Sunday October 18, 2015

Sunday, it snowed last night and part of today!! What a shock to the system. We have not experienced snow since 2013, we are back in the snow belt and better get used to it. Most people are saying it will be a milder winter than the previous two winters – let’s hope so. The forecast for the week is cold – only one day to be over 10 degrees centigrade.

Sojourn our favorite outdoor store had their fall tent sale. This is not a sale for tents, but an end of season sale in a very large tent set up in the parking lot. We replaced our merino wool t.shirts – 50% off. We are already planning for the next trip.

Monday, we met our HVAC guy at the condo and he told us the air-conditioning unit was kaput. We sent the report to the current owner and asked for a further reduction on the price.

After checking out the condo again, we headed down to vote in the Federal Election. As we cycled across the country we were amazed at what people thought about the current prime minister, most of it was not positive. It will be interesting to see what the outcome of the election is tomorrow.

Tuesday, The current condo owner accepted our new offer, now we are waiting to see what our lawyer says about the Status Certificate. This tells us how well the property is managed as well as what we can and cannot do in the condo.

We met my old boss and friend (Bob Lehman) for lunch. He has retired and is looking really well. It was nice to catch up with him. He is very pleased about the new Liberal prime minister. Justin Trudeau is the new prime minister of Canada.

Wednesday, today we started our job search. Barrie has a couple of offices that assist people with their job searches. We have both updated our resumes, although I am not that interested in finding a job until after have we moved into our new home. However, we are supposed to be actively looking for work. I want to work in a bike shop! My friend Celeste has suggested we start the first Bike Courier business in Barrie. Fat tire Bike Courier, it might be too cold for us in the winter and of course, we will be away next summer.

Friday, we chatted to the lawyer about the Status Certificate for the condo. This is a report about the finances of the condominium corporation and the rules and regulations of the condo. Bad news, we cannot rent the condo for less than one year. We were hoping that we could rent it out while we were travelling next summer – about 5 months! We had already looked into using a rental management agency. Back to the drawing board. After chatting to the lawyer we have decided not to buy a condo, as the regulation of annual rental seems to be the rule for all condo corporations! A house or townhouse it is, we have some viewings set up for Sunday. If we do not find anything by the middle of November we will rent until the market picks up again in the spring.

I am ready to pack up my panniers and go somewhere warm, I am really missing cycling every day. I am getting really bored here, I know I should really get into looking for a job, next week.

We bought a granny cart today! A little cart that will transport our groceries from the store to home.  On the very first shopping trip it broke. Back it goes tomorrow.

Saturday, another dreary wet windy day in Barrie. We spent the morning cleaning the house, Melinda is away for the week-end. I spent some time checking the areas of the two houses we are viewing tomorrow. Google maps is amazing, also Barrie police has a crime map that you can check what incidents have happened in the area that you are looking to live. Pretty good resource for anyone wanting to move to Barrie and find out about crime stats.

I spent the afternoon reading blogs about cycling the Nullabor, cycling from Brisbane to Darwin and Darwin to Adelaide – apart from the Nullabor the other two blogs were from supported riders, a van taking their gear and most of the riders riding skinny tired bikes. We would do it self-supported with our wonderful touring bikes. Much harder to do, but what an experience.