10-Oct-2025
Anyone familiar with this blog knows that PT's birthplace is the Isle of Man.
For a while now, we've been visiting every year. And we had started to wonder whether it could become the place to roost once our Sarawakian MM2H is up.
So, on this year's visit, one of the objectives was to scout for a house that we could potentially buy. That way, we could divide our time for a while, and then definitively move over once our stint in Sarawak comes to a close.
Some people love shopping for houses. We don't. To be honest, we don't even like the idea of owning a house. Nothing ties you down like bricks and mortar...
Whereas renting in Malaysia makes perfect sense, however, it doesn't in the British Isles. So, long-term (or should we say, long-tern), the only feasible way to be here would be to have our own place.
Fresh off the boat, then, we started to look.
Oy vey... I remember this roller-coaster of old, when we bought places in the UK and in New Zealand.
Admittedly, we're fussy. We have a budget, like everyone else. We don't want to plonk too many of our tern-eggs into the property basket, because we still have lots of other things we want to do in life. We're also not people who enjoy the idea of doing things up. In fact, we hate that idea. If it's not pretty much ready to move into, we're not interested.
All of which is by way of saying that we're not easy to please...
To date, we've seen five. Two have technically fitted our spec. One we got very enthusiastic about, until local knowledge informed us that the location is not that great. And the other -- well, it just didn't spark. Perfectly adequate little place, really quite nicely presented. But somehow neither of us could work up any enthusiasm.
We have a few more to see next week. And that will be our cut-off point. After that, we have two more weeks here, but we'll just spend them enjoying ourselves.
In my heart of hearts, I already feel it's a doomed enterprise. Which is sad.
So, having offloaded all that, here are some pictures from our house-hunting routes:
This lovely little secret stream is just down the road from the ex-farm building where we're staying. In Southeast Asia, it would probably be surrounded by offerings... But at least there's a seat nearby, where you can sit and listen to it gurgle
The spruce little railway station that comes after Colby
Probably needs a bit too much work...
We're having fabulous weather at the moment. Not always sunny like this, but mild and dry. Can't possible continue...
Some of the rather elegant houses round Woodburn Square in Douglas
The soft hues of the early morning on our favourite circuit
The war memorial at Ballabeg
Back in Douglas
This actually looks like a more appropriate place for a Tern to live...
So there we are. I promise there'll be no more of this nonsense (unless we're actually successful, but as I said, I would put no money on that). From here on in, normal service will be resumed, and we'll be all about the fun things you can do on the Isle of Man.