The one with the series of unfortunate events

We are cursed, if you’ve been following previous posts you know how much bad luck we’ve had over the past year, but this week’s been a bumper pack of punches in the face. We have no money, so we planned a budget holiday (it’s our first wedding anniversary, Raine’s been made to take time off work (she’s only taken about 5 days holiday all year), it’s her birthday, and we feel like we deserve some sort of break). It was to start with a local festival, a few friends and a lot of beer, followed by a camping roadtrip to Bristol (to see the Banksy exhibition), Brighton for our anniversary/Raine's birthday, and Newquay to surf. Sounds good...

Thursday I went to pick up Chris, and on the way back to Lancaster the car died – great start to a roadtrip. We managed to get it to a garage, where we were told that the starter motor had gone but, for a large amount of money we don't have, they could have it fixed by the next day. Chris and I unpacked all our stuff, and waited in Blackpool until I could take my dad’s car back to Lancaster.

My dad's car full of people and camping stuff we arrived at the festival on Friday morning, to find that it had been cancelled – apparently the site was waterlogged. We thought it was a joke, some man with a can of Strongbow and a rollie quite jollily told us it was cancelled, we didn’t believe him, but then a slightly more official man (he was scruffy, but he had a clipboard and no alcohol about his person) told us the same thing. We looked it up on the Internet, and it had indeed been cancelled. We talk to the man with the clipboard about a refund, apparently he “couldn’t think about giving us our money back” at that moment...cheers...

We decide to cut our losses, go out in Blackpool that night, and then head off on our roadtrip a couple of days early. We go out, have an ok night, but I slip on some rubbish in the road, I’m in pain, and the next morning it looks like I have an egg stuffed down my sock - add a sprained ankle to the list of unfortunate events.

I hobble about and help Raine pack up the car. We get in the car and we're off on the roadtrip - the car doesn’t start, again. We call the AA out, they say we have indeed got a new starter motor, but won't actually start the car. It’s Bank Holiday weekend, so no garages are open. Say goodbye to the Banksy exhibition because it finishes on Monday and we can only afford to camp in Bristol - so we need a car.

We retreat to Raine’s mum’s house firmly believing that we are cursed, but that we have to do *something* to stop ourselves jumping off Blackpool Tower. We start to investigate non-car reliant budget holiday options.

Now, here is the plan (and it’s quite good considering the time we took to come up with it, the lack of money, and the despair we were feeling). Tomorrow we take the coach to London – it’s absolutely amazing how cheap coaches are, yes they take *forever* to get anywhere, but they are cheaper than petrol and you can read while someone else does the driving (look at me looking on the bright side – eh!?!). We’re staying in a hostel that costs £30 a night for both of us, and that we’ve been to before, so we know it’s not flea infested. We’ve got free tickets to watch the Big Brother eviction tomorrow night – so, so, so sad, but free, and it will be entertaining. We get another coach to Brighton for the day on Wednesday, and hire some surf equipment, ankle permitting – it’s not Newquay, but it has surf, most of the time. Saturday we’re sitting in the Gods to watch an England friendly at Wembley – cheap because we will need binoculars to see the pitch (and we’re probably sat behind a pillar). Then there are the free museums and galleries, if I go ahead with some spray paint I can tell Raine that Banksy has been to those galleries...