A Special Interest for Travelling

Sadly Sofia heads back to school today – it has been a great couple of weeks riding almost everyday.

I’ve tried to do as much prepping with her as possible. One aspect of this has been discussing the need for her to have her own special interest to help stay focused on her surroundings and reduce any PDA (pathological demand avoidance) responses.

In Africa it was birds, animals and different flavours of Fanta. On this trip it is birds and photography (as an extention of her art) at the moment … the latter may be more of an issue as she doesn’t understand what it means to take a photo. Obviously she can perform the action and understand it is a creative modality, but it has no meaning for her at this point in the sense of not being able to internalise photography as a concept of creative expression – if that makes sense. So I’m hoping one of the staff in her house at school, who is a keen photographer, will be able to help her with this.

Conceptual understanding of the world in autism is a real struggle, especially where there is no intellectual disability because ideas can be understood/verbalised in an abstract way on one level, but conceptual understanding needs ideas internalised in order to take action on that information. With out that internalisation the connections between things have no meaning or value.

The main thing is that she attempts to take advantage of this trip for her own means independent of me and what I’m doing and pushes that agenda.

She needs a lot of encouragement to do this in the presence of others (me in this case) as she is constantly hyper aware of audience over and above her own needs. So this will be an on going conversation until we find the right note or even activity that will float her boat enough to over come this. This will work in line with ‘living in the moment’.

#autism #autistic #autismawareness #Canada #camping #bikersofinstagram #bikerkid #bikergirl #bikers #motorcycle #bmwgirl #bmwadv #bmwgs #bmw1200gs #bikelife #bmwmotorrad #advlife #adventure #travel #advbike #touring

The Battle of The Tents

Tents have been a thorn in our side since we started travelling.

We went through Africa with a cheap dome tent that was heavy & we didn’t use it much so I dumped it in Zimbabwe and picked up light throw away ‘made in China’.

Then we went through Europe with a super light 2 man Vaude tent which was too cramped and Sofia especially struggled with this which meant the battle was on to camp – we did camp, but not as much as I would have liked due to the added stress on both of us. I love the tent though. It is easy packing and setting up, and one I (or hopefully Sofia) will use as a solo #traveller.

After that trip I discovered the perfect tent someone was using at the annual Overland Event. An Exped super light tunnel the only problem was that Exped had stopped production 15yrs ago and refused to sell me a spare.

All hope lost I got a cheap 3 man last year that at least gave enough bearable space for Sofia, only it is heavy (7kgs) and fills an entire pannier, so now we have a packing space issue. Otherwise a good tent that didn’t spark any major issues with Sofia so a big thumbs up on that front.

Canada, however, has to be a purely #campingtrip due to costs but now we have a lack of packing space, & at best there is no room for food negating one of the cost benefits of camping.

So today I started looking at tents again not thinking a solution was out there with only a year since last looking, when Vaude popped up with a super light (4.2kg) 3 man tent with standing room porch.

I can’t begin to describe the relief at finally finding a suitable tent. It’s like a weight of stress off my shoulders knowing that Sofia, who has been amazingly good considering her own battles, will finally have a tent that she will like and be #happy enough to stay in night after night or in wet weather hold ups, whilst meeting our packing needs.

The tent is £419 on sale, so we need your help! Please could you sponsor our tent with a donation (every penny helps!) – we would both really appreciate it!

Please donate to help us raise awareness for autism.

Vaude comes up trumps for two up camping! We love this tent.

 

 

Canada Preparations

Canada preping on #Dartmoor ride. Ride – walk 2 hrs – then ride a distance.
Lesson learnt- not a good plan walking 2 hrs with biker trousers and boots! Not helped by me trying a kit variation involving keeping lining in making the trousers heavy to walk in. It was a good ride though, Dartmoor is stunning.

A big part of our #Canada trip is to slow down and ‘do’ more. Sofia really struggles with the concept of ‘doing’ and it triggers her pathological demand avoidance (#PDA) which is part of her #autism profile – this effectively means she refuses to ‘do’ that which she percieves is expected of her which is felt intensely and must be fought against and/or reinterpreted to her own liking. It is an anxiety state. From the outside this is often percieved by others as laziness, but actually it is anxiety driven.

Yet for her living in the future (aka in a state of anxiety) is more ‘relaxing’ than living in the present moment she tells me. A miss conception I hope to help her resolve in #Canada & hope in turn it will help her manage her PDA and enable her to do more. Because the frustrating thing for her is that it is not that she doesn’t want to go for a walk for example or draw the picture somone has asked her to, but she doesn’t understand why she can’t let herself ‘do’ these things.

How do I get her to do as much as she does with PDA? Constant negotiation and a huge amount of planning to ensure negotiations are successful. I don’t sweat the small stuff either, thats where the really big resistance is – in big stuff like travelling there is a fate à complis and serves as a distraction so small stuff can enter through the back door of her mind.

 

Please help us with a donation via our website (£10 =100miles) to raise #autismawareness

October Update & The LEGO Adventure 2019

The most common two questions I am asked at the moment is, How is Sofia doing in her new school?  and How am I doing with this big change?

With the first, Sofia is settling in really well.   I have to say that all the travelling she has done, has made the transition really easy for her in that she has the confidence to adapt to her new environment and make the best of it.  That is not so say that she is not confronting many challenges, but she seems to be happy to embrace the challenges and for the first time in a school environment, has the opportunity and space to process and recognise those challenges and learn something from them.  It is a huge step for her and I have to say that she is making me enormously proud.

For my part, it has been a surreal experience.  So reconnect to myself, to remember who I was and what my goals were in life and re-evaluate them in the context of today is quite a journey, and one that I feel can’t be rushed.   The conclusions I have drawn are that I will ride the motorbike for my own pleasure and will no doubt seek my own adventures where I can, but I may or may not publish them as part of Adventure with Autism, I don’t have a feel for it yet.  I will however be organising a ride from Lands End to John O’groats (the LEGO Adventure) next Summer for Sofia, which will no doubt take us via Wales and Ireland.

Adventure with Autism in the mean time will remain relatively quiet, as it seems to do during the winter months.   We are just about to leave for a proper holiday (for a change!) tomorrow on a cruise, and it will be an opportunity to recap the last four years since the last time Sofia took a cruise which started off this big travel adventure for her.  I’m not entirely sure how I’m going to film/record it, but we will be going through all the photos I have and reminiscing.  Hopefully catching as many of Sofia’s memories before she forgets them.   The results of this effort will no doubt leak into social media over the winter months so watch this space!

We travel and publish our travel experience on Social Media to help raise awareness for Autism, please could you help us continue this effort by making a small donation – Thank you:  https://uk.virginmoneygiving.com/charity-web/charity/finalCharityHomepage.action?charityId=1005498

 

 

The Battle to Leave #Nordkapp! – Part 1

Having battled to get to Nordkapp (see post The Battle for #Nordkapp), we now battle to leave!

The following is an email I have just sent to the Insurance company regarding the current situation:  

To whom it may concern at Carol Nash/AXA assistance,

As there have been many phone conversations, it seems prudent that I should in someway to clarify in writing what has been happening in the current situation regarding the recovery of my motorbike (LV03 BWJ).

On Sunday, my bike broke down on the E69 Nordkapp Road in Norway.   Some 4 hours later someone arrived to recover us, however, it was not a motorbike mechanic and he could only take the bike as far as his garage in Honningsvag as that was as far as the recovery had thus far been approved and advised that the bike should be recovered to the BMW dealer in Tromso to be fixed.

You then advised that you needed a quote from your agents in Norway, and in the conversation is was made clear that I had to choose between accommodation or a hired car.  As it is impossible to camp  with out a vehicle as we would have done and did not know if it was possible at NordKapp at this time, despite the offer of a taxi to take us there, so we booked into a local hostel (80Euros)

I believe the phone call was about 10am Monday my time when I fully understood the conditions regarding accommodation and hire car and said that I would take the hired car but please deliver as soon as possible as we had to check out of accommodation at 12pm.  When I called at approx. 5pm my time, you advised you still had not recieved a quote to approve from your agents in Norway for the hired car or for the transport of the bike.

After threatening to claim for expenses for the night, a car materialised an hour and a half later, 500m down the road from where I was located with the bike.  Effectively it took a whole day to organise a hired car that was located down the road.  Clearly someone had woken up as I was then advised that the cost of transport to Tromso had been quoted in the region of 3500Euros (I forget the specific figure)  and that the policy only covered a sum of 2000 Euros – I then stated that then a more local mechanic will need to be found because the priority was the fix the bike and continue our journey as we were on a sponsored ride.   I requested a solution by 9am the following morning or I would start taking the matter into my own hands regardless of the costs that might result for the insurance company.

That night we wild camped – as it was our expectation to do for this journey where ever possible.

I phoned approximately 10am my time on Tuesday morning to discover, once again that nothing had been done.  So I then spent the morning and at the expense of using my mobile phone to phone Norwegian phones, to locate a more local mechanic.  Once located, I relaid the information back to you, and you porceeded to find a new quote for transport.

The new quote to transport the bike a third of the distance than Tromso was 2053 Euros!

If the discrepancy is not immediately obvious to you, please advise and I will explain in much more detail to help you understand.  However, futher to this, the quote is 53Euros over the limit.  I am not prepared pay for a clearly fabricated quote, especially now that travel expenses are 300% up as a result of this situation.  I then offered to source a van myself and drive it and quote you for the job, and you advised that you would be happy to recieve the quote.

I sent you a quote for approval around 3pm (Tuesday) detailing the cost of the van hire for one day, the estimated cost of fuel, and the cost of my time – the quote totalled 600Euros.

I picked up a message from Matt, who was dealing with the case, around 5.30pm saying that the van and fuel had been approved, but the compensation for my time had not and it had be forwarded to other departments – ‘but at least I can now move the bike’

I phoned him back and explained, that I would not be moving the bike until compensation for me to do so was approved.    I am not fool to be used by the insurance company to do work for free that I pay them to pay for.

I recieved a call from you around 8pm asking if the motorbike had been delivered, and in response I made it abundantly clear that I would not do anything with out recieving compensation for it to which he explained that it was unlikely to happen.  I have already sourced a mechanic would will look at the bike immediately (or at least he would when I spoke to him yesterday morning) and researched and provided a quote to do the job of transporting it myself. This is all work that other people are paid to do and are clearly not doing.  I have now provided a quote that saves the insurance company 1400Euros and they now want me to rush the bike over to the mechanic so that they can then tell me they are not going to compensate me so they can reduced their costs further.  The poor chap got an earfull from me!  I was advised that the quote was with senior management.

We spent the night in the hostel (80 Euros) as the weather had turned bad and camping was no longer an option.

Approx 10am Wednesday morning, having still recieved no phone call, I call you to discover nothing had been done. I am called back some time later to be advised that the senior manager will not compensate me for my time, but I am welcome to transport the bike myself still.

I, understandably, am becoming very stressed and advise that you must now pay the 2053Euros as you have now refused a cheaper offer.  Further to that, I was now in a situation as the weather was till bad  and clearly nothing is being done for yet another day and I was forced to book yet another night (80Euros) at the hostel.

You are aware I am travelling with a child (11 yrs old) I have further made it clear in the last phone call that she is autistic that we are sponsored to do the journey to raise awareness for autism, that the costs are beyond us and that I will ensure that they all claimed back from the insurance company when we return because simply put – our plan was to come to Nordkapp, wild camp one night if it was possible, then leave and head south for a bike meet in Estonia.  That we are now still here is entirely as a result of the insurance company regardless of my efforts to help move the situation forward anyway I can, and in so doing saving the insurance company money – something that the company has now rejected.

So the current situation is that we are still in Honningsvag, I have booked another night at the hostel (80Euros)  the hired car will need to be returned in 12 days, the motorbike has not moved, and you the insurance company are not doing what you are contracted to do which is to provide recovery for the vehicle regardless of being given the options to do so.

My stress levels are high and increasing and I have not slept properly since this whole debacle has begun.  My daughter’s travelling preference is to keep moving towards the end goal, and she is now becoming stressed as she can’t understand why we have not moved from Norkapp in the last 3 days.  This is added stress for me as her carer for which there is no relief beyond being able to take out my increasing frustrations on the phone to your customer care agents that phone me intermitantly to tell me that nothing has been done or nothing will be done.

It is now 1.40pm Wednesday – almost exactly 3 days from my first call for recovery.

If I have miss-understood the events that have transpired these last 3 days please clarify, and like wise if you would like me to clarify further on any points I will be happy to do so.

Please note that this is an open email and is published on the internet as part of our (myself and my daughter’s) on going journey to travel from the UK to Nordkapp to Gibraltar and back to the UK with in 8 weeks.

Kind regards

Melanie Cowpland

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We don’t know the costs for fixing the bike yet but any help towards that will be GREATLY appreciated!

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