It’s a very weird feeling. We’ve reached 2001 and are only 38 days from departure. No longer am we referring to that grand and glorious adventure coming “next year”. Now, it’s “this year”. In fact, it’s “next month” which is even weirder. Not to mention somewhat scary…

In other news that is known to a couple of you on this list, and not to others, my parents have sold their farm to a couple from New Zealand and they’re moving off into the big wide world outside Waaia. Yes, after almost 24 years of “going home to Waaia”, the farm now belongs to someone else. Well, it does as of about a fortnight’s time. The news has not been spread very far up until now, mainly because the last time there was a buyer for the farm (about 18 months ago), it all fell through at the eleventh hour due to the finance on behalf of the potential buyer. As a result, this time, nothing was said to anyone until the ink was on the contract and the 10% deposit was in the bank.

One of the downsides of this is that there are now a few problems with storage we were not expecting. The Mighty Rocket, for example, was something we figured it would be possible to leave at the farm until we returned, on the grounds that there were several hundred acres on the farm, and it would not be a major problem to find a place for my car until our return. I mean, how inconsiderate of one’s parents to have their own lives and all…*gasp*

On the up side, it would appear that the plans for world domination are moving up another notch, with the Waaia residents storming the Northern Hemisphere. For several years, my parents have been planning to go to the USA on a tour specifically for dairy farmers, which takes them to various dairy research facilities and farms through North America. Since they were running out of time to qualify as dairy farmers obviously, they decided this was the year to go. And so it is that for the month of May, while Di and I are driving ourselves up the east coast of the US, my mother and father will be coming down the east coast of North America on a month-long tour. We are likely to cross paths somewhere between Quebec and Washington DC in May, according to our estimates, although the exact point will be determined closer to the date.

As for the fate of the Mighty Rocket, it is looking ever more likely that another owner will soon be behind the wheel - a concept that frightens hell out of me, but all good things must come to an end. Even the beautiful partnership of Trav’s driving and the marvelous craftsmanship and engineering behind the 1987 Holden Camira is not immune to the relentless march of time, and so the symbiotic link between the two is likely to be severed in the next couple of months.

Categories: Travel, Odyssey 2001