The last few weeks before the "GO" date were an absolute frenzy. As we had decided long time ago that it would be best not to keep our apartment so the preparations included selling a lot of stuff and moving the rest to a tiny storage unit. Selling was fun, like the first few weeks during which we filled the place with furniture and stuff, but in reverse - the rooms were getting emptier each day. Some things sold for more than expected, some for less but either way it is interesting and fun to learn the market value of one's possessions. Most emotional sale was the car, seven years old and in great condition we were sad to let it go, hopefully the young lady who bought it will enjoy driving it as much as we did.

Hint: If your fridge is more than 4-5 years old and not top of the range, now it costs a lot less than expected. If it is older you might even have difficulties selling it, don't leave it for the last moment.

Of course there were things we wanted to keep, but couldn't take with us, so we got a storage unit nearby. Planning the layout was like a puzzle game, eventually we had a great solution. After the initial move which included about 80% of the items we wanted to store we were so happy. All went downhill (pun intended) when we came back two days later to find that a cardboard box had caved in and caused a small avalanche inside the storage. That was hands down the worst moment of our pre-departure phase. Half an hour and a roll of tape later things were kind of stable, now everything is stacked inside and when we left it looked pretty good, but should put a note somewhere to only open the door wearing a hard hat. 

Hint: If you are after a storage unit in Australia - shop around. Small, local companies offer way better conditions than the large, multi-location storage specialists. For our needs (annual payment, small unit) it turned out that big companies charge sometimes 2-3 times more than the best offer on the market.

Least fun and unexpectedly time consuming was cleaning up the apartment. I don't want to go into details, but next time will hire somebody to do it. I hate cleaning slimline blinds, who came up with those? And why can't you put them in the dishwasher?

On top of all this were numerous small things to sort out - redirect the mail, cancel the electricity and water, update vaccines, choose a mobile roaming plan, pack bags, book hotels, flights and so on... 

Despite being some of the busiest weeks of my life this was time of great excitement too - counting the days until our departure from Melbourne, talking about all the places we are going to visit, the people we are going to meet, the sights we are going to see, the foods we are going to taste - we just couldn't wait for the adventure to begin!