The Surgeons show Adrian how to use the crutches

Now that we are near the end of our Gap Year, I have been reflecting on what the year has taught me. Definitely one lesson for me is that it is always right to go with the flow and not try and force life.

I now believe that everything happens for a good reason. We might not think so at the time, but  often we really actually don’t know where our lives are going or what is good for us! How can we know what is the right outcome for us?

Adrian and Nuala leave for Germany- note Adrian has borrow a walking stick

In the past I would have decided what I wanted and if it was not coming to fruition I would redouble my efforts until I got the result I wanted. Now I realise that that was a mistake, as my decision was often the wrong one for me.

So that is why you saw many shifts and changes in the Gap Year Plans as they unfolded. We wrote about selling the boat earlier, buying a caravan and completing the second half of the year on the road. When it did not seem to be happening easily I let the idea go and we ended up living on the boat over the winter in Chalon sur Saone which turned out to be a wonderful experience.

We met some great people and the space on the boat was three times what we would have had in a caravan.

Adrian and Nuala in Chalon

When my injured knee forced us to stay longer than we had planned on the Berlin lakes, instead of fighting it I relaxed and went with the flow. Subsequently on the stopover in Berlin on the way back (two weeks later than I had planned it), we met two German surgeons who came on board and gave me the right advice on how to exercise my knee to fix it. If I had stuck to the original time plan we would never have met them.

So now you have a different Adrian. Of course I still plan in detail and work to make things happen but if they are not, I just let it go and move in the direction that seems to be easy and right. Please people who know me well don’t die of shock!!

Day out with friends on the boat in Chalon