Daughter #1 wants to learn to drive.

Any idea where you'd like to go?

>>France, Slovenia or South West Scotland is the short list at the moment.

Of the three I'd probably go for Slovenia. Hell of a language challenge though.

Not for me, I'm fairly competent in Serbo-Croat which is almost universally spoken and understood in Slovenia, and is pretty similar to Slovene in any case.  Mainly the same vocab with some differing words and grammar.  The Mrs is of course native speaker of S-C, but has almost no French.  So Slovenia would be comfortable for both of us.  Cheap property, low cost of living, mountains to ski, meadows to wander, sea to swim, good food and drink, good healthcare.  Ideal really.

Last time I was in Slovenia I was chatting to the (Serbian) barman at our hotel in his native language.  He was so shocked to hear a Brit managing the language he had to go and get the blokes from out the back to show them.

One idea is to have a UK home base (small property in affordable corner of the country such as SW Scotland, or maybe less glamorous but perfectly nice parts of Midlands like Staffs, Shropshire etc), where we would spend the summers, say April to September, then autumn time, Oct-Nov rent an off season gite in the south of France to extend the summer a bit, different place every year. Back home for December-Jan, spend Christmas and New Year with family and friends, then Feb-Mar in Slovenia to ski (again rent somewhere to stay for 8 weeks or so), and during this time also see Mrs A's family over in Serbia and Bosnia - they can come up to us for a bit of skiing or we can go down there for a bit. I'd also like to pop over to Australia during their winter and do a bit of motorhome rental for a month maybe each year.

No worries about time limits on EU stays, the Maltese passports will cover that.

Now. I'll be wanting to drive to France, Slovenia etc. What vehicle do I need for this lifestyle...

When he was a teenager and probably about 15, he 'got into' indy music and was an early fan of Mancunian bands who later made it fairly big. He would tweet them etc and they responded with tickets etc.  Blossoms spring to mind as one of them.  My father gave him some decent Hifi when he was about 16, including a record player. Then he self taught himself guitar.

He stayed at home for his first two years of university, partly due to mental health issues (reported here previously) and also because Salford University is very nearby so not really worth living (until this year).  So we persuaded him to get more involved with things on campus and he approached the student radio station, they gave him an interview and listened to a demo and let him loose.  Initially, due to Covid it was recorded (which he would do in the dead of night at home so there were no distractions) and I think more recently it has been live.  He moved out in September so I don't get all the news these days.  He always forwards us the recording of the session.  He is still a but 'umm' and 'you know' but getting better.  Just needs training. His music selection and the way he described the music in particular is well over my head.  Very detailed and clear in his analysis; I couldn't do it, even to a piece of music I have loved for years.

His course is a four year Masters in Civil and Architectural Engineering but he is considering just doing the BSc and doing a Masters in Music Production or something in that sphere...  I don't blame him; one should love the work you do.  I didn't have the real passion for anything other than perhaps car design and engineering, but I knew my skills would not be up to it.  If you watch the RetroPower channel on YouTube, those guys just understand everything about vehicle engineering.  I watch in awe of how they explain their redesign the suspension of a car from scratch. I am a mere mortal compared to them and my son, who gets Firsts in every piece of work he does at Uni, is up there will them.  

Sounds great, really great.

For me it'd probably be too much travel and movement, but that's mostly because I've done to much of that over the years.

Being retired is great, but it's bloody expensive. And retiring early, which I did, makes it really effin expensive. Like you cannot imagine. And unless you're very lucky, the day that you retire is the most money and assets that you will ever have.

Free time? I wish. I genuinely don't know how I ever had time to work.