Day 5 Moscow (6th Oct)

Our first set of pics

We left Kemble without too much luggage (for which we have been grateful ever since).

This amazing sphere, in the Museum des Beaux Arts in Brussels, is covered in irridescant scarab beetles. It hs to be seen to be believed.

The rain does not really enhance Brusssels but the waffles aare fantastic.

One of a number of art works in an exhibition in Brussels Cathedral. Rahter more impressive than the minimalistic 'dropped handerchief' which was also on display (it wasn't even a used one).

Cologne Cathedral is simply stunning – neither of us could get over the amazing detail in the structure. It dominates the city from every angle.

We went to the top of an office block on the other side of the river to get this view – well worth the 5 euros.

Our compartment on the train was a little cramped but quite comfy. We were glqd to have a 2-berth comprtment rather than 4. It was not much mor4e expensive but meant that we could spread out stuff about.

This is the train in Moscow Station, althoug it metamorphosed several tiimes during the journey as bits were added and taken away.

Changing to a different gauge track in Brest. The carriage is lifted of the bogeys with four hydraulic jacks and then lowered on to the new bogeys.

This is our view from the Cosmos Hotel in Moscow – our room was on the 23rd floor. You can see a tethered balloon across the ring road. We had a better view than they did.

Sorry about the order - time running out at internet cafe!

Work ends

What an amazing day! My thirty years at Deer Park has finally come to an end.

Having said that I wanted no presents, no speeches and no cards I have been overwhelmed by the wonderful goodbyes (and the presents, the cards, the speeches ... and the cake). Since so many of my colleagues have expressed an interest in this blog it seems a good place to say thank you. I could not have had a better day (or week) and it has left me feeling quite emotional.

Anyone who has not worked in a school finds it hard to appreciate the quality of the people who do - particularly those who are not teachers but put in so much effort to support those who do teach. Deer Park has long been a remarkable school, full of remarkable people, and I have been very lucky to be part of it.

J

Launch Date - minus nine

Its now only nine days.

The last nine days have flown past – we seem to have done such a lot, and yet there is such a lot still to do.

The house is gradually being packed into boxes, given to charity shops or dispersed via the Freecycle network. I am constantly surprised at how efficient Freecycle is. We “advertised” two used dustbins – which went within twelve hours, as did the spare parts for a Hozelock system, some miscellaneous baking trays and all our house plants (the taker subsequently emailed me to assure me that they had gone to a good home – I suspect it might be a better home than they had previously). The “useful wood” in the cellar has also gone to a good home (although it might end up on someone’s fire).

We have not had a sniff of anyone being interested in renting the house. The credit crunch has a lot to answer for. However, whilst it is somewhat dispiriting to have to clean the oven and empty the bathroom cupboard, I suppose that if the worse came to the worse and we died whilst on our trip, at least all our affairs are in perfect order for the children. They simply have to take all the boxes from the attic to charity shops.

One of the bonuses of leaving has been the many kind things that people have said and done. I am struggling to empty the freezer because people keep inviting us out for meals. The planning for the next nine days will be interesting. There is a tension between packing everything you don’t want to take away, having enough to wear, and deciding what to do with the things that you are wearing on the penultimate day. I may end up wearing some very odd combinations and then throwing the lot away. But for the remainder of today – the task is cleaning the oven.

Are we getting excited?

Only 18 days until we leave.
This will be the first entry for many of you viewing this blog as we have only just begun to tell people about it - so you can get the tone of what is to come. This entry does not include any details of Jeff’s experiences of food poisoning or an itemised account of his bowel movements but that might follow later.

Meg began her ‘gap year’ two days ago, Jeff has 10 more ‘get-ups’ before he retires for the second time. Our house is beginning to resemble a ‘holiday let’ as everything disappears into storage or charity shops – although we still have to let the place. It was emotional to have to give away the table football but sacrifices have to be made …

The organisation for this trip has been a major exercise in project management. We are awaiting our final visas – from Vietnam and hoping that we will be able to get through the Channel Tunnel and, more importantly, the border into Russia won’t be closed because of all the political posturing over the Georgia affair.

We have thought about creating a board game –‘Circumnavigate the World’ … you have only so much carbon dioxide to spend and only so much cash and then its down to good planning and the fall of the dice. This could fill our days on the cargo ship from Melbourne to Mexico.

And the answer to the question “Are you getting excited?” is that we might do if we had enough spare time to think about it.

At last - visas applied for

After two weeks of getting paperwork together I finally sent off for the first wave of visas today - Belarus, Russia, Mongolia and China. The Real Russia website have been excellent and made it all much easier but you have to have evidence of train tickets, hotels and onward travel arrangements etc, and also passport photos and a large cheque £593 for 4 visas (x 2).
We also now have all our rail and accomodation booked as far as Hanoi.

Tomorrow we have the estate agent checking over our house ... and then I have to fit a new window to replace the one that is disintegrating rapidly

Two months to go

It is hard to get to grips with the fact that there are only two months before we set off. There is so much to do if we are going to let the house. The past two months have been a continuous drip-feed of clearing out junk, painting, repairing, fixing, etc.
We now have Moscow to Hanoi booked and this means we can get some visas. Some of these countries have only a 3 month window for visas so you cant apply too early. China requires evidence of onward travel and of hotel reservations.
It will take about a month to get the Russia, Mongolia and China visas using an agency. After that we can sort out Belarus, Viet Nam and Australia. It is all quite complex.

So much to do ...

Yesterday I handed in my resignation - from the 26th September. This gives me about a week before we leave for Moscow. After so long planning there is now a lot to do in the few months before we go. Letting the house for 6 months requires a lot of work, making sure everything is up top scratch and then packing our personal belongings for storage.

Meg plans to stop work around 12th September so that will give her a little more time.
Today I decided we need a chart of what has to be done, when it should be started and when it should be completed. Having created a list it doesn't look quite so bad.

A slight change of itinerary means that we will now hire a care one-way from Penang to Singapore. This is quite cheap as there is no one-way surcharge so you can deduct the train fares from the price.