By Will.
Last Canal Boat Ride to the Boat Ramp.
I take more "Stuff" over to the shed at the Reno House. It seems every trip into Mandurah I'm towing a trailer load of crap.
Damian & Jason drove down from north of Perth to pick up our Dining Table.
I wonder how it will look after 1.5 hours riding in the back of this trailer. Goodbye Table.
The Builders now have the permit, construction commences tomorrow 22/6/16.
Our International Drivers Licences arrive, just the Indian Visa to sort out now.
Andre has managed to "Shoe Horn" a Toyota 4.5L V8 into his 105 Series Landcruiser, which use to be exactly the same as our Cruiser. This is one of the "Holy Grails" of engine swaps, apparently the wiring is diabolical !
He paddles it down a few houses to Sid & Sheraines place, they bought it off us about a week ago. Now it's being installed to accept "Squid" their boat.
Looks like the neighbours have their "new" dock all sorted, good luck to them. I did them a very fair deal !
My last job for the day was to remove 3 fibro fence panels so the small excavator can access our yard, via our future neighbours property tomorrow. Then they will remove a couple of palms, dig a trench from the house to the shed & commence work on the sand pads for the new extensions. It took me about 2 and a half hours & OMG so many roots to chop through.
When did this transformation begin ? Was it when we had children ? What about when I was made redundant by Rio Tinto ? Was it when the kids flew the coop ? How about, when we sold the Roadhouse business ? Or after our first 4.5 month unsupported Cycle Touring across Europe, last year ?
It's difficult to identify a defining moment, possibly, Jenny & I have always been this way !
After spending about 8 months living on our bicycles last year, it really hit us once we arrived home last December, just how wrapped up in the conformity of society we had become !
Buy a BIG house, fill it up with stuff, "consume". Take out another mortgage, struggle to make the repayments ! Work 12 hour days, 7 day weeks, buy more stuff to make yourself "happy". Exchange your youth & living life for money & stuff that you don't really need.
Let Big Business, Government & Banks, lock you into "Golden Handcuffs".....What a con job !!! (That's our opinion these days).
Don't get me wrong, we have both had some fantastic experiences & met the most amazing people during our working lives.
I just hope that people can consider some of the consequences of what they do, whether it's buy, borrow or interact with the environment. Most new things that we all embark on are fabulous in the beginning. Just make sure you consider the real overall cost & have a future exit plan.
First time I've put the boat on the trailer in about 2 years.
Noel & Mike, hand over a bank cheque & take the old boat away.
I know it's a cliché, but everyone is different and the "Consumerism Lifestyle" is no longer working for us. We still have a long way to go, but the first tentative steps have been taken, surely it will become easier as time goes on ?
So Jenny & I are into our final week of selling, packing & shifting from our large family home on the canals of 11 years. Over the past week we have sold the heavy glass/steel TV cabinet, our 8 seater dinning table, "My Boat" (ouch that one hurt), the Boat Dock. All our ex-stuff has gone to new homes. We also did the Final House Inspection, with the new home owners, Stewart & Anna, they are extremely excited to be moving out here.
In between trying to shift, we've had to deal with Jenny recovering from her knee operation, complete the VW Kombi refurbishment, our tenants vacating our Investment Rental House & finally the Builders beginning the renovation of our future small "Lock up & Leave" Home Base in Central Mandurah.
Jenny & I hash out some future easy care Garden ideas at the Mandurah Reno House.
Whoah it's enough to make you breathless, certainly enough stress to make me enjoy a couple of extra beers at the end of the day !!!
The whole downsizing process is starting to feel a lot more difficult then we both first anticipated, though I'm sure it's easier now then in the future when we are in our 50's or 60's & your whole life has just past you by !
"Deal With Reality, Before Reality Deals With YOU " !
We have made good progress so far, but there is still a way to go. It took us at least 25 years to dig this deep hole, so it stands to reason that filling it in will take some time. The next "Big Ticket" item on the "wiljen hit list" is the sale of the investment house (after we have finished living there for the next 4 to 6 months ?).
Also we are taking back control of our Superannuation (some other countries call it pension plan, USA know it as 401K) and creating a Self Managed Super Fund, this is a big time consuming task but we are about halfway through the process.
2016 is really turning into a year of massive hard earned change for Will & Jenny. We are missing the open road, India is now on the horizon & we are both looking forward to that tour on motorbikes.
Come this time next week we'll be sleeping in another house ! Below are a few more photos of our past weeks antics. Definitely won't have another chance to Blog until after the house move, until then take care everyone !
My good mate Andre needs my legal tyre/wheel combo to pass his Motor Engineering Certificate.
Lots of 4WD's (ours now is sporting illegal bigger tyres on loan) where are we ?
A secret location close to Jarrahdale WA. It's been a long time, well about 8 years, but we catch up with a few of my cousins. Great day out, nice to meet their spouses & children, my second cousins..? Left to Right, Dennis, Corina, Kylie, Will, Steve (my youngest brother) & Sarah.
The new owners, came and did a pre-sale house inspection. They wanted to make sure the Spa worked. Once they left, Jenny decided to top it up with hot water & enjoy one final spa bath. We never used it very much anyway.
I look out the window this morning & some Bloke is stealing my boat dock.
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