of pace and lifestyle was what we wanted to do. I needed time to run, sit quietly to do my breathwork, work on my business and just not be a mum for a few moments. My partner wanted connection time with his daughter. Paternity leave is wholly inadequate in this country - and being self-employed meant he had precisely ZERO paid paternity leave - so for us to look after ourselves as well as our baby we had to do things differently. The system here is not designed so that parents (and children) can succeed. We couldn’t step out of it entirely but we could put in a circuit-breaker, take a huge leap of faith and just go for it. Yes it scared us. Yes we were heavily judged and criticised for what we were doing. No, we didn’t let it bother us. In our solar plexus it just felt right.
How did we do it? We started off by selling everything. Properties. Beloved sofas (man, I still miss that sofa), oversized vases and rugs, TVs and garden furniture were collected by a steady stream of visitors to our house. We waved goodbye to our car and bought a tiny cheap runaround for when we were back in the area to visit family. We said hello to our gigantic motorhome with six wheels, a bigger bed than we had at home and a gross weight so large I could’t even drive it on my license.
It was go time!
We started off small, revisiting Scotland and some favourite haunts we had been to over the previous few years. Things were a bit different with an 8-month old in tow and we definitely had an adjustment period figuring out how far we could get in a day and how much we could really wing it (more than I initially thought but a lot less than if we had been travelling solo).
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We went to the Fort William Downhill World Cup, hiked up and cabled car-ed down Glencoe and had a very hairy drive around Loch Katrine (put it this way - I cycled round it and nearly beat my partner who was driving the motorhome. Single-track roads, tourists in tiny cars and massive motorhomes do not make for quick journeys!).
By this point the initial shock of such a change in lifestyle had settled and we headed to the south coast via my old stomping ground of Cheltenham, Devon, Cornwall and Dorset to visit some friends. Countisbury Hill in North Devon aside, we had a blast. Our rhythm was bedding in and we’d got the hang of how late we could drive before finding somewhere to park up for the night (we rarely booked in advance). Our daughter loved spending so much time with us both, waking up to a different view every morning and playing outside for hours every day. We felt like we were winning.
Before we set off we had said that if we made it over the Channel into France it would be a bonus - but we didn’t set our sights on it. A month in we knew we had to try it so we booked ourselves onto a ferry and off we went to Cherbourg, Mont Saint Michel and Place d’Hatainville where the beach stretched for miles and we woke up to horses riding along the golden sands. We hugged the west coast and fell in love with fresh bread bought every morning from whichever village bakery we had parked near, wall-to-wall sunshine, walks, bike rides, and broken spoken French that gradually improved the more I got to practice it.
After a couple of weeks and a risky decision to see just how far south we could get before returning home, we made it all the way to the Pyrenees. We started off in a town called Arreau, a picturesque place built where the Neste du Louron meets La Neste d’Aure. From there we got to experience cycling up the Col d’Aspin, an 11km climb section of the Tour de France which I cycled in my Nanos - I’d left my clipless pedals and shoes in the UK - and spend the entire ride figuring out the French to answer ‘où sont tes chaussures de cyclisme?’/‘where are your bike shoes?!"‘.
From Arreau we thought we’d make one last stop before heading home: Loundenville. Oh my goodness. Just look at the place:
Completely surrounded by mountains with a crystal-clear glacial river running into the Lac de Génos-Loudenville, we arrived to a flock of floating parapente gliding over a lake littered with canoeists and SUPs, with rollerbladers, runners and cyclists dotted around the kilometre-long path around the lake and paragliding landing site. Rising up from the lake were the ski slopes of Peyragudes, turned into a mountain bike mecca for the summer months. It had everything an adventure-loving family could possibly wish for and the only reason we didn’t stay longer was because of a pre-booked, non-refundable ferry which would take us back home in time for a family birthday. In hindsight maybe we should have flown them all out to us?!
On the final morning before we set off north, I took a deep breath and ran off a hillside at 2000m. Strapped to an instructor from the Ecole de Parapente Virevolte whose landing site is right next to the lake. Paragliding was one of my dad’s favourite activities and the feeling of being up above the clouds, floating over trees and the lake - and not being sick into it when the instructor somersaulted the chute so we went upside down - is one I will never, ever forget. It was so peaceful up there and really put a lot of the problems we so often obsess over into perspective. Even losing a shoe on take-off (only I could do that) couldn’t dampen the experience! Plus, I got my shoe back thanks to the kind driver who dropped us off at the take-off site and must have had a good laugh at the British woman flying through the air with one shoe and one sock on!
Anyway, back to answering the questions we are often asked when we say how we spend a year of our lives. Did we hate each other by the end of it?
In short, we loved each other even more. Soppy, I know, but it’s true.
It takes a certain type of relationship to thrive from spending so much time confined in a tiny space - anyone who shared a home during 2020 knows that. What this experience really challenged and developed for us was the set of expectations we place upon other people, especially parents. That, and the understanding that without compassionate communication, connection cannot survive. And connection is an essential part of the human experience.
We had already had opinions heaped on us for what we were doing and we both had a really solid toolkit for treating opinions for what they are: how the opinion-giver sees themselves. We did, however, have to make allowances for the fact that we were travelling with an eight-month old who learned to walk and spoke her first few ‘real’ words (‘apple’ and ‘hedgehog’) during our first overseas trip. We realised that she could assimilate to being in a new place every other day, be surrounded by different languages and people and try all manner of different cuisines (turns out she’s a big lobster fan). All this variance highlighted her need for consistent connection to us. All babies have this need biologically wired in to varying extents, but I do think that our way of life and proximity to each other made it more obvious because although we interacted with different people every day and spent time with family and friends on our travels, there were weeks at a time when her only deep connection was to the two of us - no babysitters, nursery, grandparents, friends or neighbours helping out, even for ten minutes. The buck stopped entirely with us and had we travelled for longer, we would have needed to recreate the ‘village’ that it honestly does take to raise a happy child. You cannot pour from an empty cup and we had to fill ours consciously, through daily movement (running, biking, hiking, swimming, training, yoga), good food, breathwork, sleep and connection to ourselves, each other and a higher power/purpose. Our family connection took priority which was something we were both at peace with, but it took a lot of self awareness and compassionate communication to get there. It’s so easy when you’re sleep-deprived to blame someone or something else, and we learned early on that the key to a successful trip would be the same thing that we’ve always valued about our relationship: being a team. We always approach difficult conversations from the same side of the table: we are never opposing forces, even when we disagree. We rapidly adjusted our expectations - mine were for leisurely evenings spent outside chatting, training or enjoying the sunset which rarely happened - and focused on the pure joy and gratitude of how we were living life in each moment. Waking up to incredible sunrises over the mountains. Both of us being there to witness our daughter’s first steps under an apple tree in a tiny French town. Laughing ourselves silly when I flew over my handlebars because I got my bike tire wedged in the slats of a bridge. Playing games to decide whose turn it was to empty the toilet (you will never appreciate a bathroom like you will after a stint in a motorhome). No, it wasn’t always easy but being a parent isn’t easy and we are now reaping the rewards of the work we put in, with Nik having the most wonderful connection with our daughter which I don’t think he would have in such depth had he been working full time. It has also given both of us more confidence and stopped the creeping feelings of self-doubt that are almost part and parcel of those early months of parenthood. We chose a path that worked for us and continue to do so in all aspects of our lives. That year made us more humble and much braver. We accept help rather than suffering in silence, stuck behind some misplaced pride. We pay it forward in as many ways as we can. We know that tough times will pass and, if we let them, make us better people in the process.
Would we recommend it? Only if you are ready to be yourself and trust yourself, flaws and all.
Would we do it again? Yes, without a doubt. Though for now we are trying out the settled life, and falling in love with our own little corner of the Peak District.
Have a burning question about #vanlife or thinking of trying it out and want a toolkit for maximising your own potential while you travel? Leave a comment below or get in touch by booking an alchemy call.