The Life Less Traveled

Family Smudge comprises of: husband Scott, wife Alice, 1-year-old daughter Isabella and family dog, Milla. Tired of the daily grind in the UK and in search of a better quality of family life, they decided to embark on a drastic life-change in February 2008.

They sold their UK house, put most of their possessions into storage and with a handful of clothes, cooking utensils and a computer, moved into their folding camper in the back garden of a family member. 3 months later they gave up their primary income, left the UK altogether and set out on the road to France in search of a new and unknown destiny.

So far this trip has taught them to follow their hearts, live with less, cook family dinners on 2 rings and embrace every moment that life throws their way. Their journey started in France where they experienced hillside breakdowns, picnics at the beach and life on a horse-farm before heading over the Pyrenees to Spain for fiestas, siestas, olive farms and life in a rural village in the Andalusian mountains.

Find out how the family Smudge embarked on their own life less traveled…and how you can, too!

Conception

1) How did you come up with the idea to sell your house and travel Europe in a camper?
Life was getting harder for us in the UK; more outgoings, less incomings and being apart far too much in order to earn enough money to sustain a lifestyle we were not particularly enamoured with. We had a baby on the way and decided that we needed to do something drastic to try and find a better way of life, one where we could get by with less money and thus spend more time together.

Many conversations ensued until we hit upon the fact that there was no better way to find a new life than to travel freely and leave our destiny in the hands of fate. We knew we wanted to stay within Europe and with our dog in tow France seemed as good a place as any to start.

2) Why did you want to change your life so drastically?
We were in a routine that we could see ourselves being sucked into for many years and that thought scared us because we weren’t living the life we thought we wanted to live. We wanted to see more, be more and do more and felt we needed challenge and adventure to achieve that. The idea of hitting the road and being free spirits for a while seemed as appealing as any and we also thought that it would be a great way for Isabella to start her life.

3) What worried you about giving up the comfort of your life to head out into the unknown?
What if we regretted it? What if we wished we hadn’t done it? What if we drove each other crazy living in a small space? What if we missed the life we were leaving behind and couldn’t get it back? A million fears passed through our minds in the months prior to leaving, but at the end of the day life is short and for us it should be an adventure. Sometimes doing things that scare us are what makes that adventure.

4) What excited you about setting out to travel Europe?
Breaking away from our routine, the unknown, spending more time together, visiting new places, meeting new people and having new experiences. Knowing that we were taking a leap of faith and giving up everything we had built up in the UK was in itself exhilarating (once we worked through the fears!) because our future balanced on what lay ahead on the roads across Europe. The whole idea of it was exciting to us.

5) Were there people who thought your idea was crazy?
Of course. I think that whenever you step out of the box there are always going to be people that think you are crazy, but in the same breath, the people that really know us knew that it was so ‘us’ to do something like this that they just wished us luck.

6) Were there people who thought your idea was brilliant?
Lots of people said that they thought we were doing an amazing thing and they wished us well and often people would say ‘I wish we had the guts to do it’ and that spurred us on even more because we knew that we were doing what we wanted to do and truly following our hearts.

7) Was there a specific moment when you thought “Yes, I’m going to do this!”?
When we closed the door on our house, put all of our belongings into storage and set up camp in the back garden of Scott’s parents; that was the moment where the dream became a reality and we knew there was no turning back. After that, the day we booked our one-way ticket to France, now that was a euphoric moment!

Implementation

1) What was the hardest thing about packing up your life in the UK?
Emotionally: saying goodbye to family, friends and our roots in the town where we had spent most of our lives.

Logistically: moving things into storage and getting set up in our camper as well as the paperwork involved in packing up your life for a while was a real pain. We just had to stay focused on where we were going to be and just thank god we were both totally 150% committed to the dream!

2) What was the easiest thing about making the decision to go?
Knowing that we were following our hearts.

Sometimes in life it’s easy to find yourself living in a way that you believe envelopes all you should have, but we came to the conclusion that we didn’t know who sets the rules about what you should have/achieve so we wanted to set our own rules. With our decision to do that came a great sense of liberation and made our decision to take the plunge fairly easy.

3) Did you ever feel like giving up? What got you to that feeling and how did you move through it?
I don’t think we have felt like giving up (yet) but there have been many moments where we have wondered what we are doing and if we are mad.

Sleeping in the garden of our parent’s house wrapped up in bed because it was freezing outside the camper and bad weather in France did, at times, get us down. The rain we experienced on the first leg of our travels was relentless and when you’re living in a camper with a dog, a baby and each other, it can be testing on the strongest relationship. There were days when we would wake up praying for sun so that we could more easily occupy our daughter, I could work in peace and especially so that we could wash and dry our clothes, but it would still rain. During that time there were moments where we wondered what it was we were trying to achieve.

How we get through these times is by bolstering each other up when we need it. We each have this dream and when one starts to feel low, the other spurs us on. If you don’t have each other and you’re on your own then I would suggest writing a blog or diary because looking back at the things that you have achieved and how you have felt help to keep the dream clear in your mind.

4) Financially, how did you make this dream a reality?
Initially we allocated some savings to pay for a few months travel, which we supplemented with money I earn as a freelance writer and graphic designer. I worked freelance in the UK so decided to take my work on the road with us to give us some kind of income. We don’t have much, but we are getting by and learning to stretch what we do have. Now we are staying at a friend’s house in Spain for a few months (goodbye camper living for a while!) so we are pretty much relying on what I can earn. The nest-egg we made on our UK house will go towards the greater dream of buying a small house with some land, when we work out where we want to be!

5) How long did it take from conception of this idea to actually hitting the road?
Well, we probably started speaking about finding a new way of life in 2005, but we weren’t sure exactly what we wanted to do or how to go about it so lots of ideas were being batted around. The birth of our dream to travel around Europe actually happened in a Spanish restaurant in our hometown back in summer 2006. I was pregnant and we knew we didn’t want our baby to be too old before we tried to give something a go. We left two years later.

Reflection

1) What was the most fun thing about changing your life?
The exhilaration of hitting the road with all your belongings in the car and no plan just can’t be beaten, but generally just the amount of fun we have had spending all this time together. We have had such a great time along the way with new and inspiring people and now to find ourselves where we are, getting involved with people who are living the life we only dreamt of before, leaves us smiling most of the time because we are actually achieving what we set out to do!

2) Would you do it again?
In a heartbeat.

3) What is the biggest lesson fulfilling this desire has taught you about life?
That no matter how scared you are, there is always a way to achieve your goal and that life is what you make it and attitude is everything. You have to have the right attitude to achieve your dream and you have to have the right attitude to maintain your desire for that dream through the hard times.

4) What is your favorite memory of life on the road so far?
There really are so many that it would be difficult to choose one, but generally just being on the road as a family, singing stupid songs at the tops of our voices in the car, feeling free and happy and meeting wonderful people who have let us into their life to give us invaluable experiences.

5) What is your funniest memory of life on the road so far?
Our car breaking down in a storm on a French mountainside at night and then being saved by a random French mechanic who just happened to be driving by and decided to offer us assistance. Our mood went from utter gutted desperation to euphoric happiness in a matter of moments and then we couldn’t stop laughing for hours afterwards!

6) What are your plans now?
Our dream is to find a simpler way of life where we can become more self-sufficient, have land and more animals and spend time working together as a family. At the moment we are living in a small village in the Andalusian mountains, Spain, helping at a local dog rescue/kennels/farm: walking the dogs, working with the horses and trying to develop a greater understanding of that lifestyle, but who knows what is next?!

Advice

1) What is your advice to someone out there thinking of taking a leap into the unknown?
Do it. If you really feel it in your heart and you’ve thought seriously about it for a good length of time and have made firm plans as to how you can achieve it, then don’t let anything or anyone stop you. You will of course hit hard times and there will be moments where you’ll wonder what you have done; but for all of those moments, the ones where you find yourself sitting there thinking ‘I’m so glad I did this’ make it so worthwhile.

2) What book would you recommend to someone inspired by your story?
If I had to recommend a book I would recommend Paulo Coelho’s The Alchemist. Not for any other reason than it helped me realise that everything is possible as long as you really want it to happen and I truly believe that. My favourite quote from the book is: “when you really want something to happen, the whole universe conspires so that your wish comes true”.

We also spend a lot of time reading the blogs of people who are living the kind of life we dream of living; these are a great source of inspiration.

Links

Alice’s blog where you can follow the travels of Family Smudge:
http://familysmudgetravellingtails.blogspot.com

The Family Smudge’s blog about their dream of achieving a more rural and self-sufficient existence–where they can run free and feel less tied to the monetary obligations of their previous life:
http://www.livingtheruraldream.com

Alice’s website where you can read published articles about their travels:
http://www.alicegriffin.co.uk

Thanks to the following sites that reference this interview:

Modern Families Carnival Traveling With Kids Carnival Money Hacks Carnival Rich Life Carnival Carnival of Money Stories Festival of Frugality Frugal Babe Europe Travel Blog Carnival