Advertisement
Published: January 3rd 2009
Edit Blog Post
Brisbane
The Car and House Two weeks into the search for our new house we began to realise that Neighbours creates a slightly false impression of Australian houses - they don't all have pools! Well, generally only the "family" homes do, where "family" seems to equate to a house fit for ten, which is miles from anywhere. However, after pouring over the property listings on the net for what seemed like an eternity we finally found a house in the rather disappointingly named Paddington. We were hoping for somewhere with a much cooler aussie sounding name like Indooroopilly or Toowoomba or even Kangaroo Point (seriously, that's a place). Far more importantly though we do have a pool - hurrah!
At the same time we bought a car. Thinking we needed to fit in with the locals, and to quench Andy's desire for a car that looks mean, we opted for a beast of a 4x4. Although, it was described as an economical 3 litre V6 for those tree hugger types. We might even take it off road this time.
The new fourby has a turning circle the size of a small ocean going liner. We unfortunately discovered this whilst trying to perform a swift
Brisbane
An open fire for those chilly winter evenings! U-turn on a dual carriageway. Thankfully it was at night and we were able to make a quick three point turn instead, and rapidly accelarate to avoid the fast approaching lights in the rear view mirror.
So we moved into our new house, which is a traditional queensland house built out of wood, and raised up on stilts. We set about ordering furniture (which turned up at 6:30 on a saturday morning!) and in the mean time resorted to sitting on two small camping chairs, and sleeping on an air bed which rapidly deflated on the "heavy" side. In fact, our first night in the house was a fairly sleepless one as we listened to the wooden walls and beams creak and crack. This was rapidly followed by the delightful sound of the possum olympics, where the entrants participate in the 100 yards roof dash, and the tree to roof long jump.
Now some of you may be aware that we aren't renowned for being the tidiest of people - a shock to the rest of you i'm sure. However, the prospect of ants, spiders and/or cockroaches getting in has turned two very messy people into full time
Brisbane
Our kitchen and dining room cleanaholics. Our house is pristine inside - ok, so we don't have that much stuff yet (it arrives around christmas we hope) and we did take the pictures just before we had a house inspection, but it doesn't end there - our overgrown garden has been hacked back to limit web potential, and two full cans of bug spray have been liberally applied to the house, garden and anything that moves. Andy thought he'd better stop spraying one night when he heard the dog next door sneezing.
Whilst you'll all be pleased to know that it's generally been pretty hot (only about 25 degrees at 7:30 am) you'll probably be even more pleased to know that we've had some torrential storms. The worst storm in these parts for around 40 years decided to hit as we were driving back from our first day on the beach. Obviously hailing from the UK we thought we were rain-pro's and kept on driving, tutting at the scaredy aussies for pulling off the road as the thunder rolled in. After a few minutes, when it seemed like someone was constantly throwing a bucket of water over the windshield we decided to be scaredy
Brisbane
Our patio too. The rain continued for 3 days and peaked on the final night where we were woken by what sounded like the roof leaving the house. Fortunately it was just rain so heavy that we couldn't actually see the house next door through it!
A quick note on Maunsell's end of year Gala Dinner that we went to. On a slightly different scale than what we were used to, the dinner was held at the equivalent of the NEC, had over 1000 attendees, a compere, 2 acts and a band. The thing was so big that Laura didn't bump into a single person from her team.
For Andy's birthday we headed down to Lamington National Park. Arriving late on Friday night we started to make our way up the incredibly windy, often single lane, "road" on the edge of the hillside. This was already painfully slow going in the dark, but then the clouds rolled in, and we crawled up the last 10kms in about an hour. The next day we went for an explore, and got attacked by the same parrots that freaked Andy out the year before. We thought we'd go for a hike and headed
Brisbane
So many bean jokes, so little space... out into the rainforest. Hearing the distant rumbles of thunder and being passed by several people walking back hurriedly in the opposite direction we ventured on, thinking at worst we'll "get a bit wet". Then, all of a sudden, the sky turned black, all the insects got very very loud, a crack of thunder which i swear nearly split our ear drums boomed out above us, and a bolt of lightening hit the ground somewhere not particluarly far away. Within about ten seconds we were soaked through. Now a teenzy bit scared of the big nasty storm, we hightailed it back to our room and got ready for dinner. At dinner we got to watch the possums come down and eat their dinner (they're alot cuter when they're not on your roof).
More stuff we have learnt about Australia:
You need a copy of your passport, drivers license, 2 bills, bank statement, and 2 photocopies of 2 credit cards to pay for a car in cash - seriously.
You have to sign every page of the rental contract at least twice - including the photocopy of the air-con remote.
Brisbane is very hilly - particularly near our house.
Brisbane
2 hours tidying the garden in the searing heat, 1 hour cleaning crap out of the pool, jumping in with your clothes on....... priceless Funnel Webs have made it into South East Queensland.
The only way to solve traffic problems is to build more roads, and when we say problems we mean 4 cars in a queue.
Everything can be abbreviated if you try hard enough - Got the rego for the fourby this arvo.
You can't top up your phone at the weekend - there is nobody there.
Aussie chavs are called bogans.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.124s; Tpl: 0.012s; cc: 12; qc: 61; dbt: 0.057s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.2mb
ma and pa
non-member comment
Brill blog
Love the blog - will now be able to nick photos and put them on frame. xx ma, pa and Indie