deryans

agree , it's great for retiree's. Have they switched the water mist back on in the tropical house dome at the botanical gardens or is it still dry ?

To be fair, it's pretty easy to reference something better than adelaide, the place is unique, and that's not a compliment.

This is true, Emirates will only fly in northern hemisphere winter/Autumn and Spring months which means July August is a no-no for animals disembarking and waiting at their Hub in dubai. The stop-over for animals at dubai can be anything from 2 to 10 hours, and if it gets busy and fraught, 20 minutes for an animal waiting on the tarmac at temps over 30 is too dangerous for the little fella's

It will be fine, lounge access with QF and Marco Polo fine with kids, 30 mins to get off the connection and 30 mins (say 60 min) to be at the gate for the last leg, only gives you about 5 1/2 to 6 hours, there is plenty to do (i'm guessing you don't want to shop!!) , I used to work for a HK based airline and Chep Lak is one of the better airports to be stranded at with kids, and don't worry what people may have told you, the HK immigration and security are some of the most professional and nicest border staff I've ever had the pleasure to encounter, especially with grumpy children!

we've had a landcuiser prado - 8 seats for kids, 7 for adults, but back two only suitable for tyrion lanaster or kids , 6 foot adults will find the rearmost seats unconfortable. Bulletproof, reliable, fun, spacious, but a bit thirsty, our little ford fiesta zetec runaround (trainstation car) is 3 times more fuel efficent

I suppose you could, but there is a significant amount of leg work involved and you will not be able to complete all of the paperwork yourself , and if you have to get someone else (freight forwarder, Vet etc) to do some of it, why not get a single point of contact to manage all of it for you ? Of course , if you have say 10 dogs to ship, there may be an economy of scale, but if you only have 2/3 animals , I'd suggest using an integrated pet transport agency, there won't be a significant difference in freight cost (maybe 15-20%) but there will be a significant learning curve for you if you have not worked in the industry, and no paperwork (I dream somedays of no paperwork)

I think a few facts need clarifying: * Nepotism and Croynism exists everywhere, Boys clubs are not the exclusive domain of Australia. * Where they do exist, the impact is an inverse relationship to the size/Population centre, the smaller the location, the higher chance you have of being effected. * In Large centres it can be circumvented or avoided, but rarely directly effects (unless you are extremely unlucky) or a unique specialist in your domain. * In smaller places with limited opportunity, croynism and cliquism is a necessity for locals to survive, because if the pickings are slim, then they are already geared to network (as it is called) to share the limited opportunities, by it's very nature Adelaide (and I speak only of Adelaide) is a city that has a very poor chance of improvement, and the cliquism and boys club are a product of the place, they simply don't know any better and that is a receipe for economic extinction becuase it pervades the entire society. Sometimes It's almost like watching a slow motion train wreck or financial disaster porn, Santos announced earlier this week of more jobs to go, and a probe bid by an asian merchant bank was published on thursday (cue frantic PR shuffle at Santos) and low and behold, Santos makes an announcement on friday that their Gas production has reached a new milestone. This is called fluffing the market, but It tells us alot more about Santos than the bank, one is nerve, Santos felt the need to give a good news story asap. Once again, if we take a close look at this one remaining corporate in adelaide, we'll find it full of mates and mates of mates...... enough said.

Here's an example, I explained to one of my old mentors (ex cambridge) recently in London about constant frustration and being dragged backwards whilst trying to carry out my duties in Adelaide, and he remarked (Kipling's if, don't look too good nor talk too wise) that I was not as smart as I thought I was and the people I derided were actually the clever ones as I was unable to play their game. It took me aback , I'd always thought that I was pretty professional so I went away and thought about it for a day or so. I met him a few days later and he asked me what my thoughts were, and I said simply, I was never ever going to drop my game or performance to fit in with poor performers, it is unfair to me and it is unfair to the people I really work for, my family. Besides, I'm incapable of operating at their level anyway. Correct! was his response!

Whilst this may be avoidable in say a larger employment pool such as dense population centres in northern europe, it has a proportionally greater impact in smaller locations such as Perth and Adelaide, to some extent it can still be avoided in Sydney and larger population centres. I assume you meant poor performer rather than poor as in empathy based on pathos of financial circumstances. The damage that these people do to the economic, reputational and motivitational health of an organisation or city can be significant and sometimes irreversable. I find it astonishing that people seem to think it's ok to say about adelaide, "its not what you know, it's who you know" , :shocked: this speaks volumes in all the wrong ways about the place.

absolutely agree, the appointment as Carmody as the Chief Justice QLD has bannana republic written all over it, not to mention the Attorney General Buffon Brandis..... all class.......

Good god, certainly not dismissing Australians, my comments are directed squarely at the feet of those in political appointed roles and government in Adelaide,NSW and elsewhere, I've seen beautiful young confident aussies (and poms) crushed and disenchanted by the nepotism and croynism by mates of mates, only to either leave or put up with being led by 2nd raters. There goes their dreams and with it the motivation. When that happens on a large scale, it has a phenomenal impact, and don't tell me it's not manifesting itself in adelaide. Ain't gonna happen with my mob.

Hi Millie, we're an anglo-Irish family (3 kids)who used to live in Sydney, inner West for 10 years or so (fab spot), moved to Adelaide (disaster), and now back in UK. If your other half is a chippie, then there will always be plenty of work for him around Sydney, but beware that the Oz economy is commencing a slight downturn, this impact is as you have observed , occurs more quickly areas such as Mining/construction and locations or cities that have failed to diversify due to lack of vision are not doing well, for example Perth and Adelaide. The issue I see, is his daily commute, if you're living in inner west, say Balmain/Abbotsford/Five Dock area (along the paramatta river) , and he gets a gig in the CBD then it's 20-30min, but if he gets a gig out west, then he is going to spend at least 2 if not 3 hours minimum commuting , if he gets a gig in northern beaches, same deal, 1 hour up, 1 hour back, so you have to think carefully about the community you'll live in, join school board/pre-schools/parents group etc Avoid the eastern burbs, nice to look at, but flat-land, single professionals and expensive for what you get

We left South Australia for that very reason, State & Local Government croynism, corruption, Incompetence, the myopic nepotism and almost criminal incompetence across the public sector and indeed in the very small private sector, inability to take risks, show any leadership, make decisions based on integrity, the chronic inability to admit or learn from mistakes, or learn and have good regard and obligation/humility for others or guide and be professional and charitable in your work, these attributes are what makes society built on integrity, meritocracy flourish, sure the negative aspects I've referred to above exist everywhere, but nowhere have I seen such a perfect storm of concentrated dysfunction as in Adelaide and SA. We moved back to the UK because Adelaide or rather the society in Adelaide wasunsuitable for our family's needs, lack of opportunity, mypoic 2nd or indeed 3rd rater's in positions of influence (i.e. mates of mates), very poor educational prognosis for our aspergers boy (who is now thriving and has gone from strength to strength with a system that is actually competent, east sussex/kent), our other children are also fitting in very well and thriving. It takes quite some time for a place such as Adelaide to become this dysfunctional, be advised: it may take a similar time for it to recover.

We took pretty much everything except large whitegoods, as regards adaptors/plugs, we also did both. Our Samsung Led works fine with UK freesat, but can't vouch for other Tv's, I've changed over 20 plugs in the last month....yaawn.... loads of Lamps, Dyson x2, Mixer, toaster, microwave, but we left the Kids Ps3/Wii and TV along with TV Hard Drive on the aussie plugs and just use a x6 surge protected aud board with a UK plug, all our usb chargers for tablets are on adaptors, but the aud powerboard has x2 usb ports for charging.

Crown Removals , great service.

20ft container, cost $7787 + $822 specified insurance premium on items valued at 23K instead of Lump Sum % of total value, to East Sussex/Kent in June this year. Total 8600, good communication from Operator here in UK, great Packup in Adelaide, 4-5 days delay at Dover (HMRC), professional and good unpacking service (they put beds and kids bunk beds together) by UK arm of firm, not sure if I'm allowed to say who, but Lizzie wears a thing on her head that sounds like the name of the company.

lol, hope it does not worsen at a rate that outstrips my healthcare, but I'm using reading glasses only, so I do notice my first glasses (if i can find em!) are not that great for reading anymore

I worked in the Justice system in both NSW and SA, Ice is definitely a major problem both there and in SA, it is cheap and very easy to manufacture, infact one of the last trials I attended in SA was a wanna-be bikie clown convicted whilst carrying around 16K worth of cash and about 30K worth of ICE in varying states ( paste, powder, crystal). I also worked in the child protection (as a consultant on protective intervention and slow burner abuse, yeah delightful subject matter ..not) in NSW , and what I saw quite simply exhausted me emotionally and professionally, huge professional effort by case workers and police are squandered by senior lassie faire leadership & political clowns (yes, clover) who should be shown the door. I have also travelled extensively though-out australia , and been into some of the most remote areas of the country, and what I saw left me with only despair, it's not getting better , sadly it's getting much much worse. I saw first-hand what substance abuse does to remote societies. So, yes, Australia is OK if you can afford to bring up kids in a nice environment, same as UK I imagine, however, if you can't ?..... I agree with one of the other posters here, Australia is good to start a family, but not so great anymore to complete it, UK and Europe have much much more opportunity and options than say a regional area in oz like Adelaide or Perth or indeed Townsville ? We moved back to the UK this year and Kids are thriving and I have seen no evidence of ICE and or groups of kids hanging round on street corners.

BUPA offer x2 free pairs per year, calendar, so each January on or around 16th ish, we used to nip down to specsavers and collect x4 pairs, two pair for my wife and two pair for me, we now have over 8 pairs each, and I still can't find a pair when i need them. Mind you , we used to spend over 4K aud on private health care each year, so x4 pairs of glasses hardly makes a dent

bit of legwork, but work through jetpets = emirates = vet = emirates = jetpet, you'll have to do a bit of runaround

Seriously though, I can assure you emirates and any other carrier that sequences through Dubai, take very good care of the animals, as regards the little chap, as long as the medication does not affect his respiratory function (i.e. breathing) then he's good to travel on that basis, you will need to be totally upfront with emirates regading the epilipsy and I can't advise you on that. On another point, Dogs don't really have a sense of time, so say 1 hour in crate is the same as say 6 hours in crate, does not actually matter what environment, crews keep temps and pressures in cargo same as for people up top, and indeed can even make it warmer for pooch if requested/#.

Hey Rosie, Call Emirates and/or Qantas and explain what you want, they are both very professional animal movers, they know their stuff, (they may refer you to a freight handler) do not worry, we moved a Pet dog to london via dubai a few months ago and they were fantastic, call them direct, explain what your needs are and you'll be well looked after, just a head up on the timescale, you need to be doing this say 6-8 weeks before you travel. Some vaccinations need to be in place 4-6 before travel date. I used to work for QF and know exactly how animals are treated and handled, and I can assure you it's very professional and caring, they do actually take very good care of the animals.