Where is the best place to live? The good & bad as we are relocating from Australia

Wine_of_the_World

I have just move back to England from living in Australia and of the things I really like about England is that you can live in a small village or hamlet in the countryside, and yet be only a 10/15 min drive to a decent sized town / city. Australian towns are all so sprawling that to get the countryside feel you end up in the middle of nowhere.

My parents live near Luton airport, very handy for cheap flights to Europe, and also Gatwick and Heathrow airports within really easy reach making a good base for exploring the world. But property in Hertfordshire is very expensive, and the area is built up, although there are some nice smaller towns and villages.

I really like the South coast. There is a feeling of more space, lovely pretty seaside villages. Chichester is lovely, as are the villages around, but perhaps you would prefer to be nearer a larger town like Southampton or Brighton. Again there are still good links to London for all London has to offer, plus Gatwick airport nearby.

Just a note about education. In Australia children finish school a year earlier than we do, at 17, rather than 18, but Australian’s need to do a 4 year course to get an honours degree, as opposed to the 3 years it takes in England. I think it would be worth checking if English unis will accept the Australian TE thingy (which I think is more similar to GCSEs than A levels), or else look at English schools over in Australia for both your sons.

boxer691

Oxford. A lovely place with links to the Cotwolds and the M4 to London. Oxford Uni for your children and plenty of opportunities for work. I moved here 6 years ago and havent looked back.

jaimai_2

It sounds nice where you live. we live in devon and cannot afford to buy and`are looking for somewhere with low crime, affordable housing and decent schools. Where abouts do you live? and has anyone else any good suggestions. This is my first post so hope I have done it okay.

dawyldthing

I've lived in Leeds for the past 4 years and for me its one of the best places to live. The schools are ok, the transport links are really good and reasonably priced, accomodation is reasonable in the right areas, theres a music festival in the summer, 3 universities (Leeds Uni, Leeds Met and Leeds Trinity and All Saints) in the local area as well as colleges (such as Leeds College of Art and Park Lane college) that can accomodate most courses. Its near a lof of the major cities (Manchester, York, Sheffield all less than an hour away, Londons about 3 hours or so).

Someone mentioned about the convertion of the Australian courses to the English equilivant - if you check on www.ucas.co.uk you will be able to see what the differences are and what help could be given for funding loans as well as what qualifications will be needed on courses.

I think England is a sound place to live, i've spent the last 3 summers out of England and after upto 3 months away i've always been ready to come back as even though its rubbish weather and the economy is a bit pants at the mo theres not many places where you don't have to own a car to get most places, theres a lot of things to do that are easy to get to and most people are friendly, plus theres the NHS that really do look after us.

I know i personally could not live anywhere but in England full time.

windermerefamily

Thank you EVERYONE for all your imput, have printed off all these threads and added them to our move to England folder (gosh it is getting hugh now), now the task to start finding out further information on all these places that you guys have wonderfully mentioned so we can included them in the sections on each town for us to further look into. The internet is a wonderful thing to find out so much information. If anyone would like a aussie (at the moment) penpal would love to get to know you and your family so we can start making some friends over in the country before we move and hopefully (we would like to) stay friends once we are there. A little bit about us we have been married 20yrs own our own house in nsw, have two dogs, one bird and 12 chooks, love gardening and renovating our house (have done two now in our life time from scratch and still love it), love car trips, picnics, going for drives, shopping, internet and facebook (if you are interested in becoming a friend with me on face book my email address is [EMAIL="plantair@bigpond.com"]plantair@bigpond.com[/EMAIL] just put england friend in the message so i know where you are from). I am currently a sahm, husband is into mechanics, air conditioning, refrigeration, trains and the rest like me above. We also be love traveling, photography, cooking. We have four children James 13, Sarah 11, David 3 and Seanna 2. Thank you all once again for all your help. Linda

kol1234

if you want the best SW London Richmond and Kingston area

Eric1

Have a look at Channel4's best & worst places to live
(cannot post a link, google is your friend)

gorgeouslatinrose

Guildford, (Surrey - expensive but lovely countryside, and close to towns and only 30 min train journey to london - however property is expensive in comparison to the rest of the country) or Bath, ( beautiful city, countryside, heritage, close to Bristol and property not as expensive as Surrey / London) . Both lovely places, though maybe not as cheap as the north east or scotland. Maybe worth travelling around and having a look.

Fliss_M

I guess we all think where we live is fab

I would recommend the villages around the Sheffield area. An amazing city, the greenest in europe, and next to the peak district so you could live there and commute. Great schools and Uni's with good train links to Leeds, Manchester etc. for the Uni's.

I live in Worksop, robin hood country and commute to chesterfield (south west and south east of sheff) and like all old minneing towns there are dodgy areas but some areas the housing is amazing and at a much lower cost to say chesterfield. With great travel links to mansfield and nottingham.

Plus the whole area is very central for travelling about the UK. East Midlands and huddersfield airport close by too.

sunshinetours

Don't underestimate the weather as I mentioned earlier though coming from Aus

met office website has some very useful research tools of stats averaged out over past 30 years or so i.e


Average annual sunshine hours over the country http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/climate/uk/averages/7100_1km/Sunshine_Average_1971-2000_17.gif

Average annual rainfall
http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/climate/uk/averages/7100_1km/Rainfall_Average_1971-2000_17.gif

(Notice how much wetter the west side of the country is than the east - hence my previous comments on Cornwall/Devon etc)

Average mean temp in July http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/climate/uk/averages/7100_1km/MeanTemp_Average_1971-2000_7.gif

Average mean temops in January
http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/climate/uk/averages/7100_1km/MeanTemp_Average_1971-2000_1.gif