What will happen to my 3DS when I move to a different region?

Recently I bought a 3DS in America, but soon I'm moving to Australia.

I've heard that the device is region locked, so I know that if I buy any games in Australia, they won't work on my 3DS.

I want to know if I'll be "locked out" of the network and eShop when I move, or if any of my downloaded eShop games will stop working.

Has anyone had any experience with using the eShop and downloaded games outside of the country where the 3DS was purchased, and do you know if there is any sort of region detection on the 3DS?

I saw this question but it's slightly different and doesn't really answer my question.

It looks like there are 3 3DS regions: Japan, America and Europe/Australia. According to this thread, a 3DS from each region will still link up to the eShop associated with that region. So you won't be locked out, but you either have to use a US credit card or change to another country in the Americas region. When I was in Africa (which I believe is considered Europe) this summer I did connect to the US eShop over a local WiFi without a problem.

And right, you'd still have to import physical games, or buy a local Europe/Australia system.