Seeing the World

Some weeks ago I wrote about My Walter White Moment and the possibilities it opened up with my pension.  The process drags on.

The speed of IFA, employer’s pension administrator and the occasional issue with my non-standard post divorce residency haven’t made it an instant process.

But it is nearly done with.

My “Gold-Plaited” final salary scheme is worthless to a dead man.  It dies with me.  Transferring the cash value out of the scheme and placing it into a personal pension makes it inheritable.  A rather pleasing six figure sum will go to my kids in the highly likely event of me popping my clogs before I’m 55.

So this opens up an interesting timeline for me as a 49 year old.  It looks something like this:

Die before May 2019 and the pension pot, bizarrely, becomes subject to inheritance tax.  In other words HMRC will skim 40% off my kids’ inheritance.  Yes, the state has a 40% tax on the terminally ill changing their pensions and then dying.

Die between May 2019 and January 2023 and they get the lot, tax free.  Yes, that three and a half year window is the optimum time for me to depart this mortal coil.  Cease to be.

2019-2023 is also a time period that is ideal for building up credit card debt.  But only if I can guarantee dying before I access my pension.  The idea of racking up £50,000 on the range of Barclaycard and AMEX limits I have and leaving no estate to clear those debts is a new reckless side of me that has never surfaced before.  Think George Best …

As I pass my birthday in January 2023 I’ll be able to draw on the pension which I’m intending to leave to the kids.  This is bad news for them but good news for me.  Although if I have survived that long I have a judgement call to make.  How long will I live for?  Do I assume I’m going to make it to 90 and draw a modest pension, or do I blow the lot within five years because I’m still a dead man walking?

If I die between January 2023 and January 2043 the kids get whatever’s left in the pension pot.  Big or small.  And in the miraculous event of death after January 2043 they still inherit the pot, but have to pay income tax at their highest rate on it.  Or merge it tax free with their own pension.

I am beginning to think crystal meth production would give me less to worry about.

It Continues to be a Race Against the Disease

Every day is a small victory against cancer.  But I know that one day, unless there is a significant medical advancement, this cancer will score its consolation goal.  If I can beat it 1,000-1 the doctors will see that as a pretty good effort.  Hopefully I’ll double it.  More perhaps.

So I grasp the opportunity to travel.  To see the world.  To enjoy myself.  And this is where I’m up to:

Done:  Malta, Slovakia, Iceland, Slovenia

Booked:  Montenegro, Northern Ireland, Gran Canaria, New England, Chile, Australia

High Priority:  West Coast USA, Pompeii

Loose Thoughts:  The Far East, New Zealand, Antarctica, Safari, Canada, a long train journey, Russia

Possible Repeats:  Iceland, Slovenia

It’s an evolving list.  Sometimes a time opportunity between Oldham Athletic matches coincides with cheap flights.  Sometimes I just feel a moment of madness and decide to splash out.

Theres nothing on my “Loose Thoughts” list that I’ll regret not doing.  But I’ll be gutted if circumstances stop me doing Australia and The Ashes.  It’s a cruel disease.  If it denies me that trip it will have cheated me.

The Curse of the Motorway Services

Recent months have seen numerous visits to these fine establishments on our motorways.  More travel and a need to take more breaks when driving have seen to that.

Now I’m not naive enough to expect fine dining and bargain prices but these places aren’t exactly a joyous oasis for the traveller.

It all starts well.  Signs saying “Services 1m and 30m” give you a decent idea as to whether you should stop now or in half an hour.  A little bit of thought and notice to aid the driver in making an informed choice.

As you exit the motorway in the dark hours and move on to the slip road the fun begins.  First of all the speed limit drops immediately to 20mph.  No warning!  Then the ridiculously sharp bend to the left awaits the tired driver.  0.3 seconds later a tired faded painted word “CARS” with a barely distinguishable arrow stares up from the tarmac.  Was it left or right?  A barely lit sign immediately lists options for coaches, lorries, caravans, motorbikes and eventually cars.  No time to note and assess.  Just swerve sharply right and pray!

Assuming it’s not busy you’re now in the car park and wondering where the hell the front door of the multi-sided facade of the building is.  While trying to find it you realise you’re driving the wrong way around a one-way car park.  But not to worry, everybody else is too!  You park up.  And realise you’re in the hotel only parking zone.  Let’s go round again.  And park again.

Because they’ve not bothered with any thoughts for the pedestrian, you’re now playing dodge the tired motorist as you head to the front door.  If you succeed with this game you’re in!  Toilet, food or WH Smith!  The latter is quickly discounted for charging £1.60 for a standard bar of Dairy Milk.  Two for £3.00 isn’t going to swing it!

Toilets next.  A glimpse up for the signs.  What do you mean I’ve got to walk up a set of stairs for a Jimmy riddle?  That’s insane!  Legs dancing I waltz past the mobile phone accessory shops that occupy the space where the gents used to be.

Once in place I get to stare at an impudence advert on the wall in front of me.  I could do without this but staring left or right isn’t good form.  By the time I’m done I’ve memorised the bloody phone number!

I wash my hands, seek out the broken hand dryer and head back downstairs.  The Krispy Creme Donuts look good.  Remortgage hotline to the bank closed at 8pm so it’s not going to happen.  I wave my AA card at the overpriced Costa Coffee and get 20% off.  Despite there being nobody else at the counter it somehow takes close to five minutes for a latte to appear.  A rest in a near empty seated zone is welcome.  The inability to connect to wifi isn’t.

And then it’s time to get back on the road.  Another walk across the dark unpavemented car park.  Now to find the exit.  Maybe it’s me, but why are service station car park exit signs so poorly located?  I circle the car park twice and eventually spot a narrow exit sign next to a four foot high kerb designed to scrape brand new BMWs.

And now onto the little road that’s going to take me past the petrol station and back onto the motorway!  No!!  For bizarre reasons they’ve designed this place with a two way road.  I’m heading right and a cleaning truck is coming the other way at 3mph.  Get a move on!  Once I’ve negotiated this the road then disappears and becomes free for all on the fuel forecourt.  Forty two shiny pumps available.  Except nobody ever uses these petrol stations because nobody is stupid enough to pay 25p a lite more than they have to!

Another faded exit sign covered in diesel fumes is spotted and the motorway number brings a sigh of relief and allows the foot to hit the floor and the car accelerate to the slip road.  Only to slam the brakes on suddenly because some idiot planner has put a give way sign up around the back of the petrol station to enable traffic from God knows where to have priority.

Eventually an escape to the calmness of the motorway.  Two miles later … average speed check 50mph.  Kill me.

The Giants Causeway

When I took the attitude of “screw worrying about dying, do something positive” I wrote down a list of UK attractions to see.  Among them is the Giants Causeway.

While things like London Zoo, Stonehenge and a chippy in Whitby have all been ticked off the Northern Ireland option keeps getting shelved.  Usually because I can fly somewhere else for less on the dates I want to travel!

Having spent most of my working life alongside people based in Ulster, and even recruiting a handful on behalf of my employer in years gone by, I received a subtle Facebook reminder that there are people and places to see on the Emerald Isle.

And despite Flybe continuing to charge stubbornly high fares, an early May trip has been booked.  And it’s one that plays merrily with my “chase the bargain” approach to life.

While the value returning to me is small, my Flybe booking will generate a TopCashback commission and a modest amount of Avios.  And I can use my Priority Pass free access to airport lounges in both Leeds and Manchester.

My car hire booking includes a 10% discount code, a 2% British Airways TopCashback commission and will generate over 900 Avios.  Something of a triple whammy on a £41 bargain.

The afternoon I land will involve visiting a couple of places in Belfast before meeting friends.  I’d better take my blue badge with me to avoid parking issues.  Then a short drive north to pick up an out of town Holiday Inn Express paid for with points.  My Luton Airport night pre-Ljubljana combined with an “Accelerate” promotion that I’ve successfully gamed has generated just enough points to get me an Antrim freebie that includes breakfast.

And finally a B&B via Hotels.com that will trigger 8% refund via TopCashback and 0.2 free nights.  The best part is that although the room should cost £70 a night they’re only charging £35 for single occupancy.  Another triple whammy of bargain with rebates!  Looking forward to my traditional Irish breakfast.

That north coast looks rather good too.

Next Stop: Montenegro

Well after Bristol Rovers away on Easter Monday that is.

The land of the Black Mountain, as featured in a couple of the Daniel Craig Bond films, formerly part of Yugoslavia and happily divorced from Serbia.

A land where the Euro is the currency.  But isn’t actually inside the European Union.  A land where the Adriatic meanders like a river forming shallow lakes of sea apparently inland.  Even though they’re still on the coast.

A land where I’ve snagged a coastal apartment for £21 a night for three nights and used up a handful of Nectar points to knock £15 off my Easyjet fares.

Cheap.  Cheerful.  Somewhere new.

Now I just need to hope my poorly foot heals up!

Exclusive Access to the Brand New British Airways First Class Corridor – If I Leave the Airport and Do Security Again

June sees the excitement of what will be my only first class transatlantic flight. British Airways Manchester to Boston via Heathrow cashing in a huge number of Avios as you can’t take them with you when you’re gone.

Quite kindly, BA have already upgraded our Manchester to Heathrow flight from standard domestic class to their Club Europe product. This means that we get a table clipped into place in the middle seat to give our elbows more room while retaining squashed legs and also allows us to be fed a salad of some sort without having to pay for it.

I am making the assumption that we will be sat together, although they increased the cost of reserving seats from £28 to £64 for the two short flights when they upgraded us. So I’ve not booked those seats yet!

Anyway, I digress. I recently received an exciting looking email from BA explaining that as an upcoming first class passenger I will be among the first people to be able to use their new “First Wing”. Odd, as it will have been available for over two months before I travel.  But nevertheless, the email was toned in a way that suggested some new cutting edge aviation enhancement was coming my way.

Looking at the email there appeared to be lots of curvy graphics of stuff that I couldn’t really make head nor tail of. But it seems that this exciting travel innovation is some sort of fast track access taking premium passengers from airport departure hall to airport lounge in the shortest possible time. And I will be a premium passenger!

Indeed, it’s been launched today and is basically a posh security area and a corridor. Taking the valued passengers away from Heathrow’s riff raff and directly into the first class BA lounge. It looks nice but I admit to struggling to muster up excitement for such a thing, despite the high prominence that BA have given it. It is, after all, just a corridor.

There is of course another reason to taper my uncontrollable thrill at the prospect of using this. To do so, I’d have to do all the security stuff at Manchester, take the short hop down south, land at Heathrow, exit the building, walk to the south end of the rather large Terminal 5 building and re-present myself for security again. Before wandering down the shiny new curvy corridor.

Two lots of security in one morning?  I think I’ll just walk straight to the lounge without bothering.

The Joy of the Air Bridge

The air bridge is a brilliant invention. Walking from departure gate to plane without having to negotiate storms, stairs and confusing doors. And exiting the plane in a similarly civilised manner.  Some even enable you to pick up leaflets for products you’re never going to use.  Others even allow business class passengers direct access to their posh cabin without having to mingle at all with the riff raff in economy.  Who knew life as an intrepid traveller could get this exciting?

When my Wizz Air flight landed in Ljubljana they even had one connecting the front of the plane to the arrivals terminal. Alas, at the back where I was sat a stairway and bus trip awaited. Despite being just 30 yards from the terminal building the bus with no seats proceeded on a two mile trip around the airport’s preferred Tarmac routing before dropping its cargo of passengers ten feet beneath air bridge, just a few seconds stroll away from the plane and where it had commenced its journey. And a much longer queue had now materialised at passport control.

I think I prefer the Ryanair approach at Leeds which, once you’re at the bottom of the stairway getting peed on by the great British weather they allow you to walk across a zebra crossing, supervised by the ground staff, to something resembling a very long and leaky bus shelter.  Being hurled around on the seatless bus is my least preferred option.

But perhaps an international law enforcing a requirement for an air bridge at both ends of a plane preflight and post flight would be more civilised. Especially if I’m on board!

From Cow to Cone in Three Hours – Then Straight Down the Neck of a Seabird

A day in Whitby was an interesting experience.  Finding a parking space was the first challenge, but one a suitable car park was found, with disabled space availability, the fun began.

The initial problem being that despite the parking space being conveniently located at the entrance / exit to the car park the pay and display machine was a good fifty yards away.  Not perhaps the cleverest set up.  Next problem was that the pay and display machine didn’t work.  Nor did the next one in the car patk.  Eventually I noticed a large crowd of what appeared to be a coach party.  In reality it was a huge queue at the only functional machine in the place – the furthest away from the disabled parking.

Then the more interesting things came along.  The Abbey.  An impressive hillside ruin.  The legend of Dracula.  £8.40 to get in and no toilets.  English Heritage are taking the proverbial charging to get into the place which is basically a field on top of a hill.  Quite what maintenance they do to the ruins that justifies the charge is beyond me.

Still, the sun was out.  The views were magnificent and despite being in ruin the old abbey is pretty cool too.

After a short intermission in the Whitby micro-brewery and the purchase of more fridge magnets for the kids it was ice cream time.

A brochure in my inland B&B had identified a Whitby ice cream parlour making the magnificent claim “From Cow to Cone in Three Hours”.  A picture of their Jersey cows adding to the compelling strap line.  While I have my doubts about their ability to milk, churn, freeze, flavour and distribute within that timescale I was sold on the concept, handing over my £2 for a superb strawberry cone.  Cool, creamy and deliriously tasty.

As I stood staring across the river and up at the abbey I was blissfully unaware of unexpected interest in my indulgence.  Until a huge seagull swooped and grabbed my cone, dropping to the side of the river several feet below me.  It was a truly magnificent effort to extract the ice cream without being heard and without making bodily contact.  Then another seagull landed and stole it from the original thief.  Ha!

In one motion the gull guilty of receiving stolen goods lifted the cone into the air and downed it, ice cream and all, in one go.  A brilliant effort.

I didn’t cry.

The Hole of Horcum – It’s Not a Meteor Crater

A short stop as I headed to the east coast was a lay by opposite an extraordinary geological feature.  After muttering my irritation at having to pay £2 to park (that blue badge has begun to give me a sense of right to a freebie that doesn’t always exist) I crossed the busy road to view something that, in the heart of the North Yorkshire Moors, reminded me of the Arizona desert.

Well not quite.  But the last time I’d seen a hole anything like this was in Arizona.  The Barringer Meteor Crater.  A phenomenal hole smashed into the ground by an object from outer space.

Typical of the Americans to show off the dramatic that was created in a fleeting moment.  Yorkshire’s version has taken millions of years to evolve with underground spring water the cause.  Slowly undermining the rocks bit by bit causing a slow motion sink hole that continues to deepen.

It’s a remarkable scene.  I’d love to have walked around it but the body wasn’t up for such an effort.  A few minutes of wonder on a breezy afternoon reminding me that we are just a fleeting moment on a planet that’s been around for much much longer.

How Cancer Has Made Standing Up and Sitting Down Difficult