Changes in Plans and more questions

So ............. some unexpected developments. Due to the finishing of my work contract we will not be returning to Doha at the end of our scheduled next visit to Cyprus but will be going home to London.

Due to high shipping costs we will, for the second time in a couple of months be leaving 'goods behind' that we might have kept for our Cyprus Home. The biggest casuality is the sofa set shown here as it would have cost more to ship it back to England and then to Cyprus than it cost to buy! A shame as Lillian and Emily had sourced it with Cyprus in mind. But there you go.

Our possessions here in Doha amounted to 8 cu.m and we thought it might be a good idea to directly ship our things to Cyprus but the cost was a staggering QR22,000 compared to QR8900 to London. This was mainly due to the fact we did not want the container to arrive before January and it would have spent time sitting on the dock in Dubai of all places!!! We have subsequently further reduced this cost to QR 4200 (700 stg) by leaving the sofa and not buying any insurance. Don't let the ship go down!

The loss of the job (these things happen in the Middle East) means whilst the finances have taken a hit we hope that we will be able to get to Cyprus in January 2010 when the house is scheduled to be complete compared with April 2010 that was 'budgeted'. All so very exciting.

Another good thing is that we will now only leave Cyprus on 26th September due to having to get a later flight, so an extra day! We will fly Cyprus Airways for the first time from Larnaca to London. Need to join their frequent flyer club and start collecting airmiles.

Extra things to find out when there to add to the list below?

Price of cars (We have been looking into shipping from London) and regulations for importing. We suspect from internet research that cars are expensive there.