Life's a Beach

There are a few words you can't say around our dogs unless you are deadly serious. One is "treat" and another is "beach". When you say a word like "beach", you had better be prepared to load up the pups into a car and take them to the sandy interface between land and sea pretty darn quick!

It was Kingston Beach 12 months ago that convinced us in a large way to look seriously at this part of Tasmania. We love it, and as you can see from the photo, the dogs have found a new spiritual home as well. Any day with a beach visit is a joy.

Ceduna 2 Melb

Kym's amazing work colleagues gave her a gift voucher which covered three nights accommodation on our trip, one in Adelaide at the Playford, one in Melbourne at the Como and we've already mentioned Ceduna. Given the paucity of funds in the average teacher’s bank account it was never likely that we’d stump up funds for this level of luxury.

The Playford used to be the Murdoch Newspaper empire hub, whilst the Como is used by the likes of Rossi. Such a contrast to the “The Railway Motel and Inn” at Norseman!

Thank you Kym’s work colleagues - good gift! Unfortunately now we think that it’s not a proper hotel room unless it has a spiral staircase with a spa and sauna upstairs…

Transition Part I

I’m amazed at the number of people who either haven’t been across the Nullabor, or maybe did it once but hated it. It’s difficult to see the depth of decision making lunacy needed to move across a country unless you drive it - in Australia that’s a bloody long way, with not much out there!

We had a short hop to Norseman and met a fellow CCGS teacher and family on Day One, then the big day started at 4:30am as we munched down some cereal and then bolted across to Ceduna on Day Two. The Ceduna Foreshore Hotel/Motel was AWESOME. The only disappointment was that I ate six oysters, but not all of them worked...

The packing and the leaving

The past comes back to haunt us as we find ourselves surrounded by boxes again.  You can read about our last big adventure and marvel at the optimism of trying such nonsense again.

At times during our UK trip we struggled with the reasons for moving, but in hindsight (and with a few beers onboard), it now seems like such a wonderful adventure. Perhaps that will be again?

At any rate, the empty house in Vic Park is a sad reminder that any dwelling of ours is merely a vessel, with the contents being important (particularly the countless rows of book boxes!).

It did not help our stress levels when Kym’s dad Eric passed away after a long battle with illness and we were left with many of the responsibilities which occur at these sad times.  Then Anthony went AWOL on a nice little 12 day walk down South of WA.

Finally we packed up the car, spent a lovely couple of days with Jill & Damir gathering our strength, then a launch in an Easterly direction on 14 Dec, 2015.

A non-fictional narrative

Hi and welcome to our third act (tertius actus, now write it out a hundred times)!

We have decided to keep a record of our musings, triumphs and failures as we move from 30 year veterans of suburban and inner city life to the rural wonders of Southern Tasmania. It's a bit hard to explain at times why we moved from inner city Perth to Tassie, given that the process of selling up, moving and saying goodbye has been so horrendous, but we are hoping to be vindicated at some point so it may be worth following us via this blog just to find out if that's true.

We have a few stories which already we would like to record for posterity (part of the third act is failing memory, right?), plus it might be a fun opportunity for some feedback and advice from you on our progress (or lack thereof).

But for now, as you scream at your device “You’re mad you idiots!”, we give you a picture taken at the top of Mount Wellington in the first week of being here in Tasmania. OMG how pretty is that…

P.S. Don't worry about the date of publication for these posts, I've mucked around with them so that you can read the posts in order!  Therefore the posts marked "Older Posts" at the bottom of the page are in fact the newest - confusing, no?