Things are hotting up...

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Shame its not the weather...that is as cold as ever...

No, what is happening is that SJ and I are moving to New Zealand! SJ accepted a role within her current company that is based out of Auckland and so we're off!

This has been in the planning for some months so its not like this came as a complete shock, but now we've made the decision, there's just so much you have to do and think of. We have lists about lists about lists...we have the dogs to move (injections / blood tests / quarantine / kennelling, etc) as well as selling two vintage cars, a house and sorting out rental for the other house. Thats's besides the Residence Visa, police checks, medicals, removals, etc, etc, etc...!

SJ will likely move out at the end of June to start her position end of July - I will not leave until the end of August as the dogs have to wait six months from when they had their rabies shot and have proven they are producing antibodies...this means the earliest they can enter NZ is about 12th September, so I'm going to wait until then before coming out. Fingers crossed, they have their blood test next week.

Once this is sorted, I can get them booked into the (limited) list of approved kennels in NZ. Luckily they only have 10 days quarantine apparently. There's a myriad of different shots / test they need before then but the Rabies one is the main one and takes the longest.

Tomorrow I'm off to have my Chest X Ray and Medical...amazing what you have to go through despite SJ being an NZ Citizen (as well as UK and Australian).

Having told anyone at work yet...need to choose when to do this carefully...my plans on arrival are to do up a house that is owned by SJ's family so I'm looking forward to getting out of the Rat Race for a while.

More snow!

It continued to snow throughout the weekend leading to some quite big drifts by the time we went over the Chase on Sunday morning.

The dogs loved it though...it was way past their bellies!

 

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March Snow

Been a reasonably quiet week. Had to travel to Dusseldorf on Tuesday but was only for the day. The rest of the week was spent in the office and not a lot else.

We came up to Staffordshire yesterday...just before the BIG FREEZE. Woke up this morning to around 6 inches of fresh snow...the dogs absolutely loved it. Supposed to continue to snow throughout the day and finally stop sometime tonight...

 

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The night before the trip

Leaving the dogs is never easy and this time it's for nearly four weeks...we're heading to New Zealand, Bali, Sydney, Perth and Singapore for a holiday...as much as we look forward to this, it's tinged with a sense of sadness of having to pack up the dogs to the kennels. Indi doesn't really mind but chief does...great big softie...

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The Showman

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My grandma, what big teeth you have...

Chief and Indi...always up for a laugh. Chief I reckon would have been a stand up comic had he been human, he has perfect comedic timing and is so funny it's untrue. There's rarely a day go by where he does not have us laughing out loud for one reason or another. Are all Malamutes like this I wonder?

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A dogs life

Chief really does not realise he is a "Working Dog"...he is such a wuss it is untrue. The only thing he works is the camera...

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Xmas dogs

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Malamute train

Chief made his maiden voyage on a train today. It was the First Capital Connect service from Radlett to Farringdon. He was a little nervous at first but soon got into the swing of things...eventually taking the time to have a look out of the window to watch the world go by...

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Malamutes love mats

There's something about mats that malamutes love. Despite their (alleged) ability to survive in the arctic tundra, they do love something beneath them to lie on...

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Please sir...can we have some more?

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Shoeburyness Beach

We decided to head to the beach as it was a (reasonable) day. Not brilliant but not raining. We worked out that Southend is probably the closest to us - however...what we didn't realise is that it was also Southend Air Show that day. Of course, the beach was therefore closed! We carried on round the coast about and chanced upon Shoeburyness. It wasn't until we left that we realised you could not take dogs on! Chief loved it...his first time on sand and the sea - a little unsure at first but then in with all four paws!

Back to life...back to reality...

Some things never change...Chief being one of them...They were very put out after our time away though...took them a long time to get back into the swing of things...still he's now back to his normal self.

We had to do some more moving of stuff from my Grandfather's bungalow - it's still not sold...the blossom on the trees was amazing.

I also went to the crematorium for the first time in a long while...

Dog Crush

Quite how Chief gets into this I don't know!!

Xmas snow over the Chase

We had quite a bit of snow over the Xmas period...dogs loved it!