Motorhome Road Trips

Margot's L'Escargot

Margot is unusual, although not unique, in the motorhoming world, being a lone lady traveller. She has very kindly agreed to tell us about her motorhoming experiences travelling Europe. We caught up with Margot in Altura on the Algarve in Portugal.

 

Margot who is 55 years old, originally from Cornwall, England is mother to a son and daughter and grandmother to seven grandchildren. She currently has no pets feeling that this would restrict some of her adventures such as city sightseeing. Home is presently her Burstner 625, Harmony, 2.8JTD automatic which, in our opinion, has to be better than living in a tent which was one of her original ideas. Major life occurrences dictated major lifestyle changes, one of which resulted in Margot leaving her home in Cornwall. Having no idea of where she wanted to settle, although feeling a need to be closer to family in Derbyshire she bought "L'Escargot" in September 2009. I am sure we have all felt a little that we are carrying our homes on our back, we are just not all lucky enough to have a suitably rhyming name. Embarking on her search she had just three definite criteria; a separate shower as distinct from a wet room, a fixed bed and clearly after some forward planning, a left hand drive vehicle.

Why, we asked, did motorhoming present itself as the solution? After 12 years of enjoying sailing with her late husband, Margot is no stranger to living in confined spaces and on the move. While sailing she mainly travelled in Europe, including France, Spain and Italy. It was a former colleague who set the motorhome seed when sharing his own plans to buy a Hymer and embark on some travels. Thinking this a smart idea was followed by three or so months of research. After a 10 minute chat with a salesman, at a motorhome show, who tried to persuade her that she did not need a left hand drive, she promptly settled on L'Escargot which is one of three LHD's she finally sought out and viewed. Well, when your mind is made up!

After a period of sorting out domestic matters and practising and planning for motorhome living, mainly camped on her daughter's drive, Margot finally set sail for Europe on the 8th February 2010. She explains that this is her gap year and her reasons for embarking on this long trip are; to seek out new destinations, a little escapism and in Margot's words having 'very nearly lost the plot' due to the difficult period of time that she had recently lived through, she decided to live by her late husband's words believing 'No matter where you go you will always find yourself'. She grins a little as she tells us that she should really be finding work. Taking a year now however is not only good therapy, it is also a time that she considers herself to be not too scared or frail which may naturally alter in later years.