Nomads
Inspired by a Podcast I had been listening to, we came across an idea to try out different locations by doing month-long stays using AirBnB. As the Podcaster and Author Liz Moody describes it; Nomadding. She and her husband have been doing it since the start of Covid, picking various places in the US to stay for 4-6 weeks, often in areas of natural beauty. The logic for us was to test the hypothesis that we could live happily outside of London and to get a feel for other locations in the UK and see where we might want to end up.
The next 4 months were to be spent in 4 different locations; Devon, Derbyshire, Shropshire and the Scottish Borders. The AirBnB’s all had a spare room so we could both continue to work our remote jobs and all the places promised solid WIFI. The first stop was a lovely, thatched cottage, about 15 miles from Tiverton in Devon. There were no neighbours and access to our own huge field from a gate in the back garden, much to the dog’s delight. We arrived on a Sunday and ensured we had a good set-up to start work the next morning. All was going well apart from the internet kept dropping out and given the rural location, there was no phone reception to act as a fallback to hotspot from. At one point, to make a meeting, I had to drive the car with my laptop to the top of the nearby hill, where the phone reception was restored. The AirBnB owner was very helpful and the BT person was up a pole the next day fixing the fault that chose this exact time to surface. We slightly questioned our choices at this point, but the internet was restored and we settled into working and exploring the area.
First stop of Nomad life, the dog approved.
The biggest learning from the first location was that there are very different flavours of being rural, with differing levels of remoteness. The absence of a phone signal was one quickly felt challenge, as was the 20-minute drive to the nearest shop, and much more to go to a town or larger stores. Also, despite being surrounded by beautiful countryside and judging by footpath maps, an abundance of options for walking, they were rarely accessible. There were some lovely walks directly from the cottage but those not immediately on the doorstep were difficult to get to and impossible to park nearby. It’s an interesting point about how accessible the countryside is and something worth factoring into our plans.
After Devon, we headed to a beautiful village in the Peak District as summer started. The second location was someone’s family home, they had planned a few months in Europe and had posted the house on Airbnb while they were away. It was funny to just step into someone’s existing life, along with instructions to feed cucumber and tomato plants. Derbyshire certainly felt more accessible to the rest of the country than Devon had, I even managed to meet up with some old colleagues for dinner in London, getting the train down in and back on the same day. The peak district was beautiful but had a fractious relationship with the tourists that flooded in regularly. There were offers of cream teas and other sources of refreshments for hikers and bikers, but also, passive-aggressive signs telling people what to do and where to be. The highlight (or maybe lowlight) of which read “Being stupid is not a disability”. I’m not even sure I know what it means, nothing good for sure. We had been looking at property options in the places we had been and it felt there were some promising options around us in Derbyshire, I started looking at every downtrodden or abandoned farmhouse with an eye for renovation.
The cucumbers we looked after in the kitchen windows
As the summer heat wave kicked in, we moved on to a sweet cottage by a stream about 30 minutes from Telford in Shropshire. The stream provided an opportunity for the dog to cool down as the temperatures hit the mid-thirties. We walked in the woods and visited a nearby national trust property with a quarry to escape the heat. Avvy even did her first proper swimming, she decided she was more of a “bounding through water” Spaniel than a dedicated swimmer, but she could swim if needed. We had friends come and stay and explored Shrewsbury. The village set-up was similar to where we were in the Peak District, walkable to a shop or 2 and some pavement with footpaths leading off into surrounding fields. By now, our general sense was that it was about finding the right property and you could grow into the area, which would undoubtedly have its high and low points.
Finally, a stay in the Scottish Borders where summer had definitely finished and we had a damp month in a Bothy that nestled at the back of the farm whose owner let it out. By now we were starting to feel a little bit burnt out by the nomad life. It was a lot to pack up your whole life every few weeks and then establish yourself in a new place finding all the amenities you needed, places to walk the dog and everything else you needed to live your life. All whilst holding working full time. And as soon as we got to Scotland we probably knew it was too far and not where we would end up being. When the rain did stop the nearby pine forest would be full of midges, so it seemed like we got wet or bitten! It certainly wasn’t all bad, I took a trip to the beautiful St Abs Head National Park and we caught up with a friend in Peebles and had a lovely walk through the hills and Lou used the opportunity to go mountain biking in nearby Glentress.
Looking out at St Abb’s Head National Nature Reserve
Our last day in Scotland coincided with the death of Queen Elizabeth, the end of an era that provoked a collective point of reflection. For our part, we had established we could exist in different circumstances, and also that Scotland was very far! We had started narrowing down potential areas of the country that allowed us to get to family and friends in a timely way and had the sort of prices that would allow us to buy what we were looking for. And although we thought otherwise, we had already met our future home.
