Christmas in July (The Sequel)

Garry and I are currently enjoying a long weekend in Meerschaum Vale, a lush farm-filled valley near Ballina. We’re staying with our friends Liz and Adam on their lifestyle block for four days. The good weather we’ve been enjoying in Sydney recently has also followed us north. We’ve woken daily to blue skies and sunshine, with daytime temperatures hovering around 20C. This is unseasonably warm for this time of year.

Our weekend away has proven very timely. We’re now in the midst of transitioning our business and its systems to its new owner. Hence, distancing ourselves from life in Sydney is helping us physically and mentally reset for life after Artiwood. Liz and Adam have also organised plenty to keep us entertained.

We enjoyed lunch by the water in Ballina upon arrival on Saturday. Liz and Adam’s friends Tim and Kat then joined us for dinner that night as we celebrated Christmas in July. We finished our Yuletide festivities drinking Sheep Dog Peanut Butter whiskey around a bonfire. It was a wonderful way to finish a relaxing day.

Yesterday we drove to Federal, a small country village west of Byron Bay. We spent the afternoon enjoying lunch in the sun before turning our hand to creating mugs and bowls in a pottery workshop that Liz had organised. We’ll get the glazed and kiln-fired finished product back from the potter in a few weeks. 

Liz has offered to bring our creations with her when she’s next in town. Her next visit is currently scheduled for October. We’ve booked tickets to see My Fair Lady at the Opera House (along with a pre-theatre dinner at Aria). I could get used to this semi-retired lifestyle.

UPDATE: 29 July

We finished our time up north with dinner at Ché Bon, a popular French restaurant in Ballina, on Tuesday night. This morning we packed our bags and flew back to Sydney, where glorious blue skies greeted us once again.

Sold!

Garry and I have sold Artiwood. This momentous change comes less than a month after celebrating the eleventh anniversary of its acquisition in June 2015. The deal has been a while in the making. On Tuesday last week, we signed the sale contract after months of due diligence, negotiations, and transition planning. The news is already online, and the congratulatory messages are pouring in.

We’re now deep into ownership transition activities, transferring assets and bringing the new owner up to speed on the business and its day-to-day operation. We’ll then continue to be involved on a contract basis in the months ahead. However, we're still on the hook for our showroom office lease until it's eventually re-let by the landlord.  We're hoping to clear this final hurdle before Christmas.

As with all business negotiations, the last few months have had their highs and lows. It’s certainly been a stressful time as unforeseen hurdles and delays kept us on our toes. Now that the deal is done, it’s hard to believe that our decade-long career in the toy industry is drawing to a close. So many memories. So many milestones.  For example, the image above was taken shortly after we opened our showroom in 2020. I can't believe that was six years ago.

Looking ahead, I have no idea what comes next. As my sixty-first birthday approaches, I’m contemplating a transition to retirement. Although I'm not sure what that really means. For now, Garry and I are working through our short-term contractual commitments before embarking on life's next adventure. There’s talk of renovations, plenty of travel and spending more time with other recently retired friends.

UPDATE: 29 July

The new owner’s first payment landed in our bank account this evening. It’s the first of three transactions. The sale of our business finally feels real.

Yuletide dining

Garry and I hosted another successful Christmas in July last night. Including ourselves, we had seven in attendance. We lost three guests to ill health earlier in the week. Jon and Colm came down with the flu, and Jacqui found herself in hospital with an unusual atrial inflammation. However, the evening went off without a hitch, and we successfully maintained the high standard we'd set ourselves last year.

Garry spent the day cooking up a storm. His famous pavlova made an appearance. He also made some Christmas mince tarts. A turducken was roasted, along with a slab of pork and plenty of roasted vegetables. Garry’s homemade stuffing was a surprise hit (apparently pine nuts, mushrooms and bacon made all the difference).  Ian also brought over a platter of giant homemade lamingtons (delicious).

I spent the day ironing tablecloths, putting up Christmas decorations and dressing the dining table. I then prepared my signature cheese and charcuterie boards. This year I experimented with smoked wild salmon, capers and feta, in addition to the traditional classics. We also found cherries on sale in the supermarket on Friday.

After many bottles of wine, we finally said farewell to our guests shortly after midnight (and gave Mandy a foodie care package for Jacqui). Garry and I then spent half an hour organising the house and clearing as many dishes as possible. I’m glad we did. It was refreshing to wake to a relatively tidy home this morning, with just residual glassware and a few serving platters to wash.

Next weekend we’ll repeat the performance with friends up north. We’re flying to Ballina to spend four days with Liz and Adam Benson on their lifestyle block. Our hosts are putting on their own Christmas-in-July feast while we’re in town.

The bucket list

Having logged so many travel adventures over the years, I’m often asked, where to next? I’m quick to reassure people that there’s plenty left to explore. In fact, I have a five-page bucket list I’ve maintained for more than a decade, which I’m keen to complete. However, it's fair to say that Garry and I have already ticked off most of the world's easy-to-reach and cheap-to-explore destinations. As a result, completing our bucket list is an increasingly expensive proposition.

So what's on the list?  For example, it includes a tour through the “Five Stans” in Central Asia: Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, and Kazakhstan. I’m keen to see the flaming Darvaza Crater; Samarkand, Uzbekistan’s fabled turquoise city; and the marble city of Ashgabat. These days, several Middle Eastern airlines fly there, making this elusive region much easier to reach.

I’m also keen to see the Skeleton Coast of Namibia, explore the Okavango Delta and experience the Serengeti. I’d also like to see Zanzibar, visit the famous Masai-Maji tribes and encounter Gorillas in the mountains of Rwanda. I recently met a man from Ghana, who convinced me to add his home nation to my list. Equally, I’d love to visit Timbuktu. However, the rebels in Mali need to stop kidnapping tourists. 

Garry and I are both keen to visit the Galápagos Islands and see its marine iguanas. Then, while we’re in the region, explore a few Mayan ruins in Central America. Everyone says the birdlife in Costa Rica is unrivalled, so that’s also on the short list. 

A cruise down the Mekong, Vietnam and Angkor Wat top our list of must-see destinations in Asia. I’m still keen to visit North Korea and explore central China. You can only reach the hermit nation via flights from Beijing, so why not see the best of Zhangjiajie on the way? Garry and I have also talked about visiting the Philippines.

On a more conventional note, we’re both keen to explore more of France, including the Atlantic Coast and the Pyrenees, plus a few days in Andorra. Elsewhere in Europe, we’d like to visit Monte Carlo, see Albania and possibly explore the Italian Lake District. Luxembourg is also missing from our list of European countries we’ve visited.

Closer to home, Garry and I want to cross the Nullarbor, visit Southwest WA, the Kimberleys and swim with whale sharks at Ningaloo. Garry hasn’t seen Broken Hill, and we’re both like to tick Birdsville off our bucket list. I’m also keen to visit Cape York, which you can reach from Thursday Island, rather than driving 1000km overland from Cairns.

Finally, there are a few more exotic and remote locations on my shortlist. This includes the dramatic Faroe Islands in the North Atlantic (see the Google Street View screenshot above), St Helena, a remote island in the South Atlantic and even further south, the Falkland Islands. Garry and I have also talked about visiting Palau, Tuvalu and Kiribati to round out our Pacific Island adventures.

So next time you ask, “Where to next?”, I’ll refer you to this blog post. Let the fun begin.

Where to from here?

Garry and I will be on the road again later this month. I have three trips planned over five weeks. You could say that every time the diary empties, Garry and I find an excuse to fill it.

On 25 July we’re flying to Ballina to spend four nights staying with Liz and Adam Benson on their hobby farm near Alstonville. When we last caught up with them in Sydney, we decided it would be fun to celebrate Christmas in July together. This will be our second such event this month as Garry has already scheduled a Christmas in July event at our place in two weeks time.

I then fly to Melbourne in early August for an annual industry tradeshow we’ve been attending for more than a decade. I hope to find time to catch up with my niece and her boyfriend, and touch base with a few Melbourne colleagues.

My travel schedule is then rounded out by a long weekend in New Zealand at the end of August. This will be my annual pilgrimage to visit family in the Bay of Plenty. For most of my life, my parents were the primary catalyst for booking a flight to New Zealand. Now they’re gone, I need to make more of an effort to stay connected.

This trans-Tasman trip is one of many subtle and not-so-subtle lifestyle changes unfolding these days. All around me, friends and family are becoming empty-nesters, transitioning into retirement and reinventing the purpose and meaning in their lives. If I’m honest, this change has crept up on me. It’s akin to that classic trope of boiling a frog. Over time, small changes accumulate until one day you wake up and realise the world you once knew has gone.

For more than three decades, my life has been fairly predictable, at least in terms of building a career, saving for retirement and striving for traditional milestones such as debt-free home-ownership. Now, as I approach the final decades of my life, and these milestones are achieved, my priorities are shifting. My life’s purpose is quietly changing, and I’ve yet to work out what it all means for me. It’ll be interesting to see how my blog posts evolve as this journey unfolds.