{"id":2574,"date":"2016-05-17T19:35:28","date_gmt":"2016-05-17T19:35:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.kiwihoods.com\/?p=2574"},"modified":"2016-05-17T19:35:28","modified_gmt":"2016-05-17T19:35:28","slug":"horsham","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.kiwihoods.com\/?p=2574","title":{"rendered":"HORSHAM"},"content":{"rendered":"

We arrive at the campground which is near the small village of Newchapel near Lingfield and Scot is happy to see a quaint local pub just down the road. We are shown in by the warden who is from the Czech Republic and he is interested to know we have travelled to their country. We have a pitch where we can put the car next to the van and it is a bit weird to be back in the van again but at the same time we feel like we are back \u2018home\u2019. We settle in and get ourselves sorted out.\u00a0 It is weird having a little car with us but it will be great as we can leave the van to charge up in the campground and head off somewhere.<\/p>\n

April 8th<\/sup><\/p>\n

We leave the van in the campground for the day and head off in our wee car to Dorking. We drove through this village one day and decided we wanted to come back and explore and also check out the op shops for some cheap work clothes and that time is coming nearer again.\u00a0 After breakfast we head off up there.\u00a0 The roads in these areas are all very narrow and it is ok in a small car but everyone drives like maniacs and do terrible speeds on them that it does get a bit scary.\u00a0 I am not happy doing over the speed limit as even then it seems to be too fast for some of their roads but seemingly I am too slow and get passed at high speed even when bends are approaching.\u00a0 Crazy bastards really as there is nowhere to go if a car comes around the corner. Tailgating is also very common.\u00a0 It never bothered me in the van as they can see I am driving a large vehicle and I go as slow as I need to in it.\u00a0 People forget that campervans have all your crockery, glasses, bottles etc and you can\u2019t jeopardise that by flying around corners.\u00a0 I hate it being back in the car though but I just slow down and make them wait if they are that crazy.<\/p>\n

In Dorking we park up and check out the shops. The chicken is the town symbol as apparently they breed a lot of them in this area, so the main big roundabout has a large chicken on it.\u00a0 They have heaps of op shops which we take our time going around.\u00a0 I find a couple of things to buy plus a jigsaw puzzle that I am looking forward to doing.\u00a0 I love puzzles but you have to have the time to sit and figure them out which normally wouldn\u2019t happen.\u00a0 The puzzle I did in Woking was fine until one of the Vizlas ate a piece that fell on the floor \u2013 buggar!\u00a0 We did get the piece back but it was a grey salivary blob that at the time we weren\u2019t 100% sure it was a piece of puzzle until the end of it and there was a piece missing!\u00a0 We have lunch at a lovely little caf\u00e9 in town where they make all their own food and they are a little more healthy.\u00a0 Funny that over here a caf\u00e9 does not have to have their own toilet for customers.\u00a0 You have to go down the road if you need one.\u00a0 I am grateful there is a Waitrose in town as it appears that they have the only loo in the main centre and it seems that everyone has come to use it.<\/p>\n

5pm and it is time to join the peak hour traffic and head back to the camper. We have had to fill the meter a couple of times and it is a bugger here where you have to put the exact amount in for the time you want or you lose the change.\u00a0 So if it costs 3 pounds for 2 hours and you only have 4 pounds, it won\u2019t tack on 40 extra minutes you lose the extra pound or you have to put say 4.50 pounds in to get 3 hours.\u00a0 I am sure it is to profit from the fact that most won\u2019t have the correct change to put in the meter.\u00a0 Anyway we head off \u2018home\u2019 and the traffic is slow and there are long queues.\u00a0 It\u2019s no wonder\u00a0 when people drive and the roads are congested when the prices of trains are horrendous.\u00a0 An average trip on the train into the heart of London from just outside can be as much as 40 pounds return each.\u00a0 That is why the traffic congestion is so bad everywhere.\u00a0 I always thought they had a great train system \u2013 which they do, but at a horrendous price.<\/p>\n

We get back to the van and decide since we have a pub within walking distance for the first time since we arrived back here we will go down and have a drink. It is quite packed since it is a Friday night but we have one drink \u2013 which is quite expensive \u2013 and then head back to Morrie for dinner.<\/p>\n

Saturday 9th<\/sup> April<\/p>\n

We head out late morning as the owners aren\u2019t going to be ready for us to arrive until later in the day but we decide to head up anyway and we can leave the van in their carpark and head into town with the car for an hour or two. We leave the van behind and head into Horsham town.\u00a0 Being a Saturday it is busy but we find a park that is right by a pool we will check out for swimming later.\u00a0 We walk into the town centre and we find they have a few market stalls around.\u00a0 The town looks very nice and they have a big modern shopping centre right in the centre of it.\u00a0 We will check that out another day. \u00a0We walk around and I am hungry so decide to buy a frittata in a deli style shop.\u00a0 Unfortunately for me it is the worst food I have had in a while and it was expensive.\u00a0 A small piece of frittata for 6 pounds, well you have to try these places and now I know I won\u2019t be going back there again.<\/p>\n

Mid afternoon we head back to the farmhouse we are looking after. This place is a part 13th<\/sup> century Farmhouse on 5 acres.\u00a0 It has a large lake which attracts all types of birds and has fish in it.\u00a0 The gardens are lovely and we overlook lovely green paddocks.\u00a0 It is certainly peaceful, well except for some housing development that is going on close by which is a great shame as this place was right out in the countryside and obviously a farmer has sold off his land for housing.\u00a0 The owners show us around the house and then have so much to do to get themselves organised so we make ourselves at home whilst they then go out for dinner.\u00a0 Boris the cat is who we are looking after and he is a lovely good sized pussycat.\u00a0 A little aloof you could say but later I find out he actually loves cuddles and attention when given.<\/p>\n

The owners leave the next day early and we proceed to move all our gear into the house after breakfast. I don\u2019t feel comfortable to move all our personal possessions in and our food bins and fridge food while the owners are still around.\u00a0 It feels much better for us to do this after they have left.\u00a0 We check out the gardens and lawns we will look after and there is a swimming pool but it will remain under cover until they are back as they feel it isn\u2019t necessary to burden us with getting it ready for the summer.<\/p>\n

We enjoy our first weekend at the house where we have a comfortable good sized bed so we sleep well. We get ourselves organised in the kitchen which is huge and has massive cream bench tops which you really wouldn\u2019t want to spill anything on or discolour them in anyway as that would be devastating. There is a large conservatory style room on the end where it gets sun all day and it\u2019s a great room to just sit and read (and\u00a0 great for puzzles).\u00a0 Like all houses they have an oil heating system that starts up around 5am to warm the house up and switches off midmorning only to restart up around 6pm to warm the house at the end of the day.\u00a0 I really would hate to be the one footing the bill for the heating in a house this large.<\/p>\n

On Monday morning we head into the town centre as I was supposed to drive over to Swansea today to hand in our Aussie drivers licences and passports to swap the licences for UK ones. However after much thought and agonising we decided it wasn\u2019t a good idea for one of us to drive the 5 hours trip over to Wales to try and get our passports back straight away so we post them all off hoping they don\u2019t take too long.\u00a0 We then talk to the pool staff and sign up for a 6 week plan they have on which will make it about 1pound per visit for the pool.\u00a0 Not a bad price especially since most pools here are 5 or 6 pounds (10-12 AUD) per entry.\u00a0 Very expensive paying 25AUD just for a swim for us both. \u00a0Anyway we then go in for a swim.\u00a0 We only have a 25 metre pool but that is better than the 14m pool in Spain.\u00a0 It has been a while since we swam in a 25m pool and we find the 1km swim quite tough on the first day but still succeed.\u00a0 It will get easier each day. They also have many op shops here so we will be able to check them out as well.<\/p>\n

Over the first week Boris doesn\u2019t seem to be around very much and I feel he goes missing for very long periods of time. We have a morning where he has obviously just eaten elsewhere as he hasn\u2019t had any biscuits at home and he brings up a whole lot of them encompassed in what looks like mouse innards \u2013 yuck!\u00a0 Unpleasant to clean up.\u00a0 He often brings in mice so he isn\u2019t allowed into the main house area at night.\u00a0 He gets shut into the kitchen conservatory area where he can come and go outside if he wants to.\u00a0 There are mice traps in the kitchen for the live ones he brings in, but these ones are brilliant and very humane.\u00a0 They just shut the mouse in the trap alive and you can see something has been caught when you get up in the morning and then let the poor mouse back into the bush outside.\u00a0 Over the past 4 weeks we have caught 3 mice.\u00a0 The first one got let go only I think to be re-caught the next night.\u00a0 When we let him out the second time however he is very wobbly and goes around in circles.\u00a0 We realise Boris has been hassling it all night and it is very unwell.\u00a0 We still let it out but unfortunately a few minutes later a bird swoops down and he is history.\u00a0 The next one is luckier, it gets to run away very quickly and we haven\u2019t seen it since.<\/p>\n

Since we have been here we have virtually had so little rain it has been great, but the gardens may need to start being watered if there isn\u2019t much soon. The days we have had have been lovely and fairly warm in the morning, but seem to cool in the afternoon when it looks like it may rain but doesn\u2019t.\u00a0 We have had to mow the lawns each week which take quite a few hours even with the ride on mower. Scot has been doing some water blasting on the pavers for the owners which makes the outside areas look quite amazing.\u00a0 I get stuck into some gardening as of course with spring there are many weeds popping up all over the place.\u00a0 They have lots of nettles coming up in the garden which really just take over completely and the beautiful bluebell flowers get drowned by them.\u00a0 I pull out as many as I can but it is hard work.\u00a0 We buy some pansies and I pot them up to put on the patio.\u00a0 I haven\u2019t had pansies around since my teen years in Dunedin and I just adore their colour so I decide to enjoy them while we are here.<\/p>\n

We have been for a couple of walks around the countryside and the lovely spring flowers are all starting to bloom along the walkways. We walked to Christs Hospital \u2013 a kind of suburb but was based on a snotty school that was built there.\u00a0 They had a pool as well but they wouldn\u2019t let us become members as we weren\u2019t here long enough.\u00a0 The main walk travels on a public walkway on a farmers property and follows the Arun river. We have stayed previously at Arundel down south with the big castle and the town is named after this river. The river here is quite small but the surrounding area is covered with bluebells and in parts is a fantastic sea of blue. Further in the walk the foliage is starting to sprout a white cluster flower which tastes like onion and garlic. Partway at the beginning of the walk you can look across at the house we are in and sitting in the sun we can see the walkers coming and going.<\/p>\n

Our daily routine here consists of breakfast, emails etc and then off to the pool for our 1km swim, back home to a very green smoothie and lunch and then into the garden or waterblasting in the afternoon. Boris loves to join me in the garden in the afternoon.\u00a0 We don\u2019t see a lot of him except when in the garden or when he is asleep in his bed on the couch during the day.\u00a0 We sit outside early evening with a book and a drink and watch the many people walking along the public path in the farm we overlook, with their dogs and children.\u00a0 We have started to look for jobs and have completed our CV\u2019s ready to hand over.\u00a0 We have registered with a doctor \u2013 it is strange here.\u00a0 You can only register with one doctor and they have to be within 3 miles of where you live.\u00a0 You aren\u2019t allowed to go to any other doctor, only the one you register with.\u00a0 We don\u2019t know yet how that works when you work away from your home and you need to visit a doctor.\u00a0 You are allowed to go to another one a couple of times over a 2 week period but no more than that.\u00a0 I guess we will find out down the track how that works.\u00a0 We are just waiting on our UK licences.\u00a0 We had to give them our Aussie licences and they get sent back to Australia and cancelled.\u00a0 I wish I had known that before we paid to renew them just before we left, what a waste of money.<\/p>\n

We have also managed to secure several other house sits. It seems my fears of not being able to get any were completely unfounded.\u00a0 I seem to manage to get any that I apply for now and have even been approached by several I have had to turn down as we are already busy or they are a little out of the area we are heading to live in.\u00a0 This area is Milton Keynes which is a bit north of London outside the M25.\u00a0 We have a house sit there for 6 months from November so we are heading to live there and we are looking at jobs there as well.\u00a0 Over the next 6 months we have quite a few house sits, but we often have a couple or more days in between where we don\u2019t have anywhere to live.\u00a0 So I decided we needed to have a rented room in a share house where we can put the majority of our stuff and stay in between our sits.\u00a0 After a couple of weeks looking I manage to secure a room in a share house which seems to be the way most people do it here.\u00a0 It is really expensive to rent your own place and unlike Australia or NZ you pay all the council rates, water usage etc\u00a0 etc.\u00a0 Plus you pay a huge amount up front, that is non-refundable, for the real estate to do checks on you and that could easily amount to 1500 pounds or Aud3000 just to get into a house. \u00a0Then you pay your rent plus all other amounts each month.\u00a0 So it is an expensive exercise so it seems most people just share a house with others as it keeps the cost down.\u00a0 Our room is with a landlord and one other renter so we will see what that is like.\u00a0 We will only be there when we don\u2019t have a house sit but we will leave all our stuff there. Most are from Monday to Friday so the landlord gets the weekend free and the lodgers must spend the weekend at home. I would say that is because they are working away from home and this is the cheapest option. Our landlord has agreed to let us stay weekends but we have said we will probably either have sits organised or will be away exploring on the weekends.<\/p>\n

We have visited a few areas close by. We went to Brighton and met up with a friend of a friend. Unfortunately we arrived on a day they had a marathon on so it was total chaos and took us ages to just get there, so we picked up Jenny and headed out of Brighton along the water front to Eastbourne.\u00a0 It is lovely along the esplanade down south.\u00a0 No wonder so many people head there for their weekends, however when you have a look at the prices for hotels or b&b\u2019s it is so expensive.\u00a0 The average price for an ordinary hotel room somewhere in Brighton is around 200pounds for a Saturday night but some charge 400 pounds upwards and they aren\u2019t 5 star hotels.\u00a0 We had thought we would go down for a weekend but I don\u2019t think that will happen seeing those prices.\u00a0 We had a drive around Eastbourne which is a lot quieter and far less touristy than Brighton and in fact I would probably prefer staying there for a weekend.<\/p>\n

We spent a day down at Petworth which is a really cool little village, quite quirky and lots of antique shops. They actually had on an antique fair when we were there so there were quite a few people around.\u00a0 It was a really warm day as well and I am sure we got sunburnt sitting having lunch outside a little caf\u00e9.\u00a0 There is a huge house \u2013 Petworth House which we didn\u2019t get a chance to have a look around but maybe we will go back some time. Driving around the countryside is really nice and we see some beautiful old (and new but look old) stately homes. Scot will have to photo them as he has started to draw them in ink. He has done one for the owners where we are currently staying and turned out quite good so hope they like it. Maybe he can sell a few as art here seems to attract good $$. Unfortunatly we have not really done justice to the area exploring as we have been busy which is a shame. Scot has repaired the fibreglass back of the van and fixed minor things so it looks good for sale. On one Saturday we went to the spring festival in Horsham town and had prime spot and had a coffee and watched all the dancing, drumming and bands which was very cultural and fun. We had such a good possie that we made the local paper photo, the trouble was it was our backs! Maybe the best side anyway. Vicki has already had a job interview and a follow up one soon so hopefully everything will fall into place. I will wait till we are up in MK and start looking as my type of work I think will be easier to find when I am there.<\/p>\n

It will be a bit sad leaving this area and south of London but we are looking forward to our next sits and working life north of London and excited as well. Being more settled we may be able to explore more. We have purposely not got any housesits in August so we can stay at the share house and travel on the weekends hopefully even to Paris or Berlin. Also we want to see a few museums and Scot wants to check out a couple of the car, motorcycle and aircraft museums in the area.<\/p>\n

Another update hopefully won\u2019t take as long as this one has.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n