bill andrews.co.uk

I did sciences at school and read zoology at Bristol university where I met my first wife, Penny. I didn’t do well there and so continued my education at Southampton where I completed my Masters and where my first son, James was born.  My tutor employed me as a research assistant until I was able to get a proper job. This was as an Oceanographer working for the South African Dept of Sea Fisheries, Cape Town. After a short period looking down a microscope at plankton I was put in charge of a project researching upwelling – a process whereby the south east trade winds transport the water from the coast thereby drawing nutrient-rich deeper water to replace  it. We bought a house there and my second son was born there. My most prestigious publications were in Nature and Progress in Oceanography.

I returned to England to escape apartheid and because my marriage had broken down and took a supply teaching post in Ladbroke Grove, London.  

The same year with a friend I started a company hiring out narrowboats on the Macclesfield canal, Twinram Canal Hireboat Co Ltd.  This ran for about 10 years from 1975-1984.  I sold it on to join my second wife, Pauline, business a chain of gift shops, Bizar, in Hanley, Newcastle-under-Lyme and Chester.  This ran for about 20 years from 1977-1996.  I had installed up-to-the-minute computerised tills in the business and for a while I sold this system to other outlets, mainly cycle shops.  We lived in a village outside Stoke bringing up the boys whose mother had left the country and adopting two girls, Nicola and Alisa.  My second marriage floundered and I started a relationship with a lady, Sue, who was in the same amateur theatrical group.  I moved in with her, we got married, and I helped bring up her daughters, Joanna and Carla.

We bought a flat overlooking the harbour in Porthmadog in 1997 and then purchased a second property there and a large terraced house in Criccieth.   In 2007 we moved to Criccieth.  My third business, Selfcateringhols.com, which I started with my wife Sue and my son, Dougal, was an internet holiday letting business.  We started with three holiday properties in Porthmadog and Criccieth and my son had one in Barcelona and then let other owned properties.  We wound this down after about 10 years.

Boats have been an important part of my life.  I built a canvas 2-seater canoe at age 14.  I rowed at Marlow Rowing Club and Bristol University and in later life with Madog Yacht Club. We started sailing when I retired, starting off with a flotilla holiday in the Virgin Isles and then spending the summer season living on our own and other peoples’ yachts in the Ionian Sea, Greece for 5+ years.

I’m quite close to my younger brother, Chris, and have gone on holiday with him every year.  We started walking the South West Coast Path and enjoyed it so much we walked Offa’s Dyke and The Coast to Coast.  Staying in pubs but carrying our own gear.  My brother’s MS gradually incapacitated him so we were forced to stop but we discovered, later, that he could cycle and we continued our long distance forays with some wonderful trips on the National Cycle Network including cycling from Land’s End to Edinburgh.  Sadly that too is no longer possible.

Another love of mine is tennis and I was a member of a farmer’s mens doubles league round Nantwich for a number of years.  When we came to live in Criccieth I was dismayed to see the tennis courts there had fallen into disrepair and were no longer used.  With a couple of other I managed to resurrect the courts and now we have a thriving tennis club in a magnificent position.

Currently I’m living in Criccieth, North Wales with my wife, Sue, in a 4-bedroom apartment on the sea front.  I still play tennis at over 80, swim in the sea when its warm and calm enough and grow much of what we eat on my allotment.   I retired gradually between the ages of 63 and 66.  My father didn’t live long enough to retire and many many people in the world don’t have the opportunity. Hence my determination to be a retired person.