When I packed up everything in Cornwall and legged it to Spain at 60, most people figured I’d lost the bloody plot. “You’ll be back,” they said. “Miss the pubs, miss the rain, miss proper bacon.” I mean, yeah, maybe. Even I wasn’t entirely sure I wasn’t making a complete hash of it. Barely spoke Spanish, bought a finca that looked like it might collapse if you sneezed too hard, swapped welding for fishing—none of it made much sense on paper. But here I am. Five years in. Still standing. Still fishing. Still not regretting a damn thing.
Could’ve done the usual Brit thing. Coastline, easy life, a bar that serves Sunday roasts and a pint of something vaguely familiar. And at first, yeah, that’s what I was looking at. Valencia, Costa del Something, all those places that sound nice in a brochure. But I didn’t move here to end up surrounded by sunburnt blokes in football shirts arguing about gravy. I wanted space. Silence. A bit of wild. So I started looking inland.
That’s how I found these estate agents Cottage Properties and got hooked on looking at fincas for sale in Spain—old Spanish farmhouses, usually built like fortresses, often neglected to hell. The house I landed on? An absolute wreck. Thick stone walls, an olive grove that hadn’t been touched in years, and a roof that only covered most of the house. No water. Wiring that looked like it had been done by someone who learned electrics from a cartoon. A total disaster. But I looked at it and thought, “Yeah, this’ll do.”
Took a year to make it livable. A year of hauling bricks, swearing at pipes, and picking up just enough Spanish to get by (most of it stuff I wouldn’t repeat in polite company). Rented in Orellana la Vieja while I fixed it up. Met the locals. Got used to life moving at half-speed. And slowly—somehow—turned that crumbling ruin into a home.
And now? Now I wake up to birds. To wind in the olive trees. No traffic. No rush. Coffee on the porch, fishing rod in hand before lunch, the Embalse de Orellana stretching out in front of me like some kind of private painting. It’s a good life. Better than I’d planned. And, weirdly enough, I’m not even doing it alone anymore. Somewhere along the way, I met someone. Spanish. Smarter than me. Doesn’t take any nonsense. She moved in, brought grandkids, and before I knew it, the place wasn’t just mine anymore. It’s a full house again. Wouldn’t change it.
Funny thing? The same mates who thought I’d be back in Cornwall within a year are the ones scrambling to book flights out here. They stand on my porch, drink in hand, looking over the hills, and I can see it in their faces. That little flicker of “Should’ve done this.” One of them is even sniffing around for a finca of his own. Took them five years to catch on, but they’re getting there. I wasn’t mad. I was just first.
Some people think retirement’s the end of something. Feels more like the start to me. Do it right, and you might just surprise yourself.
