11 years ago I moved into my caravan which is next to Otley Chevin and I felt Whoopie - it is so nice to have my space back to myself. Here I have a wood burner, but it’s not really big enough to cook on although I can bake potatoes in it, and I have a three-ring gas hob but only one hob works. I have found lots of ways to cook in one pot and use layers and the food taste so good.

About a year after I moved into the caravan my neighbour hitched me up to a generator and I used some old car batteries and I bought an inverter from Lidl to charge my phone and that worked really well for about eight years. Most evenings my neighbour would start the generator for me when he came back from work but sometimes I didn’t want to bother him so on those evenings I would light candles and I learnt to use lots of rechargeable things.

Then after a while the generators started to go wrong and I got rid of them and now I charge my phone at other peoples or I might charge an LED lamp and I use lots of candles. To wash up I boil the kettle, and then I have to throw the water far away from the caravan

So living off grid or living differently has changed for me now I’m in my 70s. I sometimes get anxious about carrying my bucket across the fields to the outside toilet, unfortunately we’re not allowed a composting toilet here because it could bring an infestation of rats but I’m starting to think it would be nice just to have a toilet. Here I share a toilet and if it’s icy or really cold or raining and there’s lots of mud you still have to take your bucket over there and you definitely do not want to be falling over!

Sometimes I think it would be nice to have a sink to wash up in, and candles are lovely but you have to be very very careful if you have anything inflammable in your caravan the flames can take off really quickly. I once had a Bakelite knives and I’ve never thought about it and it dropped into the gas fire and before I knew it there was big flames everywhere and that can be scary

My caravan is very very old and there are lots of places where water has leaked in and the walls are quite rotten. it’s difficult because in storms and high winds it has felt scary, but I’ve got a tarp on the roof and I use a lot of positive thinking techniques and I told myself I will be safe, I’ve been living like this for two years now.

In the last couple of years I’ve had a couple of injuries, for example I broke my arm and I broke the other wrist I have a little bit of osteoporosis and so I am changing physically. So some of the jobs are more challenging, it’s much harder to cut wood or to garden.