Monthly Archives: May 2008

Day Ten and counting.

By | | Australia, General Mumblings, grrrr
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We drove up to a place called Lancelin yesterday – our first attempt to see a bit of rural Australia. huge roads – sections of it variously like driving through England, Eaglesham Moor and Spain.. but strangely fused together into one. We had to stop at the side of the road every now and then to grin like maniacs, and take pictures of the car:

One thing we have noticed pretty regularly since getting here – despite the aussie reputation for being laid back, they are even further down the old “Police state” path than the UK – everything is illegal… and has a sign telling you that it’s illegal. The road signs are insane – they have completely arbitrary signs for no right turn, no left turn, no u turn, no parking, no stopping, no looking, no smiling (okay, I made the last two up).

Seriously though, check this thing out:

Worlds Most Cryptic parking sign.

That means no parking to the left of the pole (outside of the bays). no parking to the right of the pole at all (even in the bays). On the left of the pole, in the bays, you can park for 2 Hours (that’s what we think 2P means – you also see 1/4P and so on), during these times. Outside of these times, you can park anywhere you want.. including to the left of the pole. *except* If you have a resident’s permit, when you can park to the left of the pole any time you like, for as long as you like. But not on the right of the pole… can you guess I got a ticket?  😐

In Lancelin, as well as the delightful signs on pretty much every lampost (and this is a town smaller than Plockton’s Pub Car Park) they also have a huge sign that says “no camping – campers will be prosecuted”. There is a sign at the entrance to the town saying “Local Police are targetting…” and  a set of hooks where the topic that most irritates the local plod can be hung up, so that you can consider yourself warned. Yesterday, they has mostly been irritated by Speeding it seems.

We stayed in Lancelin for just long enough to write in the sand:

the beach at Lancelin

We then decided that we had better scarper – in case smiling, laughing or standing on the sand turned out to carry a jail sentence!

Back to Perth, where the locals are thankfully not all cousins and the signs are slightly more welcoming (we think) and picked up some meat for the barbie – we are mostly eating BBQ at the moment, but this is less to do with becoming true aussies, and more to do with the flat not having an indoors cooker… we are so looking forward to moving into our house!

Posted another cool video too – the 207 doing it’s convertible roof thing:

Yeah, nice one T-mobile!

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just a quickie before we head off to the bank – we both have HTC smart phones, windows mobile things with touch screens, pop out keyboards etc. We got them from T-mobile branded as “Vario II” – they are also called “Tytn” or “hermes”, depending on who is selling them.

so, popped my new SIM into the phone, only to be faced with a Network Lock – unsurprisingly, t-mobile had locked the phones to them: not much use to me, as t-mobile don’t have an australian network (vodafone and three are the only guys from the UK out here).

quick call* to the UK later, and T-mobile want £20 and 28 days to send out the unlock code for the phone. each.

Thankfully, the magic internet comes to the rescue again – this guy has an unlocker that removes all of the network locks easily – for the princely sum of zero, taking about 8 minutes. I’ll probably chuck him a tenner donation…

I’m on three now – they seem to have good enough coverage, but I need to get the mobile internet working to see how it is.. especially as our computer kit has cleared customs, and should be delivered to the house next friday.

from here, it’s just get a phone, get broadband, set up the servers and then we should have proper email etc back.
I am, of course, trying to stop myself from jumping around the place with excitement (and not just because of who got booted on the apprentice last night!). We pick up the new car tomorrow 😀

A truly amazing night (not so good for the cows…)

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So, today was a pretty good day – the rain was gone, and it was brilliantly sunny – nice and warm, very bright and just exactly the sort of weather we are looking for. Everything got sorted with the car (we pick it up on Thursday), we ordered a new king size bed (which is fantastic – one of the latex cushioned/ memory foam jobs), and I got a new mobile (number to be sent out later – don’t really want to stick that on the ole t’interweb).

We decided that, what with it being a monday as well, that it was time to celebrate – and eat out! we have been the very models of restraint for the past few days, eating home cooking (most of which was cooked on the Barbie, naturally), but tonight we fancies something extra special.. so we drove down to fremantle (the locals call it “freo”) to a cracking place called Outback Jacks.

For starters, we opted to eat some of the local wildlife – crocodile (tasty, little bit like chicken 😉 ) and kangaroo (quite “beefy”, little bit like rabbit). This set us up nicely for the mains.

wow. they have steaks of all sorts and brilliant quality! You go up to the counter, which is just like the meat counter in the supermarket, with these huge succulent bits of raw meat sitting there – tell them what you want, they show you it, and you okay it.

Jen had a 400g Kobe steak (well, technically a Wagyu steak – you can’t properly call it kobe unless it’s been raised in the Kobe area), whilst I opted for the 500g “not so hungry” australian Angus (rare – is there any other way? 🙂 ). They arrived on huge platter plates with salad, chunky chips, caramelised onions and a pepper sauce for me (you don’t put a sauce on Wagyu steak).

so, there we were, grinning from ear to ear, eating some of the biggest, tastiest steaks either of us have ever seen, and Jen getting quite happily sloshed on the house white (I was driving, a mistake I won’t make next time!)

great food, great evening, and when the bill came, quite pleasant. came to $104 all in – about £50.

now, having rolled back to the car and driven back to the flat with the top button of my jeans undone, there’s little left to do but relax in front of the telly. a good day. 🙂

Been a couple of days ….

By | | Australia, Uncategorized
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Been a couple of days since we updated anything….

My nephew has teeth! Go Adam. Well done wee man!

Elaine, I havent found me a job yet never mind you and BJ, that will take a few weeks I am afraid, we only just got here! Besides, I am sure mum & dad will be annoyed if we all ended up here – the reason for having 4 kids was to have them spread out over the world, not all in Oz.

Di, has Jennifer got any word on her visa?

And just so he doesnt feel left out, as I am sure he hasnt seen this at all yet – Rab, ya smelly bas!

We BBQed burgers today for lunch, and then again for dinner – because it looks like Perth closes down on a Sunday. There are some restaurants open, but very few – we fancied sushi, but there arent that many open, and none of the open ones have a conveyor belt. We wanted a sushi train!

Today we explored, we saw Freemantle, which was nice, Rockingham, which doesnt really Rock at all – its industrial city with BOC plants and so on. We also went into Kings Park in the centre of Perth which is beautiful! Then we went north to check out stuff near our new house in Joondalup, and went to the nearest beach:

This is litteraly 5 minutes by car from the door. It was amazingly fab, right onto the Indian Ocean. Huge breakers, sandy beach, people surfing, kayacking, and the best bit was that it wasnt too busy.

We still have a fair bit to get sorted, tomorrow they will check the finance for the car and let us know, the house is already sorted, we have applied for our Tax numbers, so we can both work OK. We need to arrange insurance and get a bed for arriving in the house.

And after the house…

By | | Australia, Interesting! (Well, for me)
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comes the car. it’s a heck of a lot to get done in a small amount of time – we had a pretty tight schedule with 2 weeks to get the house, car, bank accounts etc all sorted out, and that schedule got even tighter when we threw caution to the wind and rented an unfurnished empty house rather than a pre-furnished one…

we now have a lot more stuff to buy/arrange before our own boatload of stuff arrives (and it hasn’t left yet – there’s another two weeks or so before it goes, unless someone else doing the central scotland -> perth route appears)

Still, the whole “abandon your plans when something shiny comes along” strategy worked okay for the house, so it’s probably not much of a surprise that we didn’t, after all, opt for an old banger to run around in.

no, siree…

we have bought a shiny new Peugeot 207 cc – the convertible one. It’s apparently a complete girls car, but I don’t care – I have been hankering for one of these since it came out.. except that Glasgow (let’s be honest here) doesn’t really have much in the way of convertible car weather, unless you are really determined.

so, that’s the house, the car.. now we just need mobiles, furniture, a bed, kitchen appliances, food….

Got our house! And its a doozy!

By | | Australia
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We had decided to get a furnished flat in the city centre and try out city living for a while till our stuff came.

Pah, that was sooooo two days ago.

Today we spotted an amazing house in Joondalup, about 25 minutes from the center and are going to be staying there from the 5th June (we will be kicked out of here on the 2nd, so either need to extend for a few days or find somewhere else). Its amazing!

Empty, but as it has FOUR bedrooms, we will be getting a new bed anyway, so when people visit we have a spare. We will get a nice patio set as well, letting us use it as a dining room table till our stuff arrives.

It doesnt *just* have a pool – it also has a hot tub!

Lookie :

Banks and stuff

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Yep, seem far better adjusted to the time zone now, got up with the alarm at 8, had a shower (realised that all I had got in the supermarket was shampoo – no soap or face wash!) and off into the central business district to the bank for our appointment for opening the accounts. We now have banking set up, and have applied for a credit card, to build up our credit history. We do indeed have *no* credit history here – which is good! But … means we cant get a car loan, so have to get an old one, still looking for that ford capri 😉

So far we have seen The Fenian Pub, and coon brand cheese, there is also “The Coliseum” – the christian gym. I can only assume that they get people fit by putting them on a treadmill, and getting a lion to run behind them!

We have also seen drive through offsales. We had heard about them – and apparently they are also common in the US, but its such a weird concept!

ARGH! Weather!

By | | Australia, grrrr
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it had to happen, didn’t it? when we visited Jamaica, we had guys out on the beach performing dark voodoo magic and sacrificing chickens, convinced that the world was going to end… they had never seen such freakish weather in their lives…

now, the “Jenni and Ian effect” comes to Australia – yes, that’s right, we are single handedly responsible for the end of the great Aussie Drought!

Weather Image

Guess where we are!!!

Ants, why does it always have to be Ants!

By | | Australia
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I think I should cover the end of the Singapore trip and coming into Perth …

We got up when the alarm went off (at 5:45 blerg!) and then the wake up call arrived (“Have a great day!”) and had a fab shower. The transport was to pick us up at 6:50, but we had to let the front desk know so that they could call them. We had tonnes of time, so checked out we had decided to skip the S$30 breakfast and grab a McDs in the airport, but while they were trying to figure out who needed to know about our transport (nobody, they just arrive) we were treated to a coffee and croissant (she made us lattes rather than white coffee, yum!) And then another one and some chocolates.

I love Singapore! I dont know whether we would have got similar treatment at another hotel, or just because it was the Ritz Carlton, but it was just amazing.

We got to skip check in because we had already done it in Heathrow, and didnt have to worry about our hold luggage either – it went straight through. Singapore Airport is ginormous, you can walk, or they have shuttle trains to get you to your gate. We wandered into Departures and got nabbed by security to put our rucksacks onto the scanner (not everyone did, I think its coz Ian looks shifty), then through passport control and into the departure lounge which was again clean and full of stuff, water features, art displays and shops.

The actual gate was were the security was – they seem to have one for each gate. So, through the scanners and the xray machines (just like being back at work but with a less restrictive list of banned items!). This flight wasnt as good as the long haul stretch, but thats not to say it was bad! It far surpassed any sleazyjet flight, and a million times better than that shitey Thomson flight to Cyprus. More space, more entertainment (it was an older version of the system on the A380 – good, but slower and not as wide a selection) Less in the way of snacks and drinks, but it was a far shorter flight. I would definately still recommend Singapore Airlines.

Then we arrived in Perth! By god by the customs and quarantine people are paranoid! It was so intimidating I ended up convinced I was going to get caught with something. They fine you for carrying food, feathers, dirt, all sorts of stuff! As it happens, we were fine. But it was an intimidating experience. They scan you again coming into the country!

The flat we are in is nice, good views, comfy bed. It has its downsides though – it someones basement, and as well as the two patio door entrances, there are stairs up to their house that they lock. The guy that owns the place very nicely brought us in some juice and bread and butter. The layout is a little awkward, but nothing to worry about, but the kitchen is really small. Never mind, we are only here two weeks, and we dealt with an even smaller kitchen in Cyprus!

We picked up a chinese takeaway last night, and it was strange. Carrots, brocolli, cauliflower and chicken thigh meat…. the kung po had at least a handful of dried chillis in it! It lasted us two nights though as we ordered wrong and ended up with 4 meals rather than 2 and 2 sides. Heh.

We have been looking around for accommodation today – thats hard work I tell you when you have no idea about the areas! But we are already figuring out where abouts we are in relation to the major roads around here.

Ian reckoned we would be adjusted to the time zone. Hah! We went to bed at the back of 8, and I was up at 00:30 and Ian was up around 3:00. We finally got back to sleep around 5am, till about 8. Its now 22:15, so this time, we might be adjusted 😉

Oh, and the only beasties we have seen so far beyond some flies is ants. All over the kitchen.

Ants, why does it always have to be Ants!

Getting settled – with a trip to woolies :)

By | | Australia, General Mumblings
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Well, a walk past Woolworths, and a visit to Coles – the Aussie equivelant of Asda and Tesco.

We stocked up with some essentials, as well as a trip to Bunnings – the local B&Q. some hack job surgery later, and we have a couple of Aussie power leads for the laptop.

starting to find our way around and took some photos from our living room – here’s jen having breakfast:

Living Room

Those doors lead out to the patio, there’s then a nice park before the river. Given that the river probably contains crocodiles, sharks and jellyfish (for all we know), we are not going down there just yet… still, the patio has what looks like a good croc-proof steel fence:


Our patio..

Anyhoo, next we head off to Westpac to prove that we are who we say we are, and open our Aussie bank accounts (which we have to do before we can rent a place).

busy, busy!

and then we went to Perth :)

By | | Australia
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Well, after a five hour flight from Singapore we landed in Perth and picked up the hire car. Our apartment is pretty cool (and then my new boss swung by with some bread and milk etc).

It’s a little intimidating driving here – they have some nasty junction merges and for some reason Sat Nav that quite seriously sucks!

still, we are finding our way around, and starting the search for an apartment. It’s 8:20 and we are starting to get sleepy. not too bad though – we will probably be adjusted to the time zone by tomorrow. 🙂

Visit Singapore!

By | | Australia, Food
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oh yeah.

so, today could easily have turned into nothing more than an airport – hotel – airport stop off. we were tired from the long flight and unsure of what to do, where to go etc.

then we got to the hotel – it is incredible. we have a bunch of pictures that we’ll get online whenever our computers arrive in Perth, in the meantime, here’s the view from our hotel – we are actually on  the other side of the hotel (with a view that’s just as cool, but not the marina!)

view from our hotel

So, we went for a walk to explore central singapore, including a visit to the famous Raffles Hotel where we enjoyed a couple of singapore slings in the long bar. the sun was lovely and warm, and the temperature (about 28) was just delicious. if this is a hint of what Perth will be like, we are loving it!

back to the hotel to freshen up (did  i mention the two person walk in wet room style shower?)

cool wet room shower

After a nap to help knock the time zone into our head, we headed out onto the esplanade at night – walk along the banks of the marina, and got rick rolled. oh yes – the band playing at the waterfront auditorium were belting out a heartfelt version of “never gonna give you up”, which gradually turned into a Kylie medley.

took a couple of hours to soak up the nightlife, then stopped off at “yoshinoya” for some meso soup, spicy beef and teriyaki chicken – yum!

that’s us now back in the hotel and about to head to bed (it’s 10pm here, and we are up early for the bus to the airport). Perth tomorrow, and we get our first sight of our new home!

I would heartily advise visiting singapore. it’s a truly wonderful place, and well worth 12 hours on a plane.

Its the only way to fly …

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I have to say, I love Singapore Airlines.
The A380 is amazing, and the service is unbeleivably good, even in economy. You cant call this cattle class!

We had a smooth boarding process, hot towels before take off. Free drinks, more free drinks (we like the Singapore Sling) both with peanuts. A tasty meal, loads of leg room, could always be doing with more obviously, but it wasnt cramped enough to worry about, even for me.

They came round with snacks later on, and repeatedly were there with water to keep you hydrated.

The entertainment system is AMAZING. I watched Dr Who, House, Bones, se7en, Pushing Daisies, Sarah Connor Chronicles, and loads of other stuff. The CD selection was great, even if it did have loads more pop and R&B than rock – still plenty for me.

Then the lights dim, but I couldnt sleep, not quite enough room for that for me, though most other people on the flight did seem to.

The lights gently faded up around two and a half hours before landing… where there were more hot towels, then breakfast!

We wandered a little aimlessly through Singapore Airport, not entirely sure where we were meant to be, through arrivals (filling out the admissions card just before passport control) then towards “Coach” as we had been promised “in coach transfer”, and found the SIA Stopovers desk. 10 minutes later a mini bus arrived for us, and we were whisked off to the Ritz Carlton.

Singapore is beautiful. Clean, tree lined streets. Warm and sunny. And the staff at the hotel were amazingly helpful. We were walked to the reception and given ice cold towels and some mango juice while we were checking in. Escorted to our room and shown round. When Ian wandered off to get some ice for the ice bucket a member of staff who happened to be in the corridor spotted him, ran towards him to find out what he needed, saw the ice bucket and apologized that the ice machine on this level is broken, took the bucket from him and got us ice from another level and brought it to our room.

We are soooooo coming back to Singapore!

update from the airport

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here we are in heathrow terminal 3 with an hour before the gate opens.

we got a taxi from the hotel to here, scooted through check in in only a few minutes but got caught in security when we totally forgot about a bottle of water we had picked up yesterday. so we got pulled over and everything checked and tested for explosives. didn’t take too long though.

now we are waiting as we don’t actually fly for another 2 hours. bur I am happier killing time here than being late.

…

doing this from my phone and its not the greatest as I can only see 1 chacter on screen. I will fix up the text later 🙂

Our house, empty!

By | | General Mumblings
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after many aborted attempts (grrrr – youtube!), I finally got the vid walk through of our house uploaded.

anyone who has ever been to the house will be downright shocked at how clean and tidy the place looks, minus it’s messiest contents (that would be us!).

for your enjoyment:

also a little bit of good news – we have a couple of viewers set up already for the house 🙂

Travelling – Day 2

By | | Australia
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Too tired to do anything other than take their complimentary beer, wine and juice, we didnt go far last night.

Bed at 8, yes, we were that tired.

Today, we are up early again and about to go try the complimentary breakfast, see if its any good. Then off to check in to the uber flight. We will probably do that early, what with my “flight missing paranoia”, there are “pure hunners” of people getting on this plane, so we dont want to get caught up in a huge queue and miss it.

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We did indeed manage to get this far without any incidents other than me blubbering at my mum and dads and then again (and again and again) at the airport.

We had plans to try and get into London itself and see some stuff, but we really are just too knackered. I can see us asleep in the next few hours. Its been a long week…..

Just had my first actual meal of the day – nerves have been keeping me from eating. Thats such a rare occurrence, it needs special mention!

The bed, it has to be said, is extra comfy and its bedgravity is extra strong.

Step One – London!

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Well, after a teary farewell at Glasgow Airport (and some scrambled egg on toast!) we had a pretty pleasant flight down to heathrow.

we arrived on time, and settled into our executive room (oh yeah) at the Sheraton Heathrow. I’m now uploading some photos and the video of the empty house using the super fast internet connection.

now the biggest decision we face – do we enjoy the club lounge here at the hotel and just relax the day away, or do we scoot into London and do the tourist thing..

sounds tempting, but then so does the mini bar 😀