Tuesday 1 January 2013

New Year's Eve

HAPPY NEW YEAR to our friends, family and blog readers!

This morning we were talking about what we were doing last New Year's Eve and I looked at what I'd written on the blog at this time last year.  Goodness... be careful what you wish for!

Friday, December 30, 2011

Is 2012 to be "a big year"?
Here we are again on the brink of what we hope will be another year of change in our lives.  We're going to think positive.  I already have a new job to start next week.  We'll sell our house, we'll find a great tenant for the house up the street (which will eventually be our home), we'll find someone to rent some storage space out at the big shed and..... in September we'll take off on the adventure of a lifetime.  It WILL happen.


Looking back over the blog for the last 12 months we're reminded of just what a huge year it's been for us. Here it is in summary :

January : The exchange rate between the Aussie dollar and the British pound hit a peak.  We'd been waiting 6 months by then to sell our house and it was excruciating! I started my new job at the beginning of the year. 


February :  I flew to Sydney to apply for my Finnish passport.  We had rain... a lot!  We lost our dear girl Coco.



March : We had terrible floods in Victoria.  Mick did a decent job of splitting his head open!  Mum and I made a pilgrimage to Bonegilla Migrant Centre where she first arrived in Australia.


April : Things picked up a bit with potential house buyers and by the end of the month there was a deal on the table.




May : In the first week we had the deposit in the bank for our place and a tenant lined up for the house up the road.  It was an extremely busy month with packing and moving all our stuff.


June : We moved out and into our caravan! Mick's mum had a heart attack and he rushed off to NZ to see her.  We had our usual birthday weekend to Barwon Heads.  Little did we know that our pick of the week at the end of June was to come back and haunt us.
 

July :  We shipped off our boxes of belongings and began farewells.



August : Oh my goodness... we bought a narrowboat!  We also went to NZ to see Mick's mum.


September : Our adventure began and we finally got to meet nb Parisien Star.



October : We finally headed out of the marina and began life afloat.  What a lovely time it was, those last few weeks of October.


November : A very enjoyable first couple of weeks cruising and then into the marina with a broken down central heating unitOur first experience of cold English weather.


December : We'll remember it for the rain.... and for meeting new people.


1 comment:

Gill said...

Hi Ellie and Mick

I have followed your blog from two months before you set off on your travels to the UK and have really enjoyed reading how you are getting on. I have to say I very much admire what you have done not only coming to a different country but also to live and travel on a canal boat that your purchased without seeing! It is also great that you have taken the time to write and share your experience "As it is"! I hope you enjoy your travels over the summer and get to see some wonderful places it is great what you are doing. Happy New Year