More Firsts

     Yesterday I was wiped out and couldn't stay awake long enough to post anything.  We went out in the morning looking at rental furniture.  Now that we have a house, we have been starting to figure out what we will need, what we will rent with our rental allowance, what we will buy, etc.  It's somewhat tedious and not exactly fun for the kids, but it's all part of this new chapter.  The interior of the house gets painted this week and we should be able to move in next week.  However, our air shipment with household stuff arrives here this week but could take several weeks to get through customs.  We are just trying to get things set up in case we can move in, then play it by ear until then. 

      While we were out going between furniture places, I got brave enough to drive for a while. It was a bit nerve-wracking to have very little feel for where the left side of the car is, but other than that it was OK.  I discovered that I dislike not knowing my way around more than I dislike driving on the left side of the road.  Of course, if I wasn't so intensely focused on not running Chris into the curb (he kept asking me politely to "Move over to the right some"), I might learn my way around a bit better.  Anyhow, I drove for a while today again and am confident it will not be an issue for long, especially once we live somewhere that becomes familiar.

     Trying to balance the tedious with something fun, we headed to Balmoral Beach yesterday afternoon and evening.  It was a gorgeous day and the beach there is just amazing.   The beach is divided by a picturesque rocky outcropping/park and bordered along its length by a shady park.  There were lots of families out picnicing last night and the kids were thrilled to see 6 Cavalier King Charles Spaniels in just three hours or so.  Jackson will have lots of his brethren around.  There was an incredibly noisy flock of sulphur-crested cockatoos flying around which we found interesting.  The locals find them bothersome and just ignore them but we're not there yet.  We can't really believe we'll be living three houses from such a pretty beach. 



The view steps away from our driveway.

Love all the water around this city!!

Rotunda in the park along Balmoral Beach.  Reminds us of the Old Well.

Sulphur-crested cockatoo

       Today Mia and Sam "enjoyed" getting school shoes.  Mia declared it's the first time she's ever not enjoyed shopping.  She also said that her fashionable friend Jessie would "just die if she had to wear those ugly shoes with white socks."  Yes, they will be wearing school uniforms complete with black shoes and white socks.  We will be going to their school tomorrow to buy the rest of the uniform gear.  I'm sure it's different if you have always worn one, but Mia is especially disgruntled about the whole uniform process.  Pictures will follow!

      The cheery shoe shopping expedition was followed by another surfing lesson for Mia and the first one for Sam at Manly Beach.  About halfway through the lesson, the beach was closed by lifeguards due to rough conditions.  More disgruntled Mia.  We'll head back another day for the make-up lesson.

     The "real-world" begins tomorrow with Chris heading off to work one way and the rest of us taking the bus for uniform shopping and library visiting.  If Chris could just figure out how to get my iPhone to work with Telstra here (he's spent every evening unsuccessfully trying to figure out "jailbreaking" and "unlocking", blah, blah, blah), then I may not feel like I'm sailing blind.  I don't know how anyone functioned before cell phones with internet access!

Taking Care of Business

     Our day was filled with tasks to set up a normal life sooner than later.  We signed our lease, measured rooms for furniture, let the kids battle out which bedroom they will get, picked out appliances, and tried to figure out where a power outlet was hiding in the master bathroom.  Answer: nowhere. Really.  Both real estate agents were as surprised by that as we were!

     In between all these house tasks, we went to register the kids for school since we now have a lease to prove our "residency."  We met briefly with the principal, who was very nice, and got an assigned time (9:25 AM) for the kids to start on Tuesday, February 1st.  Yea! Yea!  They need peers in their lives and so do we!  We will go on Monday to purchase school uniforms, including hats (there's a no hat, no play policy), raincoats, and library bags (not so sure what that is).  Interesting things: the school has a no nut policy so no peanut butter is allowed, there is a school swim carnival (American = meet) in February in which all the kids compete in swim races (Sam is extremely excited), school starts at 9:00 (much later than Chapel Hill!) and felt tip pens are called texters.  Non-residents must pay $4500 per year, per child, for school attendance.  Assuming the government can process our application in a day (hmmmm), school will start on Tuesday.  Whew! 

    Now I have to figure out which buses to take to get them there since we won't have moved into the house yet and haven't bought a car yet. 

     Jackson arrived this morning via Qantas and has settled in at the quarantine station.  We spoke briefly to his handler this afternoon and she gave us an update.  He was "sweet, beautiful and doing well."  Visiting hours are Tuesdays and Thursdays during school hours so we haven't figured out how to get the kids there to see him yet.  He has to stay until March 2nd which seems like a long time to all of us, but we are glad the trip went well for him. 

  

Can you tell we miss him and are ready for him to join the family?

Bondi, Bronte, Bluebottles and Balmoral Beach

      Today was another gorgeous day here, 28 degrees Celsius (82 F) with a sea breeze to keep you cool.  We headed down to the famous Bondi (Bond-eye) Beach and went on a 2.5 km cliff walk around the coast southward to Bronte (Bron-tee) Beach.  As usual, the scenery was amazing (Chris enjoyed some different scenery...but this is a family blog)!



Bondi Beach looking north.

Bondi Icebergs pool; they swim here in winter after adding ice cubes.  Yikes!

The sandstone cliffs along the way were surreal looking at times.

Looking south along the coast, you can see Tamarama Beach and then Bronte Beach.

       Our plan was to get some lunch in Bronte and then spend a while cooling off at the beach.  Almost as soon as we got out to the water, the lifeguards announced on the loudspeakers (love that these beaches have great PA systems) that there were bluebottles coming ashore and recommended not swimming.  Sure enough, there were tons of these tiny jellyfish washing ashore.  They are related to Portuguese Man o' War jellyfish, but much smaller and have tentacles that can be 10 feet long.  They are about the size of a silver dollar and, if you smack them with a stick, they pop like popping paper.  Aussie kids taught us that!  So, no swimming for us today but we did enjoy our cliff walk and the beach was beautiful.

The sting apparently lasts about an hour and there's not much to do about it except rinse the area with water.



Looking north at the cliffs around which we walked.



      During lunch, we got word that our rental application for the house near Balmoral Beach had been accepted.  Hooray!! That means that tomorrow we're off to measure things at the house for furnishings, try to register the kids for school, and get some furniture ordered. 
      Jackson spent the night in San Francisco and should arrive here in the morning.  The Aussie quarantine folks will pick him up and take him to jail - I mean quarantine.  :-(  We hope to see him next week! 

Australia Day and Swimming with the Jellies

     Think 4th of July.  Australia Day, January 26th,  is a mid-summer national holiday celebrating the arrival of the first permanent English settlers in Australia.  Australians typically celebrate by going to the beach, having a barbie and watching fireworks.  All very familiar - and fun!
      Chris could think of no better way to celebrate than to swim 750 meters across Sydney Harbor first thing this morning with 1000 other swimmers in the Great Aussie Swim.  It doesn't get more Aussie than swimming in the harbor from the Opera House on Australia Day amidst the dozens of (harmless) jelly fish Chris saw beneath the surface when he first jumped in.
       We spent the afternoon near the Harbor, watching the festive boats, Australian Air Force jets, skydivers and Sydneysiders in their patriotic Aussie finery.  Tonight there was a large light and firework show in Darling Harbor, a portion of Sydney Harbor, just outside our windows.  We had amazing seats and could also watch three or four other fireworks displays simultaneously!  The kids could literally roll over and go to sleep as soon as the fireworks finished.  Can't beat that.



Mia gets into the spirit of things.





Reflection on our apartment building from the fireworks

     In other news, our sweet dog, Jackson, has started his trip Down Under.  He's in San Francisco tonight and will head over the Pacific tomorrow.  More about that soon!

House Hunting Part Deux

      After getting in some morning exercise, we took off again with our realtor to look at three houses.  The first was in Birchgrove, a trendy area close to the CBD (Central Business District).  This house was directly on the water with a dock (Chris was already plotting boat acquistions) and had amazing views from every floor.  It's a "fairly quick" commute by ferry for Chris, close to a good school, and will allow a small pet.  Only cons are that certain parts aren't in great shape and it's not really walking distance to shops (though there are 200+ restaurants within 2 miles).


View of Birchgrove house from the dock.

Interior of Birchgrove house.

Birchgrove house as seen from ferry (later in day).  It has three balconies in center of photograph.



         Our next stop was back in Mosman, just steps from Balmoral Beach.  This area has good schools, nice shops nearby and a great beach.  The house is a bit ridiculous for us; it shares a tennis court and swimming  pool!  There are great water views, a good floor plan, and updated interior.  Very nice!



House #2 in Mosman. 



View looking down street at Balmoral Beach and North Head beyond.

View of Hunters Bay from House #2.

Interior of House #2

          Our third stop was another Mosman house, although not with beach or water views.  This house was an older home that had been beautifully remodeled and had a great backyard.  For some reason, I took no photos.  Sorry!  I think I couldn't believe how nicely re-modeled it was.  We looked at several homes a few days before that were a similar "federation" style but in much poorer condition and not updated.
        So, a much better real estate day.  Any of these properties will work for us.  Should I make you wait, like on House Hunters International, to see which one we chose?  Nah.  We chose House #2 but will be happy with any of these.  Tomorrow is Australia Day, a national holiday, so it will be Thursday before we know anything.  As we learned through our 5 offers on homes in Chapel Hill, nothing is certain until it's signed, so we're still in "wait and see" mode on whether our rental application will be accepted.
        We spent the rest of our day getting credit cards (to avoid those dreaded international fees), eating great Thai food, taking a ferry ride around the part of the Harbour near House #1, and playing in Hyde Park (a daily necessity for Sam). 

The ferry ride was our first trip under the Harbour Bridge and gave us a good look at all the people climbing up it (on quite a windy afternoon).

It also gave us our closest view at the old-timey amusement park, Luna Park, located under the bridge in North Sydney.  We're told it's modeled after Coney Island, but the clown face just looks creepy regardless.

And Sam is still Sam, so he couldn't go a whole ferry ride, much less a whole day without being goofy....assuming you consider wearing swim goggles for sunglasses as being goofy.

We don't have a "barbie", so we'll break one of the cardinal rules of Australia Day tomorrow, but we'll make up for it with some festival going and fireworks!

Little Surfer Girl in Manly

Having been here 5 days and with no house hunting on tap, we embraced the laid back Aussie beach lifestyle and headed back to Manly for an afternoon of playing in the sea and surfing (well, at least trying to surf).

The Sheilas (okay, I haven't heard anyone actually say that) visting from the Point Leo Surf Lifesaving Club near Melbourne must have heard we were coming and felt they better warm up in formation and practice their ocean rescue 

Fortunately no lifesaving was needed today, though they did announce 13 people including one girl from our class had been stung by bluebottles (that's Portugese Man-o-War for our American readers).  Probably good for us that we didn't see this sign until after our lesson.







The Manly School of Surf took us under their wing for our inaugural surfing attempt.  Surfing sure seemed easy on the sand!

Once we got past fighting the waves a little, it wasn't too hard riding the waves on our bellies.  Well maybe it was...




While we don't have the pictures to show it, we actually did start to get the hang off of it.

While Kelly Slater doesn't have anything to worry about any time soon (or ever), we caught the bug and are signed up for another round of lessons in the future!

Back to house hunting tomorrow!