Cars

Cars are smaller, no doubt about it.  There are some minivans, but they are less common.  The weird thing is that there are very few minivans that have sliding doors.  Even though you need them more than ever in England because the parking spaces are so narrow.  Parking our compact car was even a challenge getting out the door when between 2 cars.  This may be what forces me to not gain weight while I'm overseas. 

So Toyota has a nice offer for us Americans that are moving to the area...they allow us to rent new cars on a month by month basis.  We went over to the dealership and chose a Verso, which is similar to a Corolla but has a taller body.  It has 2, 3rd row seats, but they're kind of puny and you have to climb over the 2nd row to get to them, ha!  Unfortunately, Toyota doesn't sell minivans in Derby, though I'm not sure I want to be driving that big of a vehicle in the city anyway.  We're going to try out this Verso, and if it doesn't work out, we may try to lease a Ford MiniVan.