Blogs from West Midlands, England, United Kingdom, Europe - page 5

G’day! Not long now- I shall be leaving in approx four hours for Dubai. As I’m going Stir-crazy in anxiousness/ excitement I thought I best take some time out to write the blog I promised about the Working Holiday Visa. Just a bit of background to the workforce in Ausralia- their population is 23 million. At any one point there are about a million backpackers in the country, that is alot of tourism and casual work to be done. Being as backpackers are a fundamental slice of Aus labour market, the government created the Working Holiday Visa. (Subclass 417) The visa is initially for a year and if you want a second year you must complete 3 months of ‘ seasonal work’ in the rural parts of the country. Examples of this include fruitpicking, animal husbandry, ... read more

Woolly says – our lives had been settling down nicely, Ian had been feeling a little unwell so we decided to try out the Turkish hospital facilities. Boy do they move fast! As soon as blue books appeared we were whisked away and Ian was plugged onto machines, x rays were underway and before I even had a chance to check out the nurses we were seeing a consultant. He busily showed us the results of the tests declaring that Ian’s heart was fine but he wanted to put a shunt in that afternoon, I got rather confused at this point having seen shunts on the railway lines I couldn’t work out how that would fit into Ian’s chest and hadn’t he just told us that his heart was working well! Like Woolly we felt slightly ... read more

Hi All, T-17 days to go before the big trip! I thought I best get used to this blogging malarkey as it sounds like a good way of keeping in touch with people and as I have some serious time on my hands, this may be a good way to keep myself occupied during any spare time I have. Some may say I've just lost my blogging virginity! I intend to write a few blogs before I go, to share some of my feelings an thoughts about leaving everything I know and love about this merry place called England and embarking on the Experience of a Lifetime- a working Holiday in Australia! So why are you going I hear you ask? Well... the answer is not straight forward. I've reached a certain stage of life ( ... read more

Bank Holiday Monday and it really is countdown to the trip. Suzy's cupboards have been emptied, cleaned and refilled with reading and puzzle books for the trip, paper for writing on and anything else you can imagine you would need in a motorhome. The cooker has been cleaned, the fridge tidied out and some provisions put in ready for the off. Essentials, coffee, tea and milk plus beer and wine all in. She has had a well deserved wash and the dust of the summer cleaned off her. The last minute cleaning of the house, last minute washing of the clothes have all been completed and clothes have been moved from the house into Suzy. All we need now is to get round to Thursday afternoon and the off. Money ordered and we have a stock ... read more

It’s been a busy few weeks as we sort through cupboards, check documents, clean everything to within an inch of its life, mow the grass, and all manner of other jobs that have been on the back burner. Ollie is serviced, has had all his fluids checked and he’s sitting on the drive waiting for his final wash and polish before he hits the road again. So what’s next…….. Woolly says – Were off to Turkey!!!! Not just for a holiday but for good. I’m so excited and have packed and repacked my trunk several times with everything I might need. I found lots of new things to buy that I could take at the car boot we had a stall at but Jo wouldn’t let me buy anything pointing out that we were supposed to ... read more