When we left our camping dome, we didn’t move far. My brother, Stuart, lives less than an hour away and we were going to stay with him for a long weekend. Arriving late morning, we unloaded the car, put some washing on, had lunch with him, then went out for the afternoon. The bees were buzzing at the Quince Honey Farm where we spent a very sensory few hours. We learnt about bee keeping and honey harvesting, tasted some honey and made a beeswax candle. We made time for a visit

Hot weather, hot campers, overheated car! We moved from Cornwall to Devon on a very hot day. On the way, the car became unhappy, with a warning light on the dashboard coming on a couple of times, making it necessary to pull over for a while before continuing gingerly to our destination in Parkham, north Devon. Fortunately, it was not a long drive and we could take it slowly. The next day we took the car to a local garage where they found the coolant level was very low, though

Staying in Cornwall, a visit to the Eden Project was almost inevitable. It is well set up for wheelchair accessibility, with almost the whole site having good wide paths (though some are steep in places). There is a Changing Places Toilet outside the visitor centre at the entrance. This doesn’t have a radar key lock and the day we visited the door was often left open which means those who don’t need it will use it, especially as they get to it before the main toilets. Another

From our Bodmin flat, we had days out to various local attractions. Bodmin Jail was a fascinating, immersive insight into life in the notorious prison. We heard the stories of some of the inmates, ‘attended’ court hearings, and saw the spot where many were executed. We also negotiated a wheelchair access ramp which was more like a slalom! ‘The story of Emily’ is a new attraction in St Ive, near Liskeard (not to be confused with St Ives on the coast!). Emily Hobson was the dau

Arriving back on the mainland from the Scilly Isles we spent the night at the Premier Inn in Hayle, just because it was convenient as a pit stop. The following day we set off to Falmouth to collect Racheal’s medicines from my brother’s colleague, who had stored them while we were on Scilly. From there we went into Falmouth to the National Maritime Museum. There was an exhibition on surfing, which was interesting as surfing is part of the itinerary for this trip, while we are

The second half of our stay on St Mary’s, we didn’t go far from Hughtown. We spent a showery day wandering around its small streets, starting off at the quay and zigzagging our way backwards and forwards as we made random decisions about where to go. We visited the charity shop in the church hall next to our ground floor flat, then went to a cafe for waffles with bacon and maple syrup - memories of Canada! The Thoroughfare, which we hadn’t found before, rewarded us with the C

The first three days of our stay on St Mary’s were spent exploring as much of the island as possible. Day one got off to a bit of a false start. We were on our way to the lifeboat station when we got caught in a hailstorm. We managed to keep Racheal dry and cover her with her waterproof poncho, but by the time we had got her sorted, Summer and I were both soaked. We kept going and sheltered in the RNLI shop until the heavy rain passed over. The volunteer on duty was Sue, the

The morning we left Penzance, we had to be up early. The Youth Hostel was only 10 minutes drive from the quay, but we had to be there by 7am. I had loaded as much as possible into the car the night before after we had carefully packed the things we needed to take and everything else that would be left behind in the car. We drove the short distance and I dropped Summer and Racheal off with our luggage before driving to the parking area back near the hostel. A minibus picked up

We had booked Penzance Youth Hostel as our base to explore the tip of Cornwall before travelling on to the Scilly Isles. It was a friendly place with a large accessible bedroom and shower room. The only downside was that the self catering kitchen was downstairs in the basement which Racheal couldn’t get to. Penzance itself we didn’t find very easy to navigate with Racheal’s wheelchair. The road was closed along the seafront, even to pedestrians, and the lifts up to the town w

Our accommodation in Plymouth was a fort! This was the fourth and final Landmark Trust property of the gap year. Crownhill Fort was built in 1860 as part of the land defences of Plymouth’s naval base, and used by the military until the 1980s. Now it is owned by the Landmark Trust and part of the officers’ accommodation is a holiday let, while other buildings are occupied by various businesses. We had fun exploring outside on our first evening, and were treated to watching an

Our five week trip to SW England and S Wales began with a long drive down to Salisbury. Despite a slow start due to lots of road works and volume of traffic, we made reasonable time overall. Once we had checked into the Premier Inn for our overnight stay, we set off to explore the city and find somewhere for a meal. Salisbury gets a big appreciation vote from us for having a dedicated blue badge car park in the centre, each space having its own ramp up to a wide pavement. Aft

We had booked to go to Keukenof on the last day of our Netherlands trip and it was amazing! We had the best weather of our week away, the tulips were stunning, everywhere (just about) was accessible, and we thoroughly enjoyed our day. The photos speak for themselves. We had arrived at 11am, stayed until 4.30pm and didn’t see everything. A lot of the tulip fields around Keukenof had already been harvested, but one remained in all its glory. As well as the incredible gardens, t

The Netherlands holds a flower parade each year which follows a 42km route from Noordwijk on the coast to Haarlem. We checked the route and decided to watch it in a small town south of Haarlem where it was due to arrive around 8pm. So we had a relaxed morning visiting charity shops in Alkmaar, where Summer picked up some bottom drawer bargains ready for going to uni. We also bought our train tickets for a day out in Amsterdam the following day and stopped off at a pizza resta

Our final foreign foray of the Wheely Amazing Gap Year was to The Netherlands. It was a shorter trip, being just over a week long, but we had lots to pack in. We took the Shuttle from Folkestone, as we had on our Europe adventure before Christmas. It is so convenient and much easier to have the car packed with everything we need. As before, we stayed in the Premier Inn near the terminal so we could catch an early train the next morning and get on our way. Our route took us ac

This was the last location of our Spain and Portugal trip. With six nights in the same place, we were able to slow down and relax a bit more. Our accommodation is described in another blog, ‘Basque Paskua’, along with Easter celebrations. Between attending local festivities, we explored some of the countryside, towns and villages in the area. The village of Meano, where we were staying, was small but had some interesting features and stunning views. Racheal particularly enjo

We arrived in the Basque region in time for Easter. We had booked a three storey house on the edge of a small village in the mountains. It was a beautiful place to stay, with a ground floor bedroom and wet room for Racheal, and a big family room. Upstairs were four more bedrooms each with en suite, and two with their own sitting rooms looking out over an amazing view. Having had a busy time in Seville and Ávila, Thursday was a fairly relaxed day just gathering information fro

The next stop on our Spanish adventure was the ancient, walled city of Ávila. Although our apartment was in no way historic, it was within the walls making the experience of staying here extra special. Our ground floor apartment was in a rabbit warren of small apartment blocks, down some steep ramps and quite a distance from the nearest point we could get the car. It took longer to unload. We don’t travel light! With the changing table balanced on the hoist, boxes stacked on

We were sad to leave Portugal, but very excited to see Seville. The drive south had less impressive scenery once we left the mountains and got onto the motorway which took us over the fairly flat plains. We made good time until we got to the outskirts of Seville which was congested, adding an extra half hour to our journey. When we finally got to our accommodation, the host was waiting for us, and the villa did not disappoint. Maybe it was a little smaller inside than we expe

Following our few days in Lalín, we travelled south into Portugal stopping at Lamego, for a picnic lunch and a short walk. We had a lovely day for driving and enjoyed more beautiful scenery along the way. Our destination was a small village, in the district of Castelo Branco, called Vale de Prazeres where we had booked a self catering property perched on the hillside. As soon as we arrived we knew we were going to love it. Peaceful, private and with a traditional feel, it had

The next leg of our journey took us to Lalín in Galicia. Another beautiful drive with incredible views which are impossible to capture on camera when driving on motorways. We stopped off half way in the town of Mondoñedo, where we enjoyed lunch in the sun at a cafe, before having a wander around the old town. This was our first encounter with the way markers for the many pilgrimage routes to Santiago de Compostela. From the car park we could see the motorway in the distance,