I confess to having been a bad blogger and vanishing for a few weeks. There is a reason for that, which I did intend to mention before I went but once more managed to forget. We finally made it to our place of respite, which is a farm owned by people I've known since I was a baby. We were there for a little longer than intended, partly because I had a slight dip in health while we were there and needed a couple of pain-relief injections.
We took delivery of our brand new Motability car shortly before we left, which made the drive down interesting. It is a Vauxhall Mokka Turbo SE which, despite some of the reviews I have seen, is actually a lovely car to drive. It has much better road grip than our previous car and because it is a turbo, it pulls away faster too. The reason that we picked the Mokka was because we got much more for our money in terms of features. There is individual climate control for passenger and driver sides of the car, with heated seats and lumbar support on both sides too.
Although many people refer to Motability cars as being "free", this is not true. People who have a certain level of mobility problems are entitled to claim the mobility component of Disability Living Allowance. Let me be clear; this is not a benefit. It is an allowance that helps to contribute towards the additional costs that disabled people incur due to their disability. The good thing about this Allowance is that it allows many disabled people to work, in some capacity. This, of course, means that not only do they then pay taxes, they are likely to spend much more money in various businesses, thus contributing to the economy at a much higher level. Without that allowance, this would not be possible.
For people like me, unfortunately I am not able to work, due to the severity of my health issues. I have, in the past, volunteered in various capacities. My car played an essential role in this. What happens is I pay the entire of the mobility component of my DLA to the charity Motability. In return, I lease a car from them via a local supplier. In my case I also had to pay a small 'up-front' fee of £99 towards my car.
Luckily for me, the almost £60 a week that I pay to Motability includes full breakdown and tyre cover. Believe it or not, with only 650 miles on the clock, we had a blow-out. I wasn't in the car at the time (thank goodness!) as my husband had popped out to a nearby town to pick some food up. It was around 8pm when he called me to let me know what had happened. Thankfully he had been able to control the car and pull into the side of the lane; three guys from a nearby farm had come out to help him.
Here is my big problem with modern car manufacturers; where is the spare wheel? Why is it taken out prior to sale? This meant that rather than the 5 minutes it would have taken my husband to change the tyre, he had to wait for a tow-truck to come out, pick the car up and bring him back to the farm. Because it was night-time and they didn't have a tyre immediately available, the tow-truck then returned the next morning and drove my husband almost 30 miles to the nearest stockist. Yes, I did say 30 miles for a tyre! Had that garage not had any, it would have been a drive of over 65 miles each way.
Anyway, after that had passed, we stay an additional couple of days to de-stress me so that I would be okay with the drive back. That didn't work, unfortunately. It has taken me over a week to recover enough to get back being able to talk-type on the computer.
I hope you've all had a happy and healthy few weeks. It is good to be back! The only thing I really miss while there is that there is no internet access.
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