It was bound to happen after several years of travelling from country to country over a 3 year period. We were going to want to settle down, buy a house again, and settle in. That doesn’t mean that travel and travel writing or photography is off the radar, but it does mean that we’ll have a stable base to work from. And neither of us feels like we are settling for less than something wonderful!

We thought we had found home in the South of France, but as you have read in past posts, we were unwilling to commit ourselves to a country that wanted 60 percent (and climbing!) of our income in taxes and which would never provide a pension when we retired no matter how many years we had paid into the tax system in France.

Ah well — back to Australia we came after several years away and we landed in Melbourne 7 and 1/2 months ago. But no matter how much we love this city, it really isn’t quite what we are looking for long term. It’s bigger, busier, and noisier than what suits us — so we’ve been looking further afield. And we found it!

In exactly 7 weeks, we”ll be taking possession of our new house in the completely charming regional city of Ballarat — a little over an hour northwest of Melbourne. May I just say that working through the stacks of paperwork for a new mortgage were not my happiest moments, but I had a light-hearted attitude throughout the process because I was working towards our long-term goal. We got the pre-approval and then went looking for a house and what we found is a 1950 ranch house with 3 bedrooms and a huge lot that needs a LOT OF WORK in the months and years ahead. But what fun we are going to have as we transform it.

Front of our 1950 ranch house.

I’m putting this in print so that we can ALL remind Mark that he said this. I showed him a pristine and brand new house that he wouldn’t have needed to do a thing to other than fit out the garage with his racks of tools. But did he want that? No! He said that was too boring and he would prefer a fixer-upper that we could put our own stamp on. There you go — it has been documented!

There will be lots of posts in the coming months of various stages of renovation. And amidst all of those, I will sprinkle more travel posts and photo essays from Melbourne and regional Victoria and even some from Europe. If you plan to come to Australia, you mustn’t just stop at Sydney and forget about Melbourne or Victoria. It’s simply stunning over here.

Now you know why I’ve been posting rather sparsely lately. I’ve been slammed with paperwork and planning and house hunting. But we’re completely thrilled even with the prospect of years of work ahead to make it our ‘forever house.’

Bye for now!

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