Tiverton's A Bust

Found out last night that Tiverton's Home Rental - the company we are using for the property management of our condo - closed it's doors Wednesday. Fantastic! So easy to handle such things from another country! We are very lucky we have Trevor who owns Innovative Properties (who we bought our condo from and who has an office in our building) and Tony who is the builder and I guess the buildings property manager. Trevor emailed us Wednesday night to give us the heads up, so I in turn emailed Tiverton's to find out the deal. This morning I received an email from Tammy Johnston (the owner) stating yes indeed she closed the doors because of financial problems and that she'd started a new company called Peachtree Home Rentals (which I later discovered was opened under a different name of Tammy James) and that she'd be happy to continue our property mangement contract under the new company. Yeah right! Shortly after receiving this email I received another urgent one from Trevor giving me more details and a link to the article in the Daily News: http://www.hfxnews.ca/index.cfm?sid=33541&sc=89.
How interesting!

Trevor explained the importance of contacting our tenant and having her issue a stop payment on all her post dated cheques. He even offered to do it for us. He called our tenant who we discovered is a smart lady and had already heard the buzz and issued the stop payments yesterday. We are very lucky our tenant wasn't moved in yet so Tiverton's didn't have access to any income at this point. Trevor even set up a meeting with her for tomorrow (her move in date) to sign a new lease and write out new cheques to us (not Tiverton's). Keith and I prepared a new lease under our name (not Tiverton's on our behalf like the previous) and signed and scanned it to Trevor. Tony has offered to handle our property management for us and anything else we may need.

Keith spent the evening studying as he has a recci exam tomorrow. I went for a long walk/run on a quiet country road where there is little traffic and I can sing to the cows (as there's no one else around to hear me - I hope!). It was a beautiful evening.

Off To Penzance

Took off to Penzance this afternoon as I had to pick up a job application. Penzance is about 25 minutes away and seems to be a funky little town. I've been told the people are strange! Haha. Not quite sure this is true. I spent a few hours walking around and browsing the many shops that run up and down the streets.

The town overlooks the Atlantic and is quite a beautiful looking area with restaurants and coffee and ice cream shops along the waterfront. As I drove out of town I discovered even more waterfront, so there is still plenty to see the next time I visit.

Keith spent the evening playing soccer and badminton with the boys. He's enjoying having guys to hang out and play sports with.

Extra Long Weekend

Keith enjoyed an extra long weekend having today off as well. We dropped his motorbike off for an MOT (Ministry Of Transportation - motor vehicle inspection) to start the process of getting the bike on the road. It's a bit of a roundabout process here so hopefully it won't be as painful as we're expecting. Then we walked into town to run a few errands and browse. Spent most of the afternoon in town, then came home to enjoy a quiet evening.

Helston Tour

Today is a bank holiday so we're enjoying a long weekend. Walked into town to give everyone the tour and down to the beautiful Coronation Park.

There's a walkway around the lake, a skateboarding park, play area for children, and building which offers coffee, cornish ice cream and a place to sit down.

That evening, Keith and I took a walk down to Loe Pool. It's an hour return trip from the car park (yes, it's called a car park here, not a parking lot) we stopped at. It's a fantastic walk/hike away from the world, through the forest that runs along side Loe Pool (Lake). It's very similar to the hike around Warren's Lake at home. The hike leads to Loe Bar, which is a huge sand bar that separates Loe Pool from the ocean. We didn't continue to Loe Bar, although we could see it. It would have taken probably another 1/2 hour to get to there but it was late evening and there wasn't enough time before dark.



It's beautiful and serene here with only the sound of the birds and squirrels and the smell of the fresh air and flowers. Next we headed to Church Cove. This is the cove/beach I visited a few weeks ago on my own and wanted to show Keith. I have to say it is my favorite place yet. Being by the ocean and hearing the waves crash is so relaxing and refreshing. There is a small little church right next to the beach. I hadn't checked this out before so Keith and I had a look. It's a very old church, built no later than the 1800's - I'd say it's probably 1700's. It's stone (as I believe most or all churches are here) and has a quaint cemetary surrounding it. The sun was going down as we were there, so it was a bit creepy!

Keith discovered this evening we get the hockey playoffs! We're excited! He stayed up until 2am to watch some of the game as it didn't come on here until 12:30am. That's the only unfortunate part, if we want to watch the game, we'll probably be up to all hours of the night in order to enjoy it.

Cozy Day Inside

What a nasty day - it rained and blew all day. We attempted a trip to St.Ives for some touring and shopping, but only enjoyed the drive there. It was too miserable to get out of the car. On our return trip we stopped in a pub in some little village and grabbed a drink and some food. While at the pub we played a little pool while Olivia danced for us.

I had to take a picture of Lauren for you all to see her belly. Within a month we should have a new neice or nephew. I'm routing for a nephew!

The rest of our day consisted of a lot of chatting, eating, and just hanging out.

Dale, Lauren, Olivia & Emma Arrive

Dale, Lauren, Olivia, And Emma hit the road at 9:30am to make it here by lunchtime. However, as it's a bank holiday weekend here the traffic coming into Cornwall is insane and the 2 hour drive turned into 4! This is very typical as Cornwall is hugely touristy and everyone takes off from the cities to enjoy the outdoors and surfing. Quiet day of chatting, goofing around at the park, eating, and drinking. Keith made a big pot of fantastic seafood chowder and I made a Rhubarb Mousse Pie.

Before long Keith & Dale found a pastime of drinking game checkers where the checkers are like shot glasses filled with Sambuca. I believe more matches will develop in the fture as Keith kicked Dale's ass.

After the intense game, we were off to the playground behind our house. The 6 of us had a blast between watching Olivia enjoying the swings, jungle jim, and slides, us kicking the soccer ball, the boys throwing the football, and just carrying on. The British kids playing must of thought we were crazy.

The cutest thing was a handful of boys about 10 years old watching Keith & Dale throwing the football in amazement. They couldn't believe how far the guys could throw the ball. American football isn't really played here, so it was probably new to them all together.

What!? Mandy's pregnant!? Yes, I delivered a bouncing baby soccer ball over the weekend. Since Lauren and I were dressed the same - black coats, green pants, and black shoes, I figured we needed a picture, and to make it complete, I needed a belly. Thanks to the soccer ball for completing the outfit.

Weekend Preparation

Keith enjoyed a morning of paintball with the guys. They were given a day to do a course activity to get to know each other. He came home looking like someone beat him. Last week they began playing soccer (football or footy here), so between the brusies from blocking the soccer ball (which are some douzies) and hits from the paintball he looked in rough shape. I rather the story that he got out of line and I had to set him straight. Haha.

While he was playing paintball, I went to Pool (by Camborne) and checked out a few home shopping stores. It's not an easy place to find housewares likes sheets, curtains, picture frames, etc. Homebase had a little more than Asda and I was finally able to purchase sheets, but still not the variety as say Walmart. I miss Walmart! Being away from the city does't make it easy to shop for such items. What I've learned is the Brits seem to have something against top sheets. I don't get it but I've slept in several beds here - haha, with Keith that is - that have a bottom sheet, then a duvet, but no top sheet. Haven't figured out why. I'm guessing they just wash the duvet cover the same time they wash the bottom sheet - I hope so anyway! It was a job to find a set of sheets for our single bed. And all pieces are sold separately - well atleast in the few places I looked that's how they were sold - and not all colors had a flat sheet to match and some brands didn't have flat sheets for the single size. Still shaking my head. After Homebase I popped into the Tesco and it's huge! It has a section almost like Walmart. I was so excited. But still limited on what I was looking for. Did grab a soccer ball to kick around for the weekend though.

The rest of the day was spent with me doing some cleaning up and Keith mowing the lawn and trimming the hedges.