Lifestyle: The grey gap year

"Do not go gentle into that good night," wrote Dylan Thomas, "Old age should burn and rave at close of day/Rage, rage against the dying of the light". Little did he know that 50 years on his words would be reverberating across every flea-ridden backpackers' hostel from New Zealand to Guatemala, as increasing numbers of over-fifties stubbornly "rage" against the grisly spectre of early retirement and rose-growing to embark upon a twilight gap year.

For anyone under 40, gap years conjure the heady scent of stale sleeping bags, teenage angst, bongos, Buddhas and burning incense. But things have changed: last week Janet Street-Porter, 60, wrote that she's cashing in some of her pension policies to travel and have fun, while Richard Harvey, 56, head of one of the world's top five insurance companies, announced he was quitting his £2m-a-year job to spend 12 months volunteering in Africa with his wife. The Harveys were inspired while visiting their daughter, Jenny, on her gap year in Uganda. They plan to live in a poverty-stricken African village and use their skills to contribute to the community. "But I do have arthritis," says Richard, "there is no way I can sleep on a mud floor for 12 months."

Whether it's burning a silver streak across the globe, digging wells in African villages, or changing career, the over-fifties are refusing to lie down like an extra on the Antiques Roadshow and wait for the geriatric rot to set in.

Sex and travel, it appears, are top of the agenda. An online survey published last October asked 1,500 people over 65 whether they had regrets. The results were surprising. rather than dreaming back to a lost golden era, it found that many older people envy the lifestyles of the young. Seventy per cent wished they had had more sex, 57 per cent would have liked to have travelled more, and 45 per cent wished they had quit their jobs and changed profession.

Known, unflatteringly, to the travel industry as the "denture venturers" or the "Saga louts", there are an estimated 200,000 pre-retirement "gappers" in the UK. They spend around £5,000 per trip, totalling an impressive £1bn per year, which is big business for companies such as gapyear forgrownups.co.uk, who specialise in tailoring trips for the silver market.

"These are people who feel young," explains Tom Griffiths, founder of the website gapyear.com, which also caters for older people. "Their kids are grown up, but they don't feel ready to retire and shuffle quietly off to the home: they are looking for new challenges." Instead, he says, this spritely throng are forging across New Zealand in Winnebagos, or volunteering in orphanages in Sri Lanka.

Wealthy and adventurous, the generation that fuelled the Sixties are at the peak of their earning power and often sitting on valuable properties and secure pension plans. The over-45s are responsible for an estimated 80 per cent of all financial wealth - and they're not afraid to "Ski" - Spend the Kids' Inheritance.

Professor Cary Cooper of the University of Lancashire attributes the rise of the "golden gapper" to a changing work culture. The "job for life" that the babyboomers started out with has become a distant memory. "Employers now demand long hours and hard work, and give back little job security in return." Employees in their fifties feel little obligation to keep working and are more inclined to explore other avenues while they still can.

Stress is also a factor, says Professor Cooper. "We have become an intrinsically job insecure, long-hours culture which makes it more difficult for people to work all the way up to 65." He argues that the current trends will mean that in the future people are going to need a "gap" from time to time - whether that means travel, or downsizing from a high-pressure job to something more satisfying such as Voluntary Service Overseas or teaching abroad. "This makes people feel good about their individual contribution to the world, and that they are not just a cog in the wheel. They are the wheel."

The way things are going there will probably soon be more pensioners raving it up at the Koh Phangan Full Moon Parties, than students. It is estimated that by 2025 the over-sixties will outnumber those under 25 in Britain for the first time - and by then the under-25s probably won't be able to take gap years. With the burden of student debts, frivolous parents, spiralling house prices and career panic, the younger generation are likely to be dolefully waving their parents off while they stay in and worry about interest rates.

Graduates were warned last week that people who took a gap year abroad after university are facing a "career crisis". The Training and Development Agency for Schools found that one in four graduates aged between 20 and 30 were struggling to find the right career, having taken time out after university. Perhaps the answer is a "gap life", suggests Tom Griffiths at gapyear.com. "People have various life stages, and gap years happen whenever anyone hits one of those stages. To me," says Tom, "life is just a series of gaps."

Volunteer in Ghana

David Palmer, 58, was managing director of a firm of insurance brokers for 32 years. Two years ago he took two years out to become a volunteer for VSO in Ghana. He is divorced, lives in Cheshire and has three grown-up children.

"I'm fit and active with plenty of life left in me, but I didn't want to do what I'd been doing for the past 32 years and I wasn't quite ready to put myself out to pasture on a golf course. Volunteering was something I had always wanted to do, but I never had the opportunity. I got married, got a mortgage and had kids - and you can't just walk out on all the responsibilities of family."

"So a couple of years ago I decided to take a sabbatical from my job and apply for a position with VSO. I was divorced, my kids were grown, I was in a privileged position financially, and I wanted to use my skills and experience to make a difference. I got a position in Ghana for a year as an 'organisation and development advisor', training staff in office skills and how to start businesses."

"The experience was mind-blowing. I was sent to work in a non-governmental organisation that was founded and staffed by people with physical disabilities - some so severe they were crawling around on the floors. I was so overwhelmed that during my welcome meeting I started weeping. My main responsibilities were training staff in office skills, and helping them start businesses they could run themselves."

"Working out there made me realise what an enormous difference there is between life there and life here. You're working with people who haven't two pennies to rub together. You eat as they do, live as they do, and your friends are the people that you are working with and your neighbours. Living was hard: I got malaria and diarrhoea, I was living in a house that had no shower - just a tap for cooking and washing, and it made me realise I couldn't go back to my old life in England. I resigned from my job, sold the business and stayed for an extra nine months."

"It was difficult to adjust to coming back, especially when you went to a supermarket. I was ill for a couple of months after getting home, but now I'm getting back on my feet and thinking about where I'll go next."

The mature student

Chris Lumb, 63, is halfway through the second year of a sports journalism degree. His first career was as an RAF Vulcan pilot. He has three adult sons and lives in Eastbourne with his wife.

"At 63 I felt too young for a lifetime of golf and gardening, and I wanted to continue my education. I joined the RAF when I was 20 and stayed for 30 odd years. University was something I felt I missed out on. After a year off to catch up on chores and home improvements, I started a sports journalism course at the University of Brighton. I was quite surprised to be accepted - it flies in the face of ageism and I'm very grateful."

"I'm older than all of the other students - and probably older than most of the lecturers as well, but that doesn't faze me at all. I get on very well with a variety of people on the course. Being at university brought me back into touch with what young people think. The only disadvantage is that I can't take part in the five-aside kick-around because they are all so much fitter than I am."

"Now when I go to bed I feel that I've achieved something. I've just had exams on public affairs and media law; I know about freedom of information and the role of backbench MPs - I found that all very stimulating. In 18 months' time I will come out with a good BA, but after that I'm not quite so sure what I will do. I'm not sure that I would enjoy the pressure of daily office life and an editor, but I'd like to do some freelance writing or perhaps even write a book."

Europe by camper van

Tish Campbell, 58, and her husband, Lindsay, are about to embark on a 10-month trip to Europe in their camper van. They run a pub company in London and have three children.

"We want our lives back for ourselves. We've worked 24 hours a day, seven days a week for the past 30 years. It's always been a dream to kick loose and go travelling, and now the children are working and no longer at home we have the perfect opportunity."

"The plan is to drive the camper van to all those places we've dreamt of seeing. There are no strict plans - but we want to start in Spain for some warm weather and see Seville and Granada. We're also planning some time in Lake Como in Italy, and want to go up to northern Europe in the summer. We've got our bikes and a boat on board, so we're hoping this trip will give us slimmer waistlines and more energy. We did a first aid course, so we can look after each other if anything goes wrong."

"This trip is a huge plunge, but we're not cutting any ties with the business. We have set up management to take care of things while we are away. I think our generation is more into spending their kids' inheritance than leaving it to them. I am happy to leave them whatever is here but, I have to say, it is not one of my targets."

"We're hoping that this trip will recharge our creative rocket fuel, bring us back and perhaps set us on a completely different path. Instead of just letting things happen, we'll come back with fresh ideas about where we should put our energies."