Mike H

Mini celebration yesterday, does'nt take much of an excuse but it was 12 months yesterday that my wife answered the phone to be told by our immigration agent that we had got our visas! Wow, it seems like a life time ago, so much change in one year.

A year of real ups and thankfully few downs, actually most of the downs were involved in the preparation to get here.

The downs.....

Selling the house, a**e we sold too tried to drop the price prior to completion as he knew we were emigrating. Nice.

Saying goodbye to family and friends, a lot harder than we both imagined it would be and we expected it to be hard! Good luck with that one (top tip - taxi to the airport).

To be honest, thats about it, maybe there were more, I'm sure there were but they don't jump to the fore of my mind now so let them lie I say.

The Upside............

We like Melbourne a lot and we were never city dwellers (Cumbrians).

Managed to get a great rental that was furnished (took about a week - Rowville, lovely area)

Our dog getting here safe and well.

The people around us, all Oz and have been fantastic. Made some nice friends.

Being invited out to spend Christmas day with a family who took pity on us for being on our jack! Like that used to happen a lot in the UK!

Enjoying some time out for the first time in ages before we started looking for work. Lots of road trips and generally nosing about.

My wife landing a job from her first interview (childcare.....loads of work here if you will work in Kinder.....don't let anyone tell you different).

I landed a Job within a week of putting my CV out one agency (Occ Health), then had a offer of another within a month of starting!

Victoria itself, looked around a lot, still a lot to see but surprised how well we have settled here and how diverse one territory can be (the Great Ocean Rd is stunning).

I've played in bands and taught evening classes for years, within a month I was playing in a band here and within two months teaching evening class in two different community centres (lots of other offers too which was nice but not enough hours in the week)

Looking forward to first set of family coming over in a couple of months.

National Park's ten mins away where you can sit and have a coffee and watch roo's in the wild (why are these parks always nearly empty?)

Oh, and the weather.......it's awesome! Even now in autumn.


So all in all we're feeling pretty lucky.

Is it what we expected? Not sure (I think it's impossible to visualize a place you have never been to before. It's a bit like looking at holiday brochures, how often do they give you a real feel for a place).

Are we doing what we thought we would be doing? Not sure.

Are we making more money than we were in the UK. No.

Are we happier here than we were in the UK. We are. Definitely

Here's the thing, before we came out here we made the pros and cons list and we talked for a long time about what we wanted from the move.

The answer was a better quality of life in terms of less stress, more time together and being able to grow old in a place where you felt safe and secure. Big houses, cars, boats and income never came into it (he said sitting in a big house with a station wagon on the drive.....you try and find a two bedroomed house!).

We put all our energies into planning the move, dotting every i and crossing every t to get us here and thankfully it all went to plan. Thanks to a lot of pointers from people on this site I might add, many thanks for that.

The second night here in Oz we went for a meal and started to talk about 'what do we do now with the rest of our lives?'

Like everyone you fumble your way through the decisions that you make and you do get some wrong, but as long as the good decisions outweigh the bad your're going in the right direction.

So we made the move, had the honeymoon period........and six months in it still feels pretty good to us.

Here's hoping that we will be looking back in another twelve months and seeing as much positive progress as we have since we got here.

For us, so far Oz has been a lucky country, and we wish the rest of you the same

Keep smiling!

Mike & Jayne

rebnatoli

Glad you're enjoying life out there - great down to earth post thanks.

Bexie

Great post! Nice to read a positive one..we are leaving the UK on 31/07 and are heading for Melbourne! Haven't got a clue where we want to settle! All researched out! Will check out Rowville!

dave wood

hi mike,i was interested to read youre post on victoria.we received a visa last week and have booked a flight to melbourne in october.I have a good friend who lives in Gisburn.we,re not sure were we want to head for next year so we are trying to visit victoria,south australia and western australia this year to activate visa.[youngest son doesnt leave school till next may] my wife runs a nursery and was interested in the childcare situation.I was interested to know why you chose victoria? Any advice would be appreciated.
glad to hear that you seem settled.
all the best from rainy Oldham

LouiseD

Lovely post Mike - so glad that everything's worked out for you. Keep enjoying.

scrubbedexpat055

Great post, hope our move feels as good.

Pete

moneypenny20

Lovely post. Good luck to you both.

vickys

Fantastic post glad to hear some positiveness and very interesting too. We're on our way out there asap but we are only just submitting the TRA, hopefully not too long of a process though and that we'll get all the information right first time!!

Techno Freak

Great post - we're landing in Melbourne on October 22nd. Can't wait. We did a reccie in Jan and really liks the place and surrounds.

I hope we settle as well as you guys have!

All the best, and long may you continue to enjoy the place.

mrbond

Hi there, I'm also a Cumbrian looking to migrate to Melbourne (before or in 2010, long way off I know). Where about's in Cumbria are you from?

Kapri

Great post Mike.
We arrive in Melbourne at the end of the year.

Sara W

Glad everything's going well for you all.
I've heard of other people having trouble with house buyers when they hear that sellers are emigrating. I'll keep my plans to myself when I sell
Regards Sara

sunburn

Interesting update... will have to remember not to mention emigrating before contracts exchanged on our house sale !

vickys

Apparently the estate agents try and get the lowest price you'l except too!! We are going to advise them that we are moving in a relatives house who has moved into a care home

scrubbedexpat055

We just said "moving south"