Discovering the joy that is Trago Mills and meeting neighbours and teachers

Today (Thursday 31st Dec - New Year's Eve) we discovered an amazing wonderland. Tim had said that you must go down the A38 to Trago Mills - it sells everything! What we didn't quite understand was what this mysterious place was actually like and that they do, in fact, sell EVERYTHING. For the Australian reader you can think Bunnings on steroids. What you can't appreciate is the bizarre nature of this place. You drive in off the A38 to a mossy, stone walled area with English burbling brook/ stream, ducks, geese, a peacock. You then see an imposing almost Swiss cum Tudor building which is quite beautiful and sort of quaint with some little specialty shops, a barbers, a newsagent. All of this hides what happens when you go through some rather insignificant wooden doors and into one of the most..no, THE most..extensive department/variety stores ever seen. Floors and floors of stuff. Hardware, clothes, toys, electrical, household...everything.

Unfortunately we forgot our camera but we will be back to take some photos and buy some more things. A website link will have to do for now: http://www.trago.co.uk/image/tid/5

We bought some welly boots and a tea strainer as we couldn't find one at the Hodges' (Stef does like her leaf tea made in a proper teapot) but we sort of felt that we should have bought more things simply because there was so much to buy!

The best bit was exploring the place afterwards. It was delightful in an amazingly kitsch way. Stef loved the Winston Churchill weather vane (Mr. Churchill giving the twofinger victory salute), we all loved the aviary, the lifesize nativity scene might have been a bit much (??maybe) and we looked at the lovely, running water.

"Look kids, water runs in England because it rains," Stef said. This is a comment that reflects the Australian drought and the fact that most creeks and non-tidal rivers are either mozzie-ridden, stagnant mudpools or bone dry.

Upon arriving home a farmer called Howard dropped in and introduced himself. A very nice person who used to be a teacher. He lives a couple of houses up. We'll be seeing more of him.

At midday Martin Ollerenshaw came round for tea, introductions, a chat and the inevitable school stuff. His visit was most appreciated as it clarified much about the way things work in schools in England and what Looe school is like. It'll be interesting to actually get amongst it and see what is what. The social aspect and camaraderie of the school sounds very good with lots of fun events to go to.

In the afternoon Stef and I, battling to stay awake still suffering jetlag, went for a walk along Trethawle Lane, nosily poking into people's driveways and looking for cows and wild boars. Generally exploring. It was a good thing to do as first of all neighbour Michelle came down the road and we met her and then Richard, Jackie and ummm...curses, what was the nice man's name again?...will have to edit this later...Stef said it was Cliff, I was thinking Adrian but it may have been Peter came down the road and we met them. They are all very pleasant people and we hope to see more of them during our stay. (for the record it was Geoff!)

It is fair to say that for the past couple of days we have been struggling a bit, particularly with jetlag but also with the feeling of being lost, out of routine and out of environment. Today was much better and hopefully a good turning point for our exchange experience. It is poignant that today was New Year's Eve and we can great the new year in England with optimism and a bottle of champagne that is in the fridge.

A Walk Down The A38 To Buy A Car

Walking down the A38 is not to be undertaken lightly. Being a stranger in a strange land, needing to get out for a walk and needing to have a good look at a car I had seen for sale on the internet at Castle Motors, I (Wayne) undertook this feat on Wednesday morning.

After ringing the personable Lee Flood (Dale's brother?..I had previously been in contact with Dale by email) to see if the car was available, I set off in sneakers, tracksuit pants, coat and beanie. I didn't think about the side of the road being wet, long grass and brambles and A38 being a dual carriageway with 60mph (make that 70+ for most of them) cars, trucks, buses and council vehicles zooming past. I just plowed on in for the 1.5 mile walk that Lee assured me it was down to Castle Motors.


It ended up being a good 1.5 miles (maybe 2-2.5?) to Castle Motors, maybe more if you factor in that I turned down the second Looe road first thinking that the caryard was down there. It didn't take me long to work out that this was wrong due to the lack of advertising and the increasing amount of countryside but eventually I found Castle Motors. My shoes and feet were soaking and muddy and the bottom of my tracksuit pants were drenched. There was no way I was walking back again so this should be an easy sale for Mr. Lee Flood.


The car looked good. A 2004 Rover 25 iXL in British Racing Green with only 28000 miles on the clock and full service history for £4000. It was the upper end for this type of car but the mileage was good and it was the top of the range model with leather seats and everything...after 2 hours of test-driving, thinking, talking, test-driving, calling on the spirit of the knowledgable car guru Christopher Crankanthorp for help, doing all the tests he had shown, checking all the numbers were genuine, doing more talking and thinking - the deal was done, particularly when Lee threw in 12 months MOT.


There was a bit of bother with getting car insurance initially but this was sorted out by using confused.com and getting the services of Post Office insurance. Phew!


So, here we are, the proud new owners of a right-royal British Rover 25 in British Racing Green.

The Journey Begins

Our story starts Sunday 27th Dec 2009. After one of those nights where sleep doesn't come easily because you are so excited about the next day and you know you have got to catch a bus we woke before dawn and started to get ready for our long journey to England. The bags were packed into the car and we drove to have breakfast at Stefanie's Mum and Dad's house and then on with Ross and Peter to the bus in Batemans Bay. Here we are waiting at the bus stop.

And we waited. The bus was about 20 minutes late. This wasn't particularly concerning at the time as we knew we had a fairly good buffer of 30 minutes for the train connection but as we approached Nowra I was mentally doing the maths on distance to travel and speed of the bus. It was going to be close. The bus pulled into Bomaderry at 10:45. The train was due to leave at 10:45. It was waiting on the platform. People were milling about. There was a queue at the ticket machine. Stef and the kids dragged the bags and themselves to the platform while I ran to the ticket booth to get the tickets.

"When's the train going mate?" I inquired.


" 'bout a minute." the ticket man said.


Hastily I bought the tickets to the International Terminal while Stef and the kids did their best to delay the train by shoving luggage towards the train door. The Fosters made it, just, with about 20 seconds to spare. This was the connection with the narrowest margin so it was hoped that the rest of the journey would be less panicky.


Once on the train we were more relaxed. Here we are on the train being relaxed.


We had to swap trains at Kiama as we moved from the diesel to the electric line. The electric train was waiting for us at the joining platform but I wanted to just make sure.


"Is that the train to Wolli Creek?" I asked one of the guards.

"No, that's two hours wait" the guard replied.

"What?" I said looking startled.

"Only joking" said the guard. Jack wanted to kill him. Preferably in a horrible way. Stef left her coat on the first train and had to run back to get it before it went back to Nowra and before we went off to Sydney. She made it but the less said about that little mistake the better.

We arrived at the airport in good time. Checking in was a breeze and we were pleased to offload our luggage. It was time for lunch so we went to the noisiest place in the world - the airport food court - to eat. It was full of people from all over the world talking, laughing and calling out to each other. Combine this with endless 'bing bong Qantas are announcing that flight Q124 to Mumbai is now boarding at gate 24' and the noise was completely overwhelming. But we endured it and had our last food on Australian soil for 12 months. It is interesting to note here that other airports around the world don't do PA announcements. You have to look up the information yourself. Other airports are relatively quiet.

We decided that one more toilet break might be a good idea before going through to the gate lounge area. Who should we meet as we waited outside the toilets? Stacey Donahue - a Carroll College maths teacher - what a funny, small world it is.

At the appointed time we went through security and to the immigration hall. We knew nothing about immigration procedures so walked boldly up to the immigration person. She sent us away because we hadn't filled in the little immigration forms available at the booths along the wall. Ah, that would explain what the hundreds of people along the wall were doing. We joined them and filled in forms. Once done we got our passports stamped after the immigration person diligently checked our faces against the passport photos and then we went through to the gate lounge.

The first leg of our flight was Sydney to Singapore (7 hours). We flew straight across the centre of Australia. After take off and about half an hour into the journey, once the novelty of flying had warn off, we all enjoyed the free movies, TV shows and computer games that were on the little screens on the back of the chair in front. Jack liked the view of the sunset from the plane and being above the clouds. He took this photo and Wayne took a photo of Jack.



And then the world eating tour started. They feed you on planes and they insist. Bloated we travelled half way around the world.

The flight to Singapore went smoothly. We waited for about an hour and a half in a gate lounge at Changi Airport where we were treated to the finale of Singapore Idol too loud on the big screen TV. Our bodies were telling us it was about 1am and the girls tried to have a little sleep on the floor of the gate lounge with no success.

We reboarded our plane for the long flight to Frankfurt (13 hours). We travelled across India, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iran, the Balkan states, a bit of Russia, Austria and then into Germany. I was looking at the Flight Map occasionally as we flew and I realised that we were flying over all the 'news' areas: the tribal areas of western Pakistan, Kabuhl, Lahore, Tehran. From 33000 feet the Earth looked dark and peaceful. The glinting lights of towns could be seen but the news that night showed that wars were going on below. For some reason I found it interesting to note that as we flew over war-torn areas Jack was playing the Brick Bat computer game, Annie was watching a Disney Barbie movie and I was listening to Paul Kelly singing From Little Things Big Things Grow (hmm, something meaningful in all of this somewhere). After more food and another movie they dimmed the lights and we were able to get about 5 hours of fitful sleep. We travelled through the night. When we got to Frankfurt it was 6am local time, 5pm Australian time, dark, quiet and eerie. Two airport guards walked past with real, big machine guns. Yikes! By this time our bodies didn't know whether to be awake, asleep, having cornflakes (which we did on the plane) or having a beer (might have been a good option). The long journey was taking its toll and it wasn't much fun any more. Here we are lost and confused in Frankfurt.

Frankfurt was also our first taste of cold as it was 3 degrees C and they bused us out to the plane to walk up the steps.

Another plane (British Airways this time) and it was the short final trip to London. We flew across Belgium, the North Sea and into London from the east. Brighton and the sea could be seen quite clearly out of the window as could the Isle Of Wight. Excitement and relief kicked in as London approached. We could see the Thames, the London Eye ferris wheel and the great sprawling city of London.

We walked up the air-bridge from the plane and into the immigration hall of Heathrow. There was a very long line and it took quite a while but we met a couple who were teachers from the US and chatted with them about what we were doing. The female immigration officer knew about our exchange situation thankfully and asked all the right questions to which I produced all the right paperwork. We then stepped on to English soil for the first time in order to get our bags. We freshened up before getting the luggage as we were going to meet Tim , Karen, Jack and Ella beyond the green corridor of 'nothing to declare' customs. There were no customs officers as we went through so unhindered we emerged into England and met the Hodges. It was about 9:30 am. Tim, Karen, Jack and Ella are a lovely family and lovely people. I spoke with Tim about school things, Karen spoke with Stefanie about house and kid's school things, Eleanor made friends with Ella, Jack made friends with Jack, coffee was had...and it was all over too quickly as our journey had to continue. The friendship and shared experience of the Fosters and the Hodges would have to continue over the internet. It was terrific to have had the opportunity to meet each other in person.

We hopped on the very flashy and high-tec (and expensive) Heathrow Express train to Paddington Station saying goodbye to the Hodges with Jack and Ella chasing the train down the platform.

At 11:30am we entered Paddington Station. Here we are at Paddington Station.


Notice we are rugged up because it was cold. We were surprisingly hungry for all the food we'd had on the plane so we went in search of a nice place to eat and while away a couple of hours. What better place than the Mad Bishop and Bear English pub upstairs? Ah, now we feel like we're in England especially after a pint and a half of Fuller's finest bitter (London Pride and Chiswick) and a steak and Fuller's Ale pie and chips. The children had the traditional English meal of nachos. It was all rather yum and good. Here we are at the Mad Bishop and Bear Pub.

At 2pm we hopped on to the train to Liskeard. Four hours. It was an extremely tiring, try-to-stay-awake journey that was good until Plymouth. We journeyed through the English countryside which at this time of year looks a bit like the Southern Highlands areas particularly around Bowral and Picton. We saw the White Horse of Westbury and travelled through an interesting area just after Exeter where the tracks are right next to the sea and the waves actually splashed the side of the train!

We pulled into Plymouth and there were people everywhere. It seemed odd and it was. The Argyle football match had been on and the train company hadn't put on enough trains for the crowd so they poured on to our train and they were irrate as they had been waiting for an hour and a half. By this time the kids were asleep and waking them was like waking the dead which we had had to do and created much fuss and concern with our new travellers. Somehow we had to make our way through the crush, get the suitcases off the train and not hurt anyone or our ourselves in the process. We stood in the door area of the train amongst some overexuberant teenagers. One of the girls told some naughty boys who were playing with the train toliet door to 'shut the toilet door 'cause it stinks' in a thick Spice Girls accent which Annie thought was rather good and interesting. Finally we got to Liskeard and unfortunately I wasn't able to get the suitcases off the train without clubbing two of the aforementioned boys in the head with a suitcase as I lifted it off the rack.

Standing on the platform of Liskeard station in the dark and cold, it was very welcoming to hear 'Hello Fosters' from Deb and Brian (Tim's sister and brother-in-law). They drove us to our new home, through Liskeard, down the A38, between the tall, thick hedges of Trethawle Lane and into the pebbled parking area. After nearly 45 hours travelling, we had arrived in Cornwall and there was nothing more to be done than have some toast and go to sleep after our exhausting journey.