Early in the month, Bus was trundled off to our mechanic to have the little radiator leak rectified. I was not looking forward to the prospect of finding somewhere in Bendigo to do future services and repair work on Bus.
Four days before we were due to move, John drove the Bus to Bendigo and left it parked on site at the Marong Tourist Park. Daughter drove him home the next day and stayed on to help with the final packing and cleaning, and to transport our collection of potted plants in her covered trailer. That was one type of item the removalists would not take.
Another had been John’s pile of several large slabs of African Mahogany timber, that he’d had shipped from Darwin back in 2006. These had lived in an alcove at the back of the carport, until such time as he got round to making tables out of them. Back in April we had, with a huge effort, loaded them onto John’s new tandem trailer and he’d taken that to Bendigo, to live, trailer and all, in a shed that daughter had arranged, until we moved. Getting rid of those had really improved the appearance of the front of the place – and was something that had been “going to happen” for over a decade!
Much neater without a great stack of timber in there…
After the initial excitement of the new house purchase had died down, we faced the question – now what? The radical de-cluttering of a few months previous had seemed like a good idea in order to present our home in the best possible way. However, the thought that we might have months to fill in hadn’t really entered my mind.
The winter garden did not need much work to keep it looking good.
There was not so much packing still to do that I needed a whole three months in which to do it – and besides, we still needed our clothes, dinnerware, dog utensils and the like.
John could still work in his shed because that had not been de-cluttered yet. Given the valuable contents, he had not wanted it on display in the sale process. He was actually the one who could start to do some packing, but first there were still bowls to turn and boxes to make…
We weren’t game to go on a trip with Bus and leave the house unoccupied – in case something happened that would mess up our sale. Call it superstitious, but…
Mid-winter was a good time for me to settle in with some quilting work – but all my crafting things were in storage. My embroidery – ditto. Not a knitting or crochet needle left in the house. What about my colouring books – no, they were hiding in a box across town. I could go and buy a colouring book, but balked at the expense of decent pencils because mine too were packed away with the books – and the sudokus, crosswords… and so on.
Thank God for the computer! At least I had Solitaire, Mahjong and online jigsaw puzzles.
With all the screen time, a trip to the optometrist for new glasses became necessary. Along with a final session with our wonderful dentist, almost a welcome interlude – something to do!
Earlier in the year, consultation with a neurologist about increasing discomfort when walking had led to a series of tests and screens, squeezed in amongst the house preparation. August saw my follow-up visit to him, and the not-so-welcome news that ongoing deterioration of the old various damaged L bits in the lower back was now accompanied by some issues higher up, and general compaction of the spine. In other words, it ain’t going to get any better.
The garden put on a final impressive late winter into early spring display for me. I wasn’t going to have plants like azaleas and camellias in the hotter and drier climate of Bendigo.
The spring garden
Some of the shrubs had sentimental attachments: the camellia that had been a wedding present, the white one in front of the unit that my father had won at bowls. There was the beautifully delicate one that had grown from a cutting from mum’s garden – the original a Mothers Day present to her some 35 years ago. I thought about trying to strike cuttings of my favourites, but decided that both climate and poor soil would make success unlikely.
Mum’s camellia
In September, I commenced the final packing process – at a leisurely pace. It still resulted in an impressive number of boxes stacked up in the back rooms.
With hindsight, John should have done the same in his shed. That was a mammoth task and he kept putting it off…
Packed up to make the trip back across the Divide to the eastern suburbs. Left sat 11am.
If one had to pick the most inconvenient time for the agent to call about a house sale detail, it would, of course, be as I was trying to navigate John around the edge of central Bendigo. I had to ask him to give us half an hour and then call back. In the brief moments I was talking, John managed to take a wrong turn!
Help – which one goes to Heathcote?
Stopped at the very accessible Caltex servo on the edge of Heathcote, for fuel. $1.499cpl.
I was quite relieved when we reached home again, uneventfully. John had chosen not to put the Stop Leaks into the radiator ahead of the trip and I’d been a little on edge the whole of the time driving, that the leak might get worse and strand us on the highway somewhere.
Next time Bus makes this trip, it will have a new radiator.
Our new home has a driveway at the side, where Bus would fit – having a place to put it was one of the pre-requisites we had. We also had the option of storing it in a large shed on the Bendigo property of a family member – that might be the easier option. To be decided.
Even more exciting – once we are moved and settled in – areas across the north of the State, and beyond, are going to be more easily accessible for trips with Bus.
We had a goal to explore the length of the Murray, from Corryong to Lake Alexandrina. Whilst we had visited some places along the river, the idea of such a trek really appealed. Hopefully in 2019? Then there is the Barossa Valley of SA, the Fleurieu Peninsula…lots more places to go…
Having come to spend a few days house hunting, the rest of the time was now a bit of an anti-climax.
Come to think of it that also describes the next three months!
We had some paper work to complete. Went and found Bunnings and had a browse. Yes, it was big and diverse enough to suit John well.
The new house had a lovely large, roofed outdoor living area. We would need to buy a BBQ after the move, so had a look at the ones on offer there. John was interested in looking at the range of portable pizza ovens, rather than build another like he had at the old home.
What will we be able to do with this?
Caught up with the family, briefly, after school and work hours. Daughter was, of course, so excited that we had found a house and confessed later to doing some drives past to peer at it, being frustrated that she could not see much from the street.
A lovely part of staying at the Marong park was the sound from frogs in the adjacent paddock, where there was a dam and swampy area. It was a loud amphibian chorus for much of our time there.
Our first house inspection was scheduled for 10am, so we needed to get going at an earlier than usual hour. This meant we were up at 8am, and encountered a first for us. In all our years of camping, caravanning and Coastering, had never before had our hose from the water tap freeze solid! A drip from the attachment at the tap end had frozen into a long, solid icicle. We were lucky that the hose itself had not split.
John phoned the agent for the house we had primarily come to see, to find out what new time had been arranged for our inspection. It seemed the message John had left for him had not been passed on, and the sellers had, over the weekend, accepted an offer. That was possibly a pity for us, and definitely for them, because two potential buyers might well have pushed up the price they got. I was disappointed because the place had certainly seemed interesting.
That left us with two arranged inspections, plus an address of another place found online that John wanted to drive past and look at; this one was being sold by the owner – no agent. All three were properties John had found online – even though they did not match the parameters he had earlier given me for such searching.
The first home – at 10am – was in the Maiden Gully area we both liked. The agent was the same man who had conducted the Open For Inspection we’d attended, earlier in the year – that had shown us what an owner should not do at such events. In this case, the owners were departing as we arrived, so we could look around in the agent’s presence, without them watching us.
I loved the place. The house ticked most of my boxes: modern, light, spacious, the right number of rooms. I’d have preferred wood floors instead of the tiles, but John tended to prefer tiles. It was on a fairly standard block in what had obviously been a housing estate some years before. All the houses along the street looked to be a similar age. This meant that the neighbours on each side were actually closer than those we had at Mt Evelyn – supposedly a real no-no for John. But he really liked it too, perhaps especially because he had found it online, rather than me. Of course, it had a large shed – imperative for him.
We left the agent and went driving to the fringes of Maiden Gully, where John wanted to drive past a place that was on a larger block, with a couple of large sheds and garage detached from the main house. The sheds were the attraction for him. It was more rural here, than suburban, with undeveloped land around and bush nearby. The fencing around the block was only a couple of strands of wire – not great to contain a dog. Fortunately, from my point of view, as soon as we drove past John decided it was not what he had in mind.
Our second agent led inspection was in the northern suburb of White Hills. Again, John had been attracted by the large block – room to build a large shed to supplement smaller ones already in place. Initially, he was quite tempted by this place. There was a large, older house at the front of the large block and he saw the potential to live in this whilst sub-dividing the block and building a new, better house on the back half – which had been part of the ad that caught his eye originally.
The house was quite strange. An original garage had been turned into the main living room, still complete with bare cement floor. The original passage to the bedrooms had been sealed off – why was unclear – so one had to walk through the kitchen and laundry to reach these. The laundry also contained the kitchen’s pantry. It was all a bit ramshackle.
Fortunately, John decided sub-dividing and building would all be too much hassle. I was so grateful that he’d dismissed the possibility, because the house was decidedly unattractive.
After a very quick discussion, we parked at the Bendigo Botanic Gardens in White Hills, phoned the first agent and put in an offer on the Maiden Gully house. It was not much lower than the asking price, because we had really loved the place, but was more the token initial offer one makes, expecting to then haggle a bit.
In our favour was that we would have the purchase money without needing to wait on obtaining finance. Against us was the fact that we would not be able to complete a purchase until mid October.
Took Couey and went for a walk in the very attractive Gardens. The freezing morning had turned into a beautiful sunny day, though it was not as warm as the sun suggested.
Botanic Gardens
Waiting – hoping – to hear from the agent, we couldn’t think of much else to do but to drive back to Maiden Gully, where John had noticed a bakery in the small cluster of shops there. Late lunch A pie and pasty for him, an egg and lettuce roll for me. We sat in the car, in the carpark, eating these – then the phone rang. The agent…
Our offer had been accepted. Just like that, we had a home to move into – three and a half months down the track. Apparently, the long period until settlement really pleased the sellers, who were going to build a new and smaller place, and so would have to rent a temporary home for a shorter time.
This would be ours…
It felt great to have that sorted out, and in just the area of Greater Bendigo that I really wanted to live – and at a price that would not break our budget.
We didn’t even have to go see the agent – all would be dealt with electronically.
We cruised back past “our place”, and then back to the caravan park.
It felt like we should be having some sort of celebratory festive dinner. The reality was that, after the late bakery lunch, all we wanted was a tin of soup and some biscuits and cheese.
Another freezing night was forecast. John disconnected the water hose as a precaution.
We didn’t leave home until 11.30. This unhurried departure was because the weather forecast had predicted fog, so we would give it time to burn off – in theory. In practice, the day was sunny with blue skies and just a little cloud.
As we headed up the Great Dividing Range from Yarra Glen, the driver remarked “Where’s all that fog you were talking about?” Answer – as we topped the Range – “Up ahead.”
There’s the fog…
We descended into thick mist that persisted almost all the way to Bendigo. It actually made the drive, that we had done so many times before, very pretty and different.
Took a lunch break at Yea, where John bought himself a pie and pastie. I only wanted a coffee. I walked Couey around whilst waiting for John to come back from the bakery. It was bloody cold!
Still misty beyond Seymour
Lunch over, it was back on the road for the familiar run through Seymour to Heathcote, where my coffee lunch necessitated a comfort stop.
The drive around the fringe of the Bendigo CBD was easy in the light Sunday traffic. Arrived at Marong just after 3pm.
Back into the Marong Holiday Park – our favourite. After discount, paid $34.20 a night for our powered site – the en-suites had been booked out. The very helpful man who checked us in suggested that – at this time of year – we’d be better off on one of their mulched sites, rather than grass. We took his advice. The site allocated was actually two sites, which meant that we could drive straight through onto it – and that we had plenty of room. It was in the closest row to the camp kitchen and amenities, so we could not really have asked for more.
The night was forecast to be a really cold one. I had an old sheet and mattress protector in the Terios and used those to cover the outside front and rear windows of the car. I didn’t fancy having to scrape off ice in the morning.
Inside Bus, I put up the solar screens onto the front and side front windows, for insulation. This was a fiddly job, even after I detached the GPS and tyre monitor from the front window. The camera that lived up behind the rear vision mirror made it impossible to slide the screen right up to the top there, so it tended to come unstuck again. I needed several attempts, all crouched up like a contortionist, to make it stick,
Dog was not impressed. At night, she liked to sleep curled up on the front passenger seat where she could look out the windows and “guard” Bus from the marauding rabbits. It was not so much fun when she couldn’t see out.
It was nice and warm inside Bus, with the little electric fan heater going. However, it was a shock to the system to venture outside, whenever Couey indicated a call of nature. We are going to have to get used to the colder winter nights of Central Victoria.
After the long day trip to go house-hunting, with its obvious limitations, John decided we should take Bus and spend a few days viewing properties – going where the flow, or agents, took us.
To that end, Bus needed a service first. Not that we had done lots of kms since its last mechanical attention, but with it sitting unused for lengthy periods, I worried that things might go “off”. To my disappointment, found that the bus service establishment that was adjacent to Ventura in Knoxfield, now no longer serviced buses for the general public.
This brought to the fore another drawback of Coaster ownership, which I hadn’t realized back when contemplating buying one. It is not easy to find places and people to work on them. Many owners of motorhomes based on Coasters belong to the DIY fraternity, both in terms of doing the original conversion themselves, and then doing their own mechanical works. From what I had seen they were not always experts at either aspect.
When we bought our Coaster, I was determined that it be a professionally converted one, where I could be most confident about the quality of things like the plumbing, gas and electrical fittings, the overall balance of weight, and so on. But, just like it was increasingly hard to find professional converters, it was hard to find mechanics.
Good looking Bus
I sent out a plea for advice through a couple of online forums, and received from some different people recommendations to try FMA Car and Truck Repairs, in North Nayswater. That was just down the road – very convenient.
Bus duly went there. We were most impressed with the set up and expertise. Came home satisfied that Bus had been checked over thoroughly. Were not so happy, though, with the finding of a small radiator leak and the verdict that a re-core would be needed. However, there was not enough time to get that done before departure, so I bought some Stop-Leak – and hoped.
I also had the same place service the Terios… when you are onto a good thing. More bad news – new muffler needed, and CV joints on the way out. These would also have to wait until after the coming jaunt.
The agent we’d dealt with in Bendigo had booked an inspection of the unadvertised house he thought we’d like, for a Friday, but vehicle servicing had run us short of time, so John phoned to move the inspection to the following Monday. He wasn’t able to speak to the agent, but left a message.
After much online browsing, John also phoned another couple of agents, and organized inspections of places that looked possibilities.
With only a few days away planned, packing took minimal time. A few food items, the usual electronic gadgetry, the dog’s requirements, and the medications that must go everywhere with us, these days.
With the house sale process out of the way, it was now time to think about heading back up to Bendigo to house hunt in earnest. With some three and a half months until we had to leave our old home, it seemed we had plenty of time to find a new place….
The sign says it all…
Being able to search for properties online made house hunting much easier than it once was. Go to one of the main sales sites, fill in some search parameters, and up pops an array of choices and information. All from the comfort of the study chair.
Given that John’s stated requirement was for no close neighbours and at least an acre sized block, that went into the search engine, plus wanting at least four bedrooms – well, we would be having family and friends to visit, plus we each needed a study.
I also contacted the main large real estate firms in Bendigo, by email, stating that we were looking to buy, and giving a broad indication of what we wanted. Only one ever bothered to contact me back.
A couple of Open for Inspections looked interesting, both on the same Saturday in very early July. Drove John’s Passat up there, for a long day trip to look at these.
The first place was not our dream property, but proved very informative, because it was on an acre of land. Suddenly, the reality of an acre hit home to John – much larger than he thought! Standing on the house verandah, surveying the expanse of ground beyond the immediate fenced yard, he asked me what one would do with it. I replied “mow it” – which was not how he envisaged spending his time. So, revise block size downwards – gladly!
A big back yard to mow!
The other home was interesting, in the very pleasant eastern suburb of Strathfieldsaye, but the shed was small and grotty and the yard shaded by large gum trees. However, that did give us direct contact with an agent, who listened to our wish list. He thought he might have something that would suit, a place that was for sale but not actually being advertised. He would have to contact the people to arrange an inspection and would get back to us.
This agent had told us the address, in Maiden Gully, of the place he had in mind, so we drove across town to have a look from the outside. It appeared a definite possibility – an older build, architect designed, somewhat unusual, and on a very good sized block in a quiet area.
On the same street were a couple of vacant blocks for sale – again, a very good size, and we sat in the car opposite these for a while, pondering the “build or buy established” question.
We headed back to Melbourne, with a lot to talk about on the way.
John decided to liven up the late afternoon by becoming sleepy and so getting me to drive. Nothing unusual there – except that the Passat was automatic, and I had only ever in my life driven a manual shift car. Quick lesson ensued, after which he was relaxed enough to doze off, while I proceeded, tensely, and a good deal more slowly than he would have been driving.
Mid-winter is not considered a prime time to sell a house in Melbourne. But we had needed time to prepare it for sale – and probably more time because John wanted to do the work himself rather than hire professionals. I was conscious that the Melbourne market had probably already peaked, and was starting to fall, so we did not want to wait until spring.
Our agent friend and his team went all out, holding some open for inspection events, and scheduling a number of private inspections.
After the experience we had at an inspection in Bendigo, back in March, when the owner was present, we had determined we would not be such an inhibiting presence, so took ourselves – and Couey – off to the Lilydale Lake every time, sometimes at short notice! Couey had never had so many walks in such a short period.
We had to keep the home constantly ready for visitations, which meant being much tidier than came naturally. I vacuum cleaned the carpets every morning – definitely not normal…
Ready for inspection…
We had asked our agent to try to get us a sale settlement period of at least 60 days, thinking that this would give us time to find and purchase our new home, without too much pressure. Way back, we had purchased this house before we married, and before we both sold our existing houses, and then been caught with an extended period of very costly bridging finance in a falling market. This was not going to happen again!
After only three weeks on the market, we accepted a purchase offer. Even better, the couple was going overseas that same week, for three months and so did not want to settle on the sale until mid October. That would give us lots of time to visit Bendigo and find a really suitable new home, without being under pressure, we thought.
If we were really serious about this move, it was time to get really serious!
I was fortunate that a former student who was also a friend now headed up a major local real estate company. He visited, gave us advice and arranged for his stylist to come and add her opinions about what was needed. In some ways it was ironic that improvements I’d wanted for ages now came about – just because we were going.
For years, the pathway outside the back door had been an area where work was needed to improve drainage in heavy rain and then re-pave. Finally, with the help of a friend of John’s, holes and trenches were dug, a drain pit installed, pipes laid and the path put back down.
This had needed doing for years…
Couey thought all this hole digging was a new form of dog games and just had to “help”.
This is a new game…
I chose to use Allied Pickfords as our removal company, mainly because they were used by the government when relocating diplomatic and other official staff overseas. Hence John’s daughter had experienced several moves by them and had been happy with their service. We found their quotes, both for interim storage and ultimate removal, were reasonable. Even more important, they would be able to cope with moving all John’s woodwork machinery, some of which was bulky and heavy – using a specialist sub-contractor. This would be harder than it first sounds as access to the shed was not straightforward.
After the rear landscaping, John got busy repainting the kitchen and living areas. For ages, I’d found the blue walls – not my original choice – rather depressing, and the stylist had agreed. So a warm pale peach colour was applied – big improvement.
Painting the living room
John was not looking forward to the big job of repairing and painting the rather old wooden front fence, whose main uprights had been the targets of cockatoo and galah forays, pulling bits off them, searching for grubs. I wondered if we needed a front fence at all? So we pulled it out and were quite pleased with the fence-less appearance of the place.
Look – no fence!
Completely of his own volition, grandson decided to try to grow us a replacement for our large and prolific lemon tree, to take to our new home. He retrieved some fallen lemons that were starting to sprout shoots, carefully planted and tended these over a period of months. His efforts did not result in a viable tree, but the thought was a wonderful and caring one.
Looking after little lemon trees
Major de-cluttering was needed before our home was ready to display. We had lived here for 27 years after all. It was time to be quite ruthless. No more of “it might come in handy one day”. Would I really need those several very large flower vases that had been wedding presents? All those travel books about places like the Gulf Track and the Kimberley could go to the young man across the road, who was gearing up to go adventuring – we would not be revisiting such places. Grandson received the large and assorted collection of shells that I’d picked up on far-flung beaches, over the years of travel. The clean out was actually quite cathartic – maybe something that should be done every few years?
Sorting through the shell collection
Belongings that we wanted to keep, but which would not enhance a minimalist look in the house, and which we could do without in the short term, were packed and taken off for storage, in Round 1 with the removalists.
De-cluttering
That did not include anything from John’s shed! Boxes and bags of items were taken to local charities and the Diabetes association came and collected a small truckload of our surplus. Some things were good only for the tip.
About to go to storage…
In a sign that the move was meant to be, our long standing, increasingly frail tenant of the granny flat decided that she could no longer manage on her own and gave notice that she intended to go and live full time at the ashram community she had been spending weekends at. So a tenant would not be an issue for any purchaser.
Dog not happy about all this change…
Finally, the place was ready to sell. Photos and a video were taken, the agent brought his local sales team to familiarize themselves with it. The Sale board was erected at the front – I think that was when the reality finally hit us.
This Adventurous Age 