This Is What Happens When You Move to a Tiny Village with No Shops, No Cafe — and You Don’t Own a Car

Anyone fancy a two-hour walk to the shops and back?

I wrote this story just before I moved to Porto this summer. I’d rented a small one-bedroom house close to my family in North Wales in the middle of nowhere. And I don’t own a car.

It was a fascinating experiment in making do with what we have. In slowing down. In being less car-reliant which I know is a big point of interest for those looking for a simpler life.

I’d love to know your thoughts. Drop them in the comments below.

Image courtesy of author

(Temporarily) moving to the countryside was going to be a challenge for this city-loving woman.

Yet here I am for the next month, typing out articles from a tiny one-bedroomed cottage in a picturesque, but completely resource-free (unless you count the crappy pub) village in the middle of the Welsh countryside.

The local cafe only opens on Saturdays. There is literally nowhere to buy food within an hour’s walk down a busy main road. And I don’t own a car.

I’ll be the first to admit I get a bit judgy about people and their car obsessions. Having lived in cities for the last three years with easy access to stores and resources on foot, I’ve always rolled my eyes at people’s overreliance on them. Especially if they could perfectly well do without.

So it would be an interesting experiment, I thought, to move somewhere where you absolutely need a car and try and make it work without one. Is it possible? Is it pleasant?

Could you do it? Should you?

Here’s what it’s like.

You get really good at making do with what you have in the house

Within an hour of moving into my little cottage, I’d set up a food delivery to arrive, and I f**ked it. I’d forgotten what felt like half the items I needed.

If I had a car, I could have run out to the nearest store but of course, I don’t, so I’d have to make do with what I have. I’d have to substitute, I had no other choice.

It’s too easy to always be “nipping to the shops.” There have been times I’ve visited my local store three or four times in a day because I’d forgotten one ingredient or another when I could have substituted it for something else.

And often we do it in our cars. Over a third of drivers use their cars for walking distance journeys.

But convenience isn’t always good for you. To make use of a car this way is a) shitty for the environment and b) makes you spend more money on both gas and items you could have done without and c) takes up your time with a potentially pointless errand.

Or, you could just make do with what you already have in the house. And that’s true whether you live carless in a rural village or not.

It makes you appreciate how far apart things really are

The nearest store to here is a 55-minute walk away. Great, I thought, let’s walk it. It’s exercise and an errand rolled into one.

I also know the route well. My current village is only a 10-minute drive from where I grew up so I know these roads better than most.

As

Sam

and I started on our epic adventure, I realized…

I don’t know these roads at all.

Whilst I may have whizzed down the lanes at 60mph hundreds of times before, I’d never noticed that farm here. That pub over there. How muddy the river is. How damn hilly this road is.

Much like when you drive across Europe or the US rather than taking a plane, walking roads you’ve only ever driven down makes you realize how far apart everything really is. It’s so easy to board transportation, sleep (if you’re not the driver), and wake up somewhere completely different a few hours later. It lulls us into a false sense of how far apart places really are and how many changes occur within that distance.

By not owning a car, I’ve discovered new things on the doorstep of my family home I never knew existed.

It slows you the hell down

This weekend I did nothing but hike, nap, make food, drink wine, and watch TV.

This is Snowdonia, the famous Welsh National Park. If I had a car I could have driven to one of the well-known mountains for my hike. But I don’t so I had to make do with walking the unknown, slightly ugly mountain that is literally outside my front door (and yes, I appreciate how ridiculous “making do” with that sounds).

I’m really pleased I did.

Not owning a car slows you down. It forces you to spend time in your local vicinity, not traipse across the region in search of what you could find outside your front door. It means taking your time because if you don’t own a car, everything is slower and takes longer.

Whilst this could be a massive pain in the ass, it’s also kinda cool to be forced out of our hyper-connected culture. To be forced to be slower, more deliberate, and more local.

It makes you appreciate how lucky people are to be able to afford a car

I keep wondering if there is anyone else in this village who makes do without a car, not through choice — like my frankly privileged position — but because they can’t afford one.

Do they feel trapped? Do they feel inconvenienced by being reliant on the thrice-daily local bus?

It’s easy to take owning a car for granted and forget about how privileged you are if you can afford one — even a rustbucket. They’re freaking expensive, especially if you live rural. Rural households use 70% more gas than their urban counterparts.

If you live in a city, not owning a car might be OK but out here in the countryside, it will shape the whole way you live your life. And for 6% of the rural population, that’s their reality.

Owning a car is a privilege, not a right. If you forget that, check yourself.

It makes you realize that the car ruined small villages like these

The only reason there isn’t a village shop here is because of the car. I know this for a fact because this particular village shop was owned by my relatives back in the day.

It’s the same the world over. Small towns and villages become like ghost towns as large out-of-town stores that are only accessible by car take over.

Without a car, the village shop here would still exist. Perhaps the cafe that sits in it now would be able to open more than just at the weekends.

As someone who owned an independent wine store on a local high street, I’m more passionate than most about doing my part to ensure small stores thrive. If there was a store here, you bet your ass I’d frequent it.

For starters, I’d have to.

But there’s not one. There is, however, a huge Lidl just 10 minutes away by car. *Eye-roll*.

The car changed the nature of villages like this one — and for the worse. There are no chances for micro-interactions, those small conversations we have throughout our day that work wonders for loneliness. There’s no meeting place, nowhere to have a chance encounter.

Inventions like the car were meant to connect more people but in places like these, all they’ve done is take connection away.

It doesn’t mean you can’t make use of the sharing economy

My mother lives a 10-minute drive away so I can borrow her car when I need to. I’m not so far away from the nearest town that I couldn’t take a taxi. Online shopping exists so I can get my veg box / wine / meat / storecupboard ingredients delivered at the click of a button.

When people talk about the sharing economy they often consider it from an urban perspective. But depending on how remote you live, you can absolutely make use of it in the countryside too.

I’m all over the sharing economy. I love the idea of pooling resources and it flummoxes me why we’re so obsessed with individuality that we don’t make use of it more.

Wherever you live.

Do we all really need multiple cars per household or could it be multiple households per car?

My mother and I are doing quite nicely sharing that resource. There are cars in this village that haven’t moved since I arrived a week ago that could be used by, well, me. Or at least the likes of me.

We’ve become so obsessed with convenience and our own comfort that we forget the kickass benefits of the sharing economy. Yes, it might be slightly more inconvenient but it’s also cheaper. Environmentally friendlier. It makes you plan better.

It’s not for everyone in all situations. But it with the right people, it can work.

So. Should you move to the countryside with no car?

Honestly, probably not.

That doesn’t mean it can’t be done. If you live in the right place, are prepared to be inconvenienced, and live a smaller, slower life, you could absolutely live like this.

It’s not like it’s terrible. I’m quite enjoying it.

However, I’m in the hugely privileged position to be able to experiment. I don’t have kids. I work on my own hours. I have few commitments.

If I had an office job or kids that to go to school a couple of villages over or I’ve got to ferry family members to doctor’s appointments and the like, not having a car would be more than an inconvenience.

It would be impossible.

But — and it’s a big but — if there is one thing this experiment has taught me, it’s that many of us are waaaay too reliant on our cars. We’re too eager to jump into them for a journey we could do by foot. We spend far too long in them. And in some cases, we could absolutely live without them. Or at least de-prioritize them.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I’ve run out of eggs and I spied an honesty box at a local farm up the road. When I say up, I mean 200 meters straight UP. This is Wales, after all.

See you in an hour.