When I tell people about my trip and that I paid just £1.00 including tax for my flights they say "Yes but then you've got tax on top ", "no that includes tax" I say, "Oh that includes tax" the penny drops. "Yes, that includes tax" I say ... again.

So I have bought 10 of these unbelievable bargains and am going travelling around Europe and to Morocco for the month of September. I have had to sacrifice any hold baggage for that space so have just 10kg of carry on, which is hard for a woman who's first Xmas card every year is from the lady on the local Clarins counter.

So I'm going from Bournemouth – Dublin – Cork – Glasgow – Paris – Madrid – Marseille – Morocco – Barcelona – Pisa. Each flight £1.00 including tax. I am camping to keep costs down and I have had to resign from my job of 15 years as unpaid leave wasn't "possible on this occasion".

On the flight to Dublin, what I have given up and left behind becomes more of a reality, my children, travelling alone in foreign countries, no nice wedge of cash winging it's way to my bank account at the end of the month, but what I am most concerned about is the fact that I can't quite see the headline of an article about Jennifer Aniston in the "Closer" magazine of the woman sitting next to me. I twist my head and try to appear as if I am scratching a very annoying itch on the back of my head, but I still can't see it and now she thinks I have something infectious and edges further away from me. She takes a drink of water and I hope perhaps she will go to the loo and leave it on her seat for me to have a squiz at what ol Jen's up to.

Where the boys are so pretty.

Dublin airport is huge areas of glass walls and miles of moving escalators.

I get my first "tanks a million" from the cheery Garda when I show him my passport, this is in stark contrast to all other immigration officers I have known and reluctantly been let cross various borders by, and I feel welcomed.

"Easy internet access here" a few coppery cents and I am logged into the phenomenon that has replaced my need for a brain that works or to remember anything ever again, www.google.co.uk. I look up 'campsite in Dublin' and soon I have confirmed space for me and my tent with the helpful man at Camac Valley Caravan Park. Which would be fine, except I don't actually have a tent yet. Although the messages are conflicting and tents aren't actually on the airlines restricted items I suspect security wouldn't even let fibre glass tent poles on board a plane so I plan to buy one.

I know that Dublin has two Millets stores and several other camping shops which is just as well as I don't have a plan B. Millets are surprisingly secretive about their Irish stores, they don't appear on the website store locator and southern Ireland isn't on their map. The Irish stores however link to the main site, an oversight or incompetence I don't know, but I am a consumer with a wish to consume so I take the bus into Dublin, cross the Liffey via the Ha'penny bridge to go get my tent.

"Sure no we're all out of tents what with the festival season and all."

At the first shop this didn't faze me too much but by the sixth one I was getting a bit twitchy.

"Well you're in luck, we found a box out the back we didn't know we had." Relief.

I leave the shop and it begins to pour with rain, so I go back in. The man who was on the counter has been replaced by Colin Farrell, at least I think it's Colin Farrell. I try to find an excuse to engage him in conversation and find myself pressed up against the counter clutching a "pac-a-mac" and can't seem to stop my eyelashes from batting at him like a cheesey drag queen. The Beard's last kiss to me has barely cooled on my lips and I am swooning over a man who probably refers to music on vinyl as "those big CDS they used to have" I fight to regain control of my hormones and lose. I make inappropriate comments to him about being the owner of a "two man tent" and feel myself wink involuntarily as I say it.

I pay for my "pac-a-mac" and leave, sure in the knowledge that the second I do he is on the walkie-talkie to other shop owners warning them of the escaped randy English mental patient lose in town.

I turn into Mary Street and decide to shelter to avoid the rain, my options are "workwear" navy blue overalls for men 5ft 6ins and under. "Celtic Bookmakers, No Stake Refused" or "Shauna's House of Naughty Adult Fun."

I cross the street to one of the many bagel places in Dublin to top up my carbs, which I always like to keep at "running a marathon in the morning" level. There I begin to discover what a great place for food Ireland is, especially vegetarian food. A yummy soup, salad and hunk of soda bread later I make for my campsite.

I came, I pitched, I froze all night.

In the ten minutes it didn't rain that day I managed to get my tent up. The campsite is about 45 minutes out of Dublin and is beside a busy main road, it is inhabited by packs of rabbits the size of labradors and they roam around unperturbed by humans.

I'll tell you two things I have learned about Ireland; it's that the ground is bloody hard and bloody cold.

Women abed in England tonight do not hold your manhood cheap; hold him close because body warmth, my friends, is a beautiful thing.

The "investment buy" sleeping bag I bought from the "Ha ha I'm a teenage Saturday boy" salesman gives me about as much warmth as a match, unlit. I don't know what kind of geese they got the down from but I think they must have been nudists or hardy blitz spirit "what do you mean it's cold, put a jumper on" types

I have seen the gentlemen of the road sleeping on newspapers for warmth but I have only a Chinese takeaway menu and a leaflet for "Wicklow Tours" After a further half an hour of life sapping shivering I risk exposure and stick one arm out to drag my "pac-a-mac" and micro thin towel out and put them under me. The various buttons and toggles continue to dig into me all night and leave me bruised the next morning. I can hear Ray Mears laughing at me from here as I put on the one thin pair of socks that I nearly didn't pack. I am gradually getting in touch with my inner backwoodsman and layer on the few remaining items of clothing I have with me.

I couldn't say I was warm but I managed to sleep for half an hour at a time before being woken up by howling rabbits, re-arranging my makeshift mattress and then falling asleep again.