It took us the best part of 2 1/2 to 3 hours, but it was worth it. Our little Renault 5 is finally clean again!! We got the car in a very dirty, filthy state - grime everywhere, hairs of some sort all over the upholstery, dirt, dust, gravel and even hay all over the interior.

We soaped up the outside of the car, but due to the weather being typically British - which means it's foggy and if it's not foggy it's raining - we couldn't give the car the wax and polish treatment it deserves. So after clearing the soap off, we started cleaning the inside, which, to be honest, was the main part. But judge for yourself. This is what it looked like when we got the car:

And after putting the vacuum cleaner to good use and using buckets full of hot water, loads of Cif, window cleaner and mould and mildew remover, this is what we got the car to look like now:

It wasn't easy but we got there in the end. But the previous owner can't have cleaned it very often in the last 15 years...

Just as my other half and I had decided not to buy a cheap Nissan Micra that had been offered to us, on the grounds of not really being able to afford it, this offer came up: A 1995 red Renault 5, manual for GBP 100. How could we say no?

I haven't driven a manual car, let alone on the wrong side of the road, in quite a while, so getting behind the wheel of our new car was a weird sensation. And I never thought that reverse gear and I could ever be friends, but we seem to have called a truce. It's still got a cassette deck though, which I find is kinda cute.

The picture above is not the actual car we bought - as you can see, the steering wheel is on the wrong side for Britain - but it is the kind of car we just got.