Well moving countries was hard and so did not expect to have problems moving states. It is surprising how much you get into the system within 6 months! We had been living out of suitcases for all this time. It’s so easy to just wear the same clothes and live in a confined manner within very little means both material and monetary. Well we had sublet our home at a lovely large 3 bedroom house. Our room was big and comfortable. We had the run of the house with use of the kitchen and all its utensils plus food. I had tried hard not to get too comfortable in the situation and the locality as we were not sure where we would end up living.
Sure enough the job was in Sydney and so the move had to be done fast. As soon as he got the job we started making plans to leave at the weekend. The unplugging from this 6 months of life meant returning the library card and books; changing address with bank, telling the doctors and optician; ringing the Centrelink; organising for the luggage to be sent on once we had a address to send it to and other such tiny details. Then had a look at what I wanted to take with me! I had come with only 2 bags but somehow this had expanded to a shopping trolley, some additional clothes and linen, food items, a couple of bags of medicines and so on…. There was no way we could fly to Sydney with all this baggage. So we hired a car and decided to drive over the weekend and keep the car for a week.
Saturday morning came and we filed up the car and left just before 10 am. Being early the rush had not started on the Hume Highway. After an hour we stopped at the service station for comfort break and a drink. I took over the driving at this point and enjoyed doing it after a long time. Thought we could have a break for lunch at Banalla but ended up going past and finding a small service station which only had a MacDonald’s….. Very unsatisfactory lunch was had and we moved on. Reached Albury at about 3 ish in the afternoon and found the place we were staying at. There was a restaurant attached to the place and so had dinner there itself rather than wander about in the dark. We thought the place would be open in the morning for breakfast as there was room service… sadly this was wrong and so we had no breakfast just got a couple of cups of tea.
Next morning filled up on petrol and off we went again. The drive on the second day was good too. There was not much traffic and the countryside kept changing. There were hills or wide spaces, empty land or gun trees. The sun shone and skies were big and blue. Today also I drove for a couple of hours and did not feel any stress. Today we went off the highway to have lunch at Gundagai. There was a fairly large service station with various food places and even a shop selling fruit and veggies plus jams and pickles and souvenirs. Took pictures of the pickle jars which were labelled Bum Hummers! This is a brand of pickled onions. I had a good laugh and made Paul take a snap to put up for the girls to see.
Then we drove on to Goulburn where we stayed overnight. It started raining as soon as we turned into Goulburn. The room had free WiFi and so we caught up on the mails and family in the evening. It poured all evening and so it was nice not to go far for dinner. On Monday morning we were guaranteed breakfast as the room was bed and breakfast. I actually could have the toast and so it was not too bad. We left at 9 30 am and were on the last leg to Sydney. Got off the Hume Highway at Preston and drove towards Paramatta. My nephew stays just before we get to Paramatta and we got there right on the dot of lunch.
Thus, started the proper settling down period for us. Since we had the car for a bit longer we managed to find our way around the area. Looked up the way to Paul’s work, shopping centres, car showrooms, Havery Normans etc. Had to spend a fair amount of time specially on Saturday to look at all these houses for rent. Seems that apartments and flats are most popular, being newer and compact, with low maintenance since there is no garden. Most of them are on the first or second floor and we really did not want to live in a flat again. We did manage to see a couple of houses and these were spacious enough to take our entire luggage (when it came). However there was another house which was not for viewing and we managed to see it on Monday. Nice 3 bedroom house with a garden and plenty of light. We fell in love with it and asked that our application be put forward for this house. Then we went to Harvey Norman to look over the fridge freezers and washing machines. While on the way there we got a call that the landlord had agreed to our application and we could pay a deposit by the evening and sing contract on Friday. Thus we found our home in Toongabbie. Shall not bore you with the details of getting furniture and white goods along with our luggage into the house. Slowly the home is taking shape… will put up some pics once it gets done. We have finally arrived in Australia as I do the census tonight!
Sure enough the job was in Sydney and so the move had to be done fast. As soon as he got the job we started making plans to leave at the weekend. The unplugging from this 6 months of life meant returning the library card and books; changing address with bank, telling the doctors and optician; ringing the Centrelink; organising for the luggage to be sent on once we had a address to send it to and other such tiny details. Then had a look at what I wanted to take with me! I had come with only 2 bags but somehow this had expanded to a shopping trolley, some additional clothes and linen, food items, a couple of bags of medicines and so on…. There was no way we could fly to Sydney with all this baggage. So we hired a car and decided to drive over the weekend and keep the car for a week.
Saturday morning came and we filed up the car and left just before 10 am. Being early the rush had not started on the Hume Highway. After an hour we stopped at the service station for comfort break and a drink. I took over the driving at this point and enjoyed doing it after a long time. Thought we could have a break for lunch at Banalla but ended up going past and finding a small service station which only had a MacDonald’s….. Very unsatisfactory lunch was had and we moved on. Reached Albury at about 3 ish in the afternoon and found the place we were staying at. There was a restaurant attached to the place and so had dinner there itself rather than wander about in the dark. We thought the place would be open in the morning for breakfast as there was room service… sadly this was wrong and so we had no breakfast just got a couple of cups of tea.
Next morning filled up on petrol and off we went again. The drive on the second day was good too. There was not much traffic and the countryside kept changing. There were hills or wide spaces, empty land or gun trees. The sun shone and skies were big and blue. Today also I drove for a couple of hours and did not feel any stress. Today we went off the highway to have lunch at Gundagai. There was a fairly large service station with various food places and even a shop selling fruit and veggies plus jams and pickles and souvenirs. Took pictures of the pickle jars which were labelled Bum Hummers! This is a brand of pickled onions. I had a good laugh and made Paul take a snap to put up for the girls to see.
Then we drove on to Goulburn where we stayed overnight. It started raining as soon as we turned into Goulburn. The room had free WiFi and so we caught up on the mails and family in the evening. It poured all evening and so it was nice not to go far for dinner. On Monday morning we were guaranteed breakfast as the room was bed and breakfast. I actually could have the toast and so it was not too bad. We left at 9 30 am and were on the last leg to Sydney. Got off the Hume Highway at Preston and drove towards Paramatta. My nephew stays just before we get to Paramatta and we got there right on the dot of lunch.
Thus, started the proper settling down period for us. Since we had the car for a bit longer we managed to find our way around the area. Looked up the way to Paul’s work, shopping centres, car showrooms, Havery Normans etc. Had to spend a fair amount of time specially on Saturday to look at all these houses for rent. Seems that apartments and flats are most popular, being newer and compact, with low maintenance since there is no garden. Most of them are on the first or second floor and we really did not want to live in a flat again. We did manage to see a couple of houses and these were spacious enough to take our entire luggage (when it came). However there was another house which was not for viewing and we managed to see it on Monday. Nice 3 bedroom house with a garden and plenty of light. We fell in love with it and asked that our application be put forward for this house. Then we went to Harvey Norman to look over the fridge freezers and washing machines. While on the way there we got a call that the landlord had agreed to our application and we could pay a deposit by the evening and sing contract on Friday. Thus we found our home in Toongabbie. Shall not bore you with the details of getting furniture and white goods along with our luggage into the house. Slowly the home is taking shape… will put up some pics once it gets done. We have finally arrived in Australia as I do the census tonight!
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