Canberra to Nottingham 

Our second big trip was to Nottingham, England where Peter was appointed to his first lecturing job after gaining his PhD. He would be teaching statistics at Nottingham University. We flew from New Zealand with Bronwen, now 11 months old, to
Heathrow, London on 13th September 1972 - Pete’s birthday! We hired a car and made our way to Nottingham in the Midlands and both remember driving down Derby Road in Nottingham feeling completely alone in a foreign country. Derby Road had beautiful big brick houses on it and I remember thinking we could knock on a door and ask for a bed! We ended up staying in an old hotel in the city overlooking the canal. It had threadbare carpet on the floor and a huge alsation dog which we had to keep away from Bronwen who was by now crawling and venturing up and down the stairs.
I was homesick and Pete felt the burden of providing for his little family. We had very little money and Pete’s first pay cheque wasn’t due until we’d been there a month!

Peter started work and met some very nice, caring people in the Mathematics Department - especially Edward Armour, Cliff Litton and Johnson Anderson who lived with his family in Wortley Hall Close, a male student hall of residence on the
University campus. Johnson knew there was a residence in the Close about to come vacant and thought that we would be a suitable couple to live there. He organised for us to meet up with the head of Wortley Hall, Bob Waterhouse in his big woodlined office. Bronwen came with us in the canvas carrycot I made for her. She was such a good baby - she would sleep anywhere we took her. Bob was a really lovely tall, handsome English gentleman. We must have impressed him with our New Zealand accents and enthusiasm because he was keen to have us join the other families in the Close and to be moral tutors for the male students residing in the hall. We were very relieved to have a house of our own and excited about taking on our new role - after all we were virtually students ourselves!! Being moral tutors meant we had to set a good example of how to live as a family. The students visited our house for a regular get together and chat and we would also be invited to eat at the Hall on a regular basis. We remember the brussel sprouts, so much so that we don’t ever have them now!! Pete enjoyed being part of the student pub crawls on a bus followed up with a hot curry on the way home early in the morning. I waited patiently on his return.

We lived in the Close for four years and enjoyed our time therevery much indeed. We became lifelong friends with two of the families in the Close, Meg and Johnson Anderson and Susan and Robert Cockcroft. Bronwen grew up with their children, Elspeth and Imogen and Hester, Jane and Laura. Also lifelong friends from Nottingham are Suzanne and Edward Armour, Gabrielle Greenwood and Pamela and John Hampton - the Grand Committee as Robert named us all!

Pete worked hard to be the best lecturer in statistics that he could be. He would walk up the hill from the department each
week day to have lunch with Bronwen and me. It was great that he was working so close to home. After a few years he was sent a directive from the university to vary his walking trail as the grass was becoming dead and unsightly! I was a fulltime Mum looking after Bronwen. This was a real pleasure of course. When Bronwen was about two years old we became pregnant again. Unfortunately after 19 weeks I miscarried twins :( This set us back quite a bit as we were far from home and had to manage to cope by ourselves and with the support of our friends. The advise from our doctor was to take a holiday and relax. We drove to London and bought a waterbed in Finchley Rd. These beds were popular at the time and we certainly enjoyed having ours for many years. We had a heater in it which was a necessity in the cold UK winters.

Relaxing must have done the trick because on the 17th March, 1975 Pete took me into Nottingham Womens’ Hospital where Olwen was born - yay! She was 10 days early and just a little dot - 5lb 4oz. Her breathing tubes were small and once when I was feeding her at home she couldn’t breathe - very scary!! I was upstairs and stamped my feet very hard on the floor and Pete came rushing up to help me. He sensibly tipped Olwen upside down and patted her firmly on the back. This worked well and Olwen took a deep breath and continued feeding - phew! She has
been beautiful and healthy ever since. Bronwen and Olwen are 3 years and six months apart in age. Bronwen loved having a little sister and delighted in sharing her with friends in the Close. Wherever Bronwen went Olwen always said, “Me too.”

We needed a car while we lived in Nottingham. We decided to try and find a campervan to travel around while we were living in the northern hemisphere. We found a place in Ripley not far out of Nottingham where secondhand VW Kombi vans with Dormobile conversions were for sale. We bought a 1972 D4 model for 1350 pounds!! It was blue, in very good condition and had 14,000 miles on the clock from being hired out during the previous five months. We were very happy with our new purchase. We drove it round England, Scotland, Wales, Ireland and many countries in Europe as far east as Venice in Italy. It was part of our family and served us so well from 1972 until we sold it in 2019 - nearly 50 years of campervan fun!!