The Waltowns Exodus........

After weeks of planning & preparation, as opposed to weeks of Snow Boarding which was what we actually had envisaged our last few weeks might be spent doing, the Waltowns life was packed up into lots & lots of boxes, loaded on to a 20ft Container in the Great British rain on March 7th 2006 and sent on its way 10,509 miles or as we should now say 16,913 km, to sunny Melbourne, Australia. :-)

The Waltowns themselves spent 5 days in an empty house - thanks to those who supplied much needed camping supplies!! - and set off on March 12th 2006 from Heathrow, via Singapore - like their household effects - but arriving in Melbourne at 6:30am on March 14th 2006. The household goods docked into port today April 14th 2006 so pretty fast too but lots has happened in between and we may not see the goods for sometime yet!!

What's it like to leave the UK? Well initially you need to pack, pack, tidy, throw out, throw out some more and organise........







Oh and in the case of bikes, clean, clean, clean and clean some more to make sure there's no dirt anywhere. For a country full of dirt roads they seem very concerned about people bringing any more with them!

Then some really nice chaps come round to your house, drink gallons of coffee, eat all your McVities and pack anything not nailed down or moving!









and finally they load up the container. It has to be said they're very very good at what they do. We didn't think it would fit - that's a very small container when you see it empty and then look at your house!! And as you can see it nearly didn't - that's one full container!!!











And so the household gear went and we camped out in the 'old' house. On the Saturday we went to the airport whilst still making phone calls to the utilities to report Meter Readings from the car! and arrived at Heathrow complete with masses of luggage. Luckily we'd managed to blag Immigrant Fares with double the luggage allowance and had so much stuff in the queue vs. the rest of the plane queuing up to board people actually asked if we were competing in the Commonwealth Games - as if I look that sporty !!???! Spody maybe but not sporty! ;-)

Then just 22 hours later after taking off in the rain and following some major relief tears we arrived in Melbourne. In the rain. In fact in the heaviest rain they'd had in months!! Not necessarily what we thought it might be like! However it did clear later in the day for beautiful clear skies and mid 20's temperatures. Over the next 3 weeks it never rained once and hit 30+ over the weekends :-) Very Nice! Autumn has now set in though and in the land they say can experience 4 seasons in one day we've worn coats and beanies one day and shorts & T Shirts the next.