Settling in……

We pass the above billboard each time we drive into town and laugh every time. It pretty much sums up things here.

Four Square for those of you who are not familiar, is like a Seven Eleven. They have been around for years and years and in every town, the four square guy is a NZ icon. I remember seeing posters of him up in Kiwi homes overseas, for that little bit of Kiwiana you crave for when you live away. Rich for the longest time could not remember Four Square and would call it Four Corners, “I am just going to the Four Corners” , and Luca and I would yell back “it is Four Square!!!!! ” 🙂

Togs are swimmers and yep in summer they are worn everywhere. It is definitely not a Canadian thing to do, in fact they probably would not let you in the shop like that! Rich still comes home telling of guys he sees shopping for groceries, no shirt, bare feet and in their togs. The bare feet thing is a thing here too. Luca loves it and it is something I have always encouraged him to do. The amount of times though at school he was told off, or someone when we were out mentioned it, in a “what are you thinking type way”, are countless. Studies have shown how beneficial it is for the developing child to go barefoot and here the school encourage it especially when climbing trees, running, playing on the field etc .

Anyway…..

We arrived back in Dunedin on the 2nd and threw ourselves into finding a rental as quickly as possible and soon discovered it was going to be very difficult! Dunedin is booming, and on top of that, the University students are starting to come back for the start of term. The demand for rentals high, at each showing were 20-30 people! We also needed one that accepted pets and we wanted one in specific areas ,(because of the schooling we wanted for Luca), stress levels were high, (understatement!) . We took time to relax 🙂

Our Airbnb hosts were so kind and let us stay on and dropped our rent to 1/2 price while we looked.

Then miraculously it came together and by the 9th we had one! It ticked all the boxes, it is a little big for our needs and the rent higher than I wanted ,(I was aiming for $350 a week and it is $370), but it is warm, (sunny, heat pump and wood stove), Luca can walk to school, (and it is the school we wanted him in), they agreed to Pica and a kitten, and we knew that finding a rental here in Port Chalmers is even more difficult and so we grabbed it with both hands!

Now the search to find furniture. NZ is not cheap! Things are expensive, very expensive, we would need to get creative!. Luckily Dunedin is a mecca for op shops, (thrift stores), and NZ has an online auction site called trademe that deals in second hand goods. It is fair to say we know all op shops in the area intimately now 🙂

We got beds first, so we could move out of the Airbnb, which we did on the 13th, but it has taken us until this last weekend to get the rest of things, we ate many meals on the lounge floor!

We graduated to having a coffee table and seats in the lounge ….

and had our first guests over this last weekend where we could offer them a seat to sit on 🙂

Then last night we ate our first meal on a dining table in weeks !

This is the view from our lounge, the big field you see down by the water is a part of Lucas’s school. The school has a shed full of boats and teaching the kids to sail and boating skills is part of the curriculum, they also have a pool next door and teaching the kids to swim is also part of the curriculum.

The antenna you see is on Mt Cargill , we were up there last night, finding a way that we could hike from here to there, we found it! It is on our list to do in the next little while. The views from there are incredible.

During this time Rich has been working on his visa application, it is a long, tedious and expensive business. We needed to make a trip to Cromwell for fingerprinting, so we made a day trip of it, we kinda missed touring and it felt good to be a on the road again 🙂 . It is about a 6 hour round trip. Central Otago is another world, so beautiful…

So here we are now, all settling into domestic life again

It feels a bit odd I have to say after being so mobile and free from stuff for so long. We are trying hard to hold onto what we have learned, keeping things as simple as we can, not giving up doing what we love ,(ie being in the outdoors as much as possible), and being in a community that is diverse and welcoming.

We find Port Chalmers is very much the above. It is fulled with all sorts of folk from all over the world. There are ones who live here totally off grid and then others who are very mainstream. It is where a lot of the artistic, creative type people settled so the Port is alive with creativity. It is an international port, cargo and huge cruise ships arrive daily. We are about 15 minutes from the city centre in Dunedin, but feels like another world out here, it sorta is 🙂

I have been having job interviews during all this period and aiming to start at the DHB on the 11th of February. So many people have helped with this and I am incredibly grateful to them, me having a job makes this move possible for us. Luca starts school on the 4th along with everyone else ,(this is when school goes back after the summer break down here in NZ), so that works nicely, means we can go as a family for his first day and settle him in. We have been down and enrolled him in the school and met the Principal seen his class etc. He likes it and is looking forward to starting. There is more to say about the schooling here which I will go into in later posts. I need to get a handle on it all myself first.

Rich will be manning the home front and we have plans to do up another house so we have started looking. Dunedin is certainly not short of old old homes that need renovating! He is currently bidding for a road bike on trademe to get back into biking, and is talking about helping out with the kids and their sailing at school, (they want volunteers) , to learn some boating skills himself. He is REALLY wants a small dingy like boat 🙂

We have found all the trademe buying and picking up has meant we have got to know areas and people throughout the city, an added bonus of buying second hand! We have met lovely folk along the way, some we are even meeting up with again as got on so well, how cool is that?! 🙂

Luca has started to hunt out cats in the bush on our walks! Time we went to the SPCA I think 🙂