Well, it has happened. On the 8th July, we turned the key in the lock for the final time and said goodbye to our much loved, renovated Istrian stonehouse and our lives for the last seven and a half years.
When we put the house up for sale in March, after the completion of the new garden to the rear of the house, we had our first viewing almost immediately and a price was agreed very quickly. We met the potential new owners a few times before we finally completed, and we could not be happier that they found our home. They *got* her and all of her quirkiness and we hope that they are now enjoying a little piece of Istrian idyll.
Once the sale was agreed and the deposit paid, we swung into action. We weren’t planning to move to the next town, so we had to be super, super organised. We were planning to move Andalucia – and I say planning, because although we had viewed houses online and had spoken to estate agents, we hadn’t had the opportunity to view anything. We also had to clear a whole house and try and get a storage unit – nothing could be transported out to Spain until we knew where we were going to be. However, finding a storage place in Istria did not prove easy. Nothing of the kind seemed to exist, until one day, we were driving back from Porec and we spotted a hoarding at the roadside advertising Blue Box Storage. Very similar to the storage places in the UK, it had recently opened. We checked it out and it was perfect for our needs, so we booked a room from 1st July, so that we could begin to start to move things. Although we’ve done this kind of move before, we still underestimated how long it would take to pack and how many trips we’d need to do, but we did start off well, packing boxes tightly and neatly, and stacking them up in our Well Room. “This is a doddle!” we thought. Stupidly.
We did lots of car trips, moving boxes and smaller items and the unit soon started to fill up. It became clear quite quickly that we were going to need some help, and a big van, and our lovely friends Amanda and Steve, who were going to be in northern Italy, offered to help. What a godsend. We hired a white van for two days, and in that time, we largely cleared what was left in the house. All of the big furniture was moved, artwork wrapped and safely transported and garden furniture dismantled and taken away. Televisions went. Comfy chairs. Kitchen stuff. And pretty soon, we had filled our large room in the the storage unit!
When Amanda and Steve left, the house felt very empty – quite literally. We had a few days of indoor camping, a few more trips to squeeze in yet more stuff into the storage unit, and then before we knew it, we were packing the car with essential belongings to lock the door for the very last time. We were so happy to share this moment with our family, who have spent many happy times in our Istrian home, and over FaceTime, they waved off the house too.
So, our lives are largely in a storage unit, with us now on the road, with a very full car. Things have progressed very quickly since we left and suffice to say, we may be arranging for that storage unit to be emptied in the very near future and all of our belongings making their way down to Andalucia, to join us…
