Update

Well, I know that it has been a little while since I last blogged - I was waiting for a New Zealand update until there was something to say! (I could post about lots of job application rejections, but they get a bit boring after a while...)

So...

We now have news - after everything going really slowly for the last month, in the past week, we have:

Set up a HiFX account for transferring our money across - we're going to be doing this in two stages; a lump sum as soon as the exchange rate comes out of the deep dark hole that it has been lying in for the last few weeks, and then another lump once we've moved out to NZ - this will include our last month's pay, our flat deposit, and any tax return that we manage to prize from Alistair Darling's cold, dead fingers... Out of all the various companies that do foreign transfers, HiFX got my business for the simple reason that once I'd managed to get hold of a human being that would speak to me outside of office hours, she was able to tell me how many NZ$ I would get for my £. You would think this would be an easy question to answer (assuming the rate of exchange at the time), but nooooo.... I'd not got anything other than "It depends" from anyone else! She was even able to set up the account for me over the phone :-)

Set up a Westpac joint bank account for myself and John for us to transfer our money into. I've been incredibly impressed with their pre-sales service - given the 11 hours time difference between NZ and the UK, they have been very quick in getting back to me with queries, and even answered the questions I didn't ask (I had mentioned that I was looking into whether it was worth investing in a short term savings account (60 days) prior to arrival, or waiting for the exchange rate to improve - there was 0.75% gross interest rate difference; he came back to me this morning to say that, after tax, there would only be $11 between the two, so it was worth waiting for the exchange rate to go up!). And, if John gets a civil service job, then we don't have to pay bank fees, either :-) (one of the issues with NZ banks - fees for everything {sigh})

Booked our flights...!! Yes, in 80 days, 7 hours and 25 minutes (if I get this post finished soon ;-) ), we will be on the plane and leaving the UK on a one way ticket! (That's 21:05 on the 5th November to save everyone doing the maths...) This has suddenly made everything get a lot closer and a lot more real - even with the visas, I don't think it had really sunk in. Now we have an unchangeable (well - it would cost too much to change it without a real emergency!) deadline...

I have failed (so far) to book the venue for our leaving party. However this is not for want of trying - the booking clerk for the original venue went on a 6 week caravanning holiday and didn't provide for any deputy to cover for her; the second venue I tried was fully booked; John is looking at a third venue for me, and the fourth is shut today, so I have to go back tomorrow...

Next major task is booking a shipping company...