Time Out,

We've been watching Sky news and thanking our lucky stars we aren't living in our van in England. You guys have had it rough! We hope our reader is coping and managing to get where you need to be. We’re thinking of you. It was Dave's birthday yesterday, he got a new pen-knife. The UK got 3' of snow. We got back at Jacqui & Al's place in France without anything going bang or grinding to a halt; in the past two days Dave and Al have had the van’s gearbox out and back in, they’ve taken the clutch to bits, greased the mechanism and re-assembled it, they’ve taken a drive-shaft to bits and fitted a new gaiter, they’ve tightened the alternator belt and put a fresh dose of antifreeze in the radiator . The water tanks are all drained so they don’t freeze, Ann-Marie’s written all our Christmas cards and sorted our clothes into piles for taking and leaving and we’re getting ready to head back to Calais. We’ve got everything crossed that the weather in England will improve in the next couple of weeks so that when we get back we’ll be able to get round to see all the people we’ve promised to see.

Jacqui & Al have got flights booked to Gatwick in a couple of days, we’re supposed to be looking after the animals for them for a week, but they don’t know if they’ll be able to go or not yet.

Anyway, there won’t be much to report for a week or two so it’ll be a bit quiet on here. Rest assured though, as soon as anything happens you’ll be the first to know.