https://youtube.com/@retiredandroaminguk?si=qUM_90zcFx78MBZl

Retired & Roaming, National Exhibition Centre, Birmingham (2026)

06/09/2026

🎉 Well… there are now more than 2,200 of you! 😳❤️

So, firstly, a HUGE welcome to everyone who’s joined us recently!

If you’re wondering who on earth you’ve started following… we’re Andy & Fleur — Retired & Roaming. We love travelling, exploring, walking, discovering new places and generally seeing what’s around the next corner — usually with Monty the Motorhome and often three dogs in tow! 🚐🐾

We’re not great believers in posting just because Facebook thinks we should. 😂 If we’ve got something worth sharing, we’ll share it. If we haven’t… we won’t!

But you’ve joined us at a particularly exciting time because…

⏳ TODAY IS EXACTLY 200 DAYS UNTIL ANDY RETIRES! 🎉🎉

Which means the countdown to both of us being fully retired is getting VERY real.

And, needless to say, plans are already being hatched… 🗺️👀

Our first big overseas adventure in Monty is already taking shape, ready for as soon as work finally stops getting in the way of all this roaming! 😂🚐🌍

We also have a growing YouTube family of more than 1,120 subscribers, where we share the longer versions of our adventures. If you haven’t subscribed yet, we’d genuinely love to have you over there too — and every subscription helps our channel continue to grow. ❤️

👉 Subscribe to Retired & Roaming on YouTube⁠

2,200+ Facebook followers ❤️
1,120+ YouTube subscribers 🎬
200 DAYS TO GO! ⏳

Things are about to get interesting… 👀🌍🚐

Welcome aboard!
Andy & Fleur x

04/09/2026

So I'm going to be honest.....
I hate driving!

I don't mind so much in Monty or bigger vehicles but I find driving as a rule a real bore. Strange, I know, for two people planning some epic adventures from 2027 hoping to explore all over the world in a motorhome!

One of the main reasons we switched from caravanning to motorhomes was because Fleur really didn't like towing, and to be honest, neither did I!

In Monty however, Fleur is probably more happy behind the wheel than I am and that suits me fine. We can genuinely share the driving on longer trips and we play to our strengths; with my farming background I am far happier in tight places or doing tricky manoeuvring but hate boring motorways whereas Fleur much prefers motorway driving.

This has been one of the most liberating things of motorhoming for me. I no longer dread that longer journey; we actually find ourselves wanting to move on and explore new places and hit the open road more often. We get itchy feet. We want to keep moving on to see 'what's around the corner'.

So be honest, who does most of your driving in your campervan, tow car or motorhome? Do you equally share it between partners or does one dominate? And is that by choice or by default?

03/09/2026

📣 **CAN WE ASK A LITTLE FAVOUR?** ❤️

YouTube has introduced something called **HYPE** — and it’s designed to help smaller channels like **Retired and Roaming** get their videos seen by more people. 🙌

If you enjoy following our travels, we’d REALLY appreciate your help!

👉 Head over to our **latest YouTube video**
👉 Look for the **HYPE** button and give it a tap
👉 That’s it! It doesn’t cost you anything, but it could give our video a really useful boost. 🚀

⏰ **There are only 5 DAYS LEFT to Hype this video**, so if you could spare a minute to pop over and give us a Hype, we’d be incredibly grateful.

Every Hype helps tell YouTube that our video is worth sharing with more people — which could help us reach a whole new audience as we continue growing **Retired and Roaming**. 🚐🐾🎥

And while you’re there… if you haven’t already, a 👍 **Like** and a little **comment** would be the icing on the cake!

Thank you for supporting our adventures. ❤️

**Retired and Roaming**
*The biggest adventures are still to come…* 🚐🌍

31/08/2026

***NEW VIDEO NOW UPLOADED - bank holiday special!***

(Link in first comment!)

🏔️ 028 ROAMING THE YORKSHIRE DALES | Epic Scenery, Hiking, History & Monty the Motorhome! 🚐

Join us for our latest Retired & Roaming adventure as we take Monty the Motorhome through the spectacular countryside of the Yorkshire Dales.

This time we’re making the most of everything this incredible part of the country has to offer. We travel along winding Dales roads and through breathtaking landscapes, capturing some truly dramatic scenery from both land and the air.

🥾 Along the way, we pull on our walking boots and hike some magnificent hills, discover the fascinating history behind some of the Dales’ most famous landmarks and, continuing our newfound enthusiasm for the National Trust, paying a visit to the wonderful Sizergh Castle — another National Trust property ticked off the list!

🚐 We also bring you our latest real-world update on the IndelB 12V air conditioning system fitted to Monty. Having now had much more opportunity to actually live with it, we share how it’s performing in everyday motorhome use and whether our experience has lived up to expectations.

From soaring drone views and remote Dales scenery to walking, history, heritage and life on the road in Monty, this episode really does have a bit of everything.

So make yourself a cuppa, settle back and come roaming with us through one of our absolute favourite parts of the country.

👍 If you enjoy the video, please give us a like, leave us a comment and subscribe to Retired & Roaming for more motorhome travels, narrowboat adventures and life as we get ever closer to full retirement!

Retired & Roaming — the adventure continues… 🚐🥾🏔️

29/08/2026

Wondering where everyone else is this bank holiday? 🤔

Standing here watching our ‘normal’ bank holiday weather which has resumed 🌧️ and surveying the considerable mole damage on the lawn from our recent roaming! 🪏🪴

Monty is snuggled back up on the drive awaiting a good clean and Velvaere is safely tucked up at Enslow Marina until she can be rescued. 🚐⚓️

On what is Andy’s last summer bank holiday of his working life we’re excitedly reading the travel blogs of other people and wondering what adventures we’ll be up to this time next year…… 💭🧭

28/08/2026

🚐 We’re still roaming… just a little closer to home this time! 🏡

Have we mentioned our newfound excitement about discovering the National Trust? 😍

Today’s adventure took us to Baddesley Clinton — and what a place! A beautiful medieval manor house with a fascinating history packed full of mystery, intrigue, secret hiding places… and even murder! 🫣

We were so intrigued by the stories surrounding this place that we went armed with the cameras and microphones 🎥🎙️ and gathered enough footage to put together a short film all about Baddesley Clinton for our channel very soon.

Don’t worry, we haven’t forgotten about Monty! 🚐 Our video from our recent Yorkshire adventure will be uploaded over the Bank Holiday weekend — then we’ll get to work on this one.

In the meantime, these photos should give you a little flavour of today’s visit. 📸

And we’ve discovered something else that might make our National Trust adventures even more addictive! 😂

We’ve found a completely free app called Trust Quest which lets you track and record all your National Trust visits, collect a virtual passport stamp for every property you explore, and share reviews, photos, hints and tips with other visitors. We’ve included a screenshot of the app icon at the end of the photos in case anyone else fancies joining in.

We have a feeling that passport is going to start filling up rather quickly…! 🏰🌳

Roaming just got a whole lot more exciting… and full retirement for us both feels a whole lot nearer. ❤️

25/08/2026

From Caravanners to Motorhomers… 🚐💚

After 20+ years of caravanning, making the switch to our first motorhome was always going to feel like quite a change.

One of our biggest concerns before taking the plunge was whether a motorhome would really suit the way we like to holiday. We could absolutely see the appeal of touring — moving on regularly, exploring somewhere new and taking home with us wherever we went — but what about those times when we wanted to stay on one site for a few days?

With the caravan, we always had the car sitting outside. We could unhitch, set up our little base and then head off down narrow lanes, explore villages, find remote beauty spots or simply go wherever the mood took us.

Would we lose that freedom with a motorhome?

As it turns out… not at all!

As our confidence with the size, dimensions and capabilities of the van has grown, we’ve realised just how versatile motorhome life can be. Yes, we absolutely love touring in it — packing up and moving on, watching the scenery change and waking up somewhere different.

But we’ve also discovered how much we enjoy using it almost like we used to use the car.

We can leave our campsite for the day, head off exploring and find somewhere beautiful to stop. And when we do, rather than just having the car with us, we’ve got everything! ☕️🥪🐾

We can make a coffee, have lunch, change our boots, sit somewhere comfortable, head off for a walk or simply put our feet up and enjoy the view. We might stay for an hour or two, or spend virtually the whole day there, before eventually heading back to our campsite for the night.

And today, on the last day of this Yorkshire Dales trip, that’s exactly what we’ve done.

We’ve returned to one of our favourite secluded spots, well away from everyone, parked up and simply enjoyed being here. No agenda. No rushing around trying to tick off another attraction. Just us, the van and those breathtaking Dales views. ❤️

And we weren’t entirely without company…

A Swaledale sheep, looking perfectly at home amongst the scenery, and a rather inquisitive juvenile Meadow Pipit who decided that looking at the motorhome wasn’t enough and actually popped inside for a visit! 🐑🐦 Fortunately, after a little assistance, our unexpected guest was safely shown the way back out. 😂

Twenty-plus years of caravanning gave us some wonderful adventures and memories, and we’ll always have a huge affection for it. But we’re discovering that motorhoming hasn’t meant giving up the things we loved about caravanning.

It’s simply given us another way of doing them.

And sitting here today, surrounded by the Yorkshire Dales, we’re rather glad we made the switch. 🚐💚

24/08/2026

UPDATE IN PINNED COMMENT

***Restricting comments now due to some incredibly rude or unhelpful posts. If you find your comment has vanished, it’s because it was neither appreciated or valued and brought nothing to an adult page. Your point may have been excellent but the way you put it across may not have been! It’s clear our previous post about the system in New Zealand has stamped on the cave roof of a few trolls.

If you’d all like to interact with the lovely positive posts about our adventures, travels and general enjoyment of life just as much, we’d be very grateful and life would be so much sweeter.***

ORIGINAL POST:
So a little motorhome conundrum for anyone travelling to Ingleton in North Yorkshire

They have recently introduced a new car park charging system. First the good news; you can now stop overnight for £6.60…I think! I say that because although it calls itself an ‘evening charge’, the permitted time is 6pm - 9am. I also note the t&c state “no camping, sleeping, cooking or servicing of vehicles permitted except in a designated motorhome bay.” I couldn’t find any marked designated motorhome bays; just coach bays, parking bays or ‘pop & shop’ bays? ***

So we parked anyway for Fleur to pop in to the Co-Op and then the takeaway. ‘Pop & Shop’ sounded perfect.

BUT…..
The machine, as you can see tells you to press 3 for a motorhome - which I did…..and it then tries to charge you the flat rate of £6.60 overnight parking with no other available options.

I objected to that for a 20 minute stay but then noticed that the board says that for motorhomes 9am - 6pm ‘charges as per daily charges above’. So I assumed that meant we were treated like a car during those times.

I therefore started again and instead of pressing 3 for a motorhome, decided to press 1 for a car. After entering your number plate and the system saying it is ‘checking your registration details’, (no idea what for as no ANPR is present and no specific details then come up other than to request your payment) it calculated 50p for up to 45 minutes for the ‘pop & shop’.

That’s better - happy to pay that; so I did!

My brain hurts and fingers crossed I did the right thing? Why does it have to be so complicated? Pretty sure I could devise an easier system to work out and one which made more sense in around 10 minutes!

24/08/2026

Our penultimate day up here today. 😢

Another lovely day in the hills. A super little 4.7 mile walk from Austwick taking in Oxenber Wood and Wharfe Wood and towards the little hamlet of Feizor. It had everything: open views and rolling hills, woodland, limestone outcrops and scree slopes and finding in lovely flat walking back to the van via the Pennine Way.

As ever on moors, hills and trails, we met some colourful characters. Today’s encounter was a ‘nearly retired’ secondary geology teacher cycling off on his mountain bike with rucksack and hammer to find, in his words, some “recently exposed really funky rocks!”

With an ascent of only 630 ft today’s was far less strenuous than yesterday and greater cloud cover made for a thoroughly pleasant days gentle walking.

Now back for an earlier dinner and some rest before our final day tomorrow and then sadly heading home on Wednesday.

We’re now bookmarking walks we want to come back to in different seasons when time constraints are no more as this one had clear evidence of carpets of bluebells which we’d love to see in April/May time.

24/08/2026

We won’t make a habit of this but this last minute getaway deal due to a cancellation is simply too good not to share. As you’ve seen from our previous post the heather on the moors will be at its absolute best at that time as well.

Retired & Roaming

06/09/2026

04/09/2026

03/09/2026

31/08/2026

29/08/2026

28/08/2026

25/08/2026

24/08/2026

24/08/2026

24/08/2026

Address

Website

Alerts

Shortcuts

Share

Category

Listing takedown request