289 January to June 2016

So.....  the Norfolk Broads it is then.

The next 6 months were spent getting the house ready for sale  (it did not need much as it was in good condition anyway) and looking for somewhere else to live.

Our house sold quite quickly for 430 of the £450k we were asking for so it was time to get our skates  on and find somewhere to go. Aside from stupid meddling solicitors sticking their fingers in the pie to drum up their costs, it went farly well. For example, the small stream that was 300m down the hill was classed by them as a flood risk to my house. Wankers. I hate solicitors.

We spent the first 2 months of the year clocking up hundreds of miles driving backwards and forwards on the A11 to the Norfolk Broads. We searched high and low and my expectations were clearly a lot lower than Karen's and properties that I was quite happy with, were not appropriate for Karen.

Our prerequisites were not too complicated. It had to have a good sized garage, for me, a good sized garden, for Karen, and within walking distance of a pub for the cats. Yeah right!

During our many forays around the broads, we passed through a village called Martham and both agreed that it was a lovely place. Luckily not long after a property came up at the edge of Martham so we came for a look. It was within our price range and on the face of it appeared to tick all our boxes.

We arranged a visit and this was what we saw. As you can see, it has a a large garage that measures 3m x 9m. It has been extended seversal times and as such is a bit of quirky place but we could see the potential of it and put in a bid for £215k.  The bid was the same as a rival bid but we were accepted, presumably as we had sold ours.

The real good thing about it was that it was at the end of a small cul-de-sac off a side road. It was seriously quiet.

The front view of the house that shows a wierd 'sun room' extension on the front.

 The extended living room (from the shelf onward) was a fair size. A big drawback was the storage radiators which to be fair, were completely crap unless you went to bed at 6pm.

The next wierd thing was the third bedroom/study which was accessed from the kitchen. It turned out that this was the original back door to the house.  

The good news was that the garden was of a fair size and Karen was happy with it. On top of the garage (not literally) there was also a small summer house and a clad shed.

Behind the house was a large empty wall that was cast in shadow for most of the the day and as such was a wasted space. It was however paved over.

The extensions, in order of being built, included a large one to the rear of the house, including the living room and third bedroom. A side extension to the kitchen, 2 rear plastic lean-to's that house the laudry room and a sort of drying room (in the above picture). A further extension to the front that was described on the plans as a 'sun room'. It is an odd space that we still struggle to know what to do with and is plain to see on the first picture.

The bungalow, despite being ready to move in, needed a new bathroom, a new kitchen, a heating system, a conservatory and a new kitchen.

We're not sure if Hyder was stopping us from leaving or making sure she came with us.

...and Juneau just does not know what is going on.

10th June 2015.
We moved into the bungalow on the 10th of June with the assistance of a rental van. Trula's family gave us a hand with the removals and once everything was in we took them to the beach. What the hell, we had just moved to near the sea.

We could now relax a bit before the real work was to start. We decided to do some exploring areound where we had jast moved to. We a found a local steam railway at the lovely little sea side town of Sherringam.