[sarahw]

Hi everyone!

We've arrived!!! :raebanana

It was sad saying goodbye to all our family, friends and work colleagues over the past few weeks and when we were stood in the queue for security at Heathrow I had a bit of a moment where I thought "What the heck are we doing? leaving all these people we love and our lovely home etc. do we really think this is going to work?" - it was a very fleeting moment but reality really struck! :eek

We got here this morning and although I'm suffering from jetlag big time (even though I religiously took my "No Jetlag" pills through the flight) I'm surviving on the absolute high of being here!

We got through immigration no problems - it was nice to see a smiling, helpful face at immigration who actually sounded as excited as us when we said we were coming to live here permanently!

On the way to the B&B we were driving round past Petone looking back at the beautiful view of the city and I couldn't help shouting out with excitement - "we live here now!!!!" Hee hee!!!

We've spent the day sorting out mundane things but it has been an absolute pleasure - people can't do enough for us and all want to stop and have a chat which is lovely! :yes

So far... we've set up a post box NZ$125 for 12 months and you can get access after hours via a swipe card which is useful.

Bought sim cards for our mobile phones from Vodafone NZ$20 - 49c per minute on pay-as-you go that's to a NZ or a UK number - not bad for UK but a little steep for NZ!! But the tarrifs we looked at for contracts were from NZ$20 per month - which isn't bad.

We've also set up 3 bank accounts between us - all we had to do was give our post box address and give our passports as ID - the current account we opted for gives 4% interest and if you have $50K in the bank (or on a mortgage with same bank) there are no bank charges!!

Not bad for a couple of hours work!

We're off to an estate agent tomorrow to see rental properties in Paramata, Whitby and Plimmerton and if that is not successful then we're going to have to widen our search to Island Bay, Lyal Bay and Miramar...

Oh and we're going to celebrate with some Champers tomorrow (once the jetlag has subsided enough for an alcohol intake!) with the owners of the B&B who have followed our story since the last time we were here when Ian had job interviews. :cheers

Anyway - more soon - just going to scan the forum to see what we've missed since we've been offline!

[Diny]

Great to read your update sarah - you sound as high as a kite. Long may it continue.

Good on you and all the best. Keep us posted.

Diny

[ateal]

Congratulations Sarah & Ian, you've done well :cheers .

I Hope you have a great time settling in and i hope Ian enjoys his new job.

Please be sure to keep us all posted on your adventures over there.

All the best.

Adrian

[Wannaway]

Congrats Ian and Sarah - keep us posted on how you get on down there. Welly was tops on our list of destinations 'til the silly business of getting a well paid ( OK - in NZ terms!) job came in to it.

[sanjivgoomer]

GR8 news Sarah, :raebanana
Best of luck with your new life. May all your dreams come true. :cheers
Keep posting your experiences as a Kiwi. These will help people like me, who are tense waiting to take a flight.
I am as tense as a coiled spring (April 21 is not that far off ......)
Regards
Sanjiv

[heimatseeker]

Welcome! :nice1 Wishing you a great start here. Wellington rocks!

(And hopefully the weather will soon start to finally resemble summer. :roll: It's been so miserable that our Kiwi friends and acquaintances keep apologizing for it ...)

[zsj]

Yay.

Hi Sarah, my first post on this board, have just joined and am very glad I did - we fly to Wellington on 3 Feb and have just been looking at schools and houses on line. My daughter is 5 and I want to find the right school and area for her (my son is 2 - he doesn't have a vote!)

I have found very few rentals in the Realenz site, a quick question - are there more 'on the ground' so to speak? Please let me know,it would greatly allay our fears about finding a place to live! (and leave us with the million other worries!)

Good luck, it sounds like you have acheived a lot, I hope we do as well next month. Enjoy the bubbly stuff!

Sarah.

[shagen]

Great Sarah! :nice1

I hope you settle in well.

So is Wellington as windy as they say it is? :mrgreen:

:cheers
Shagen

[kiwidebs]

Hi Sarah, sounds like it's all going ok so far. I love Wellington (but wouldn't live there cos my family are in Auckland and Christchurch). Can't wait to hear more stories of how you all settle in.

Debs

[Milliemoo]

Wahooooooooo ! :mrgreen:

keep us posted xxx

Milliemoo :nice1

[KD17]

Many Congratulations - We wish you the very best and hope you settle in very quickly.

:cheers

Keith & Debby

[Soon2baKiwi]

Congratulations on getting there. Sounds like it's what you were hoping for :cheers We'll all be looking forward to your updates.

[RoadRunner]

Congrats, Sarah!

Best of luck!

[Kim39]

Sarah,

Congratulations, you sure have done a lot in the first few hours. Was it adrenalin getting you through or something much stronger?????? :laugh

Kim

[jo b]

Wow Sarah

Excellent

What are you like without jetlag?? :laugh

Jo

[Jodie]

Welcome to Welly Sarah!

Sounds like you've been pretty busy since you got here and covered a lot of ground! How did the house-hunt go? Are you looking to rent or buy?

ASJ - If you're looking to rent when you get here, rest assured that the Dominion Post is bursting with places to rent. OK, some of them are pretty crap, but it only took us 2 days to find our rental which I must say is pretty good. And if you can't find anything through the Dominion or the Wellington Renter paper, you can always go to the rental agents, although they will charge a fee so do try and go private if you can.

Anyway, if you want to meet up for a drink sometime to toast your arival, let me know!

Jod
:cheers

[sarahw]

Hi! Well managed a full 8 hours of sleep last night - but at 4am we were both wide awake watching a DVD until it was a respectable time to get up!

Thanks for all your responses!

zsj - the rental market is pretty quiet at the moment & we haven't got a lot of choice but that was our fault for arriving when everyone's on holidays! I reckon you'll be fine by February.

Shagen - my usually straight hair looks like a scarecrow's at the moment - it is certainly windy! Although the sun has been out - even got to wear a t-shirt today! We're forecasted for a high on Sunday - but the weathermen are just as useless here as in the UK so we're not holding our breath!

Jo b - oh I'm usually a veritable whirlwind! :laugh but we've moved here so I can calm down & chill out a bit :cheers :cheers

Jodie - certainly we'll meet up - looking forward to a nice glass of wine!

So what have we been up to today apart from trying to beat the jetlag?! Well we went to look for rentals - what a wierd system!! We went through estate agents - firstly they won't let you look around a property until you've done a "drive-by" :laugh and checked whether you like the look of the outside. We found out to our detriment that the outside is a really bad indicator of what the inside is like!

Went to house number 1 & it looked great - in Whitby - nice street etc. Went back to agent & registered interest & then they arranged to take us to see it - what a pit!!!! It stank of damp, had a 1960's electric fire in it - I think that was to heat the whole house & the carpets were filthy! (so were the walls & the curtains come to that!) It would have taken me the 6 months to get it habitable! This was on at $260- per week.

Next place was in Paramata - overlooking the bay - lovely views - opposite train station, bar, mini supermarket, Dr's, Dentists, garage, Indian restaurant :cheers and many other amenities. Sounds perfect - right? I didn't like the inside it was quite outdated & the outside area felt a bit bitty to me - it was on terraces being on a hill which I thought I would like but nope! (I'm going to study at home this year so need somewhere I'm going to feel comfortable to be in a lot) - this was $380- per week - that was mainly because of the location.

Next place was in Whitby - didn't look anything from outside - but was fantastic inside - 3 beds, rumpus, double garage, huge garden & decking with a stream at the end & bush views - again at $380- per week. We've put in an offer but are still to wait to hear back from the owners - if we don't hear by tomorrow then I'm going to follow Jodie's suggestion and get a copy of the Dominion Post.

Out of 3 agents we managed to see 3 places that fitted our criteria & we're not that fussy really so we're feeling a little deflated tonight but you never know we might get place numer 3! :hopeso

So tomorrow we're off to hunt for cars - Japanese cars seem to be the best value & hopefully will need the least fixing - will let you know what the car scene is like - we've been warned about Japanese cars being clocked & that we should ask the garage to certify the mileage. Also to have an AA check if we're not buying from a main car dealership....

More news soon! I'm off to have a well deserved snooze soon!

[zsj]

Thanks Jodie and Sarahw, That's good to hear - my husband is panicking cos of the lack of things on the net to rent and with me nagging him that we must have a 'home' for Phoebe to start school from!

Maybe see you both in a month - we arrive 8 Feb after a few days in S'pore.

Sarahw - keep up the good work and hope you get the house you want!

Sarah.

[jesselyn]

hi sarahw,

welcome to welly and back to the forum :smile

cheers,
jes

[sarahw]

Hey zsj - we got the house in Whitby this morning - not bad for spending a day and a half looking at properties - and that's at the time of year when there aren't that many around because of the lull at Xmas. You'll certainly have no worries!

We've been looking at cars today - its been great! All the car companies want to give you the cars (and this is second hand ones) overnight for you to try out. We've heard the life stories of 2 ex-pat car salesmen both telling us we're going to love living here! Its been an absolute pleasure looking around even though its pouring down today!

I'm going for a much smaller and cheaper to run car than I had at home but there are some good cars to be had out there. Looking to spend around $18-$20K for something a year or 2 old with low mileage - small car with 5 doors - I've got a lot of choice and a few test-drives lined up in the coming couple of days which should be fun! :exit

I'm on such a high - we're really enjoying ourselves so much at the moment :mrgreen: If anyone is fretting about all the stuff they've got to organise when they get here - don't. I'm usually quite a worrier but its really been fun!

[pleccy2000]

Welcome to Wellington! It's a fab city!

[Annierobrigado]

gosh sarah, your stories make me feel like i'm there with you already. thanks for the description of your activities, so now i have an idea what to expect when we're there.

congrats and best wishes!


annie