A CHAOTIC START TO OUR RURAL RETREAT

A MUM swapped her “predictable” life in the city for something completely different - but within 30 minutes disaster struck. Enfys Maloney, 40, is originally from Wales but left at 18 to go to the University of Manchester, where she met her husband Rick.

- LIAM MCINERNEY

Since 2018 the pair had been living in Bedford, where they had two daughters together who are now seven and nine. But braving change last year, they ditched their modest semi-detached townhouse for a sprawling farm and historic small-holding in Eryri National Park in Wales.

They are located by the beach and the mountains. The slower pace of life involves their kids learning Welsh in a tiny school with just 15 children in total - having previously been surrounded by 400 other pupils.

The family also have 20 sheep and a river at the bottom of their garden - but their life-changing move had a rocky start.

“We were really happy,” Enfys told us. “I don’t want to paint a negative picture of Bedford because it was lovely. But we decided it was very predictable and a very conventional set-up, and we decided to trade that predictability for the unknown wild rural life in Wales where actually there would be a lot of question marks as to how life would look as opposed to doing that town living thing indefinitely without much change.”

After losing her travel company during the pandemic, Enfys launched a new venture offering sales training to business owners.

Rick, meanwhile, was an engineer and the trigger point for the move was when he asked his employers to reduce his hours to four days a week for a better family balance.

Enfys said: “They said no to the reduction and we swore then. We thought, ‘Sod it, we are quitting and we are going to move to Wales’ - and that was a very instant decision.