Each year we visit the remotest village, Lesnica, in Slovakia as it’s where my wife’s father’s family is from. Whilst there we usually visit graves, visit her father’s log cabin home and compound where her uncle now resides, and then check on our little plot of land on a hillside just outside the village. This year we decided to go on Feisty and take the bare minimum camping equipment with us.

The weather switched between extremes – 35 degrees centigrade plus meant leather jackets, helmets, kevlar jeans and boots were a nightmare to wear, and then torrential rain and storm made the road all slick. Try as we might, we just couldn’t find one part of our land level enough to erect a tent – it’s a steep hillside which will need excavating if we ever get around to building a cabin on it, so we ended up camping near the Red Monastery, Cerveny Klastor, at the best campsite in Slovakia, Goralsky Dvor. I’m not a fan of paid, public campsites as I prefer my privacy in the bush but it was nice to have a bit of luxury and level ground for once. The amount of thought and effort that have gone into that place is astounding – they even have an onsite chainsaw carver who continually adds to the decor of the place.

Feisty is definitely not the best choice for long distances and the seat makes my arse hurt. I really need to get a new king and queen seat made for her.