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“I work for seven days then have two weeks ‘holiday’ at home in France”


Donna has come to enjoy her commute. “I drive up to Caen, take the ferry to Portsmouth and the hospital I work at is just an hour and a half away,” she says. “I have accommodation with the job, although I sometimes stay with a friend. “It’s just the right balance


Leſt : Donna McDougall – commuting off ers a great way of life. Above: She crosses the Channel 34 times a year!


by the Wednesday!” she says. “There’s a lot of demand, as for emergency medicine you have to be very experienced, as well as have no commitments requiring you to be at home in the evenings.” Now Donna works one week


moved to France in 2012, she gave up her job as a specialist veterinary surgeon and had no intention of commuting for work. However, she has since returned to practice and found commuting gives her a great way of life. “I was working about two days a week until 2012 when I left the UK with Brian, my then partner,” she says. “We settled on the border of Normandy and Pays de la Loire and were very happy, but sadly in 2016 he died. “I knew I wanted to stay in


France, but began to miss the intellectual challenge of having a job,” she says. “However, my French is not good enough to work with the general public in France. As I specialise in emergency medicine, detailed questioning and explanations are often required.” Even if she had sought


employment in France, a commute would have been on the cards. “Emergency work is nearly always at night, and to do that here I’d have had to look at the big veterinary hospitals in cities like Paris,” she explains. Instead, Donna decided to


think about positions in the UK. “In 2020 I enquired at Kynoch Vets in Wokingham on the Monday and had the job


FRENCH PROPERTY NEWS: May/June 2024 29


in three in the UK, giving her the best of both worlds. “I work for seven days then have two weeks’ ‘holiday’ at home in France,” she says. “It’s wonderful, although it does mean that I cross the Channel 34 times a year.” Despite the amount of travel involved,


Donna's home in Sarthe, Pays de la Loire


for me. I have friends and a daughter in the UK and I get an intellectual buzz from my job and enjoy working with my colleagues. Then I get to come back to two weeks’ downtime in France. Here, I live in the countryside – I love the tranquillity. It wouldn’t suit everyone, but for me it’s the best of both worlds!”


“COMMUTING WAS HARD, BUT A MOVE TO PARIS SHOULD SIMPLIFY THINGS” Margaret Spink, 56, consultant Margaret and her husband, Rob, 46, bought a holiday home in Normandy at the beginning of 2018 with the idea of renovating it and eventually


using it as a holiday home. The pair both work in the tech industry as independent consultants, taking on contracts for a variety of diff erent fi rms. However, Covid changed everything. “We assumed the pandemic


would disrupt things for about two years, so once travel was permitted again we decided to relocate and try life in France. We moved heaven and earth to get under the Brexit wire in December 2020,” Margaret says. After fast-tracking their


renovations to make their new home habitable, the pair initially wondered whether


4


Margaret and Rob: Paris is on the cards


© SHUTTERSTOCK


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