Renting on coast

Norma_Desmond

PasturesNew - can I hazard a guess that you're in S.E Wales?
Salaries are poor here with very few 'decent' jobs, we're 70 miles away from the motorway, there is one train a day to the north of the county and it's 15 miles to the nearest big supermarket/town of any size!

Phirefly

Norma_Desmond wrote: »

I just hadn't realised how beautiful Wales is until we moved here and started to explore; Pembrokeshire still takes my breath away every time I set foot outside my door, and the wild beauty of the place combined with a gentle way of life and low crime makes it a fabulous choice.
Cornwall is lovely, but imagine it 50 years ago without commercialism and you've got Pembs!

PasturesNew wrote: »

Wales at least has shops, motorways, good trains. Salaries are much higher. There are many, many more jobs. You can buy/get anything you want much easier.

Oh dear, I can feel my phirey recepticles tingling. Why can't I just for once NOT have a project on the go?!

Kez100

PasturesNew wrote: »

I moved from Cornwall to Wales last year.
The trouble with Cornwall is - you can't get anything. You can't buy things. Every day things. There just aren't the shops.

I was desperate for a common or garden work suit at one point. I am petite and went into Truro (capital 'city'), I could only find 2 in town. Both were summer suits, so pale blue/pale green, intended for early 20s. So I thought "I know, Marks ... you can always get what you want in Marks"

Marks didn't do ANY petite suits. The woman said to me "pick the one you want and we will order it in". But I'd have needed to try it on (top heavy/not much suits me either). And I needed it THEN. Didn't want to order then make a 30 mile round trip another day.

And I tried to buy a bicycle. There was about 1 bike shop per large town. So it involved a 100 mile round trip visiting 2-3 shops for a bike. Ended up having to buy one a tad too big just because it was there and it was the style I wanted (normal bike, not a mountain one).

Then, Xmas, found out my parents hadn't bought my sister a present from me. They said they had. I expected it to be at theirs... nothing. At midnight on Xmas Eve I drove out to the supermarkets to get two simple items: set of red wine glasses and a blue towel. Ended up doing an 80 mile round trip to get these! You end up giving up trying to buy anything!

For trains, to get to London, you're best off driving the first 100 miles or so to Exeter and getting the train. The earliest you can arrive at Paddington is 10.30 (if the train's on time). And you really need to catch the 4.30pm train back to Cornwall. It makes for very long days when your job needs you to go to London for the day.

Wales at least has shops, motorways, good trains. Salaries are much higher. There are many, many more jobs. You can buy/get anything you want much easier.

From Cornwall, I always said that if I was going to a wedding and needed to get a gift and an outfit in one day's shopping I'd have to drive 165 miles to Bristol (2.5 hours) to know I'd achieve that.

So, the coast might look nice, but think about how good access is to things you need.

Although there is an underlying truth in that areas are not commercialised, you are being rather overdramatic!

I buy petite with next day delivery from Next. Quick and efficient and plenty of free delivery postage rates available.

Plymouth has Drakes Circus, Dingles and Debenhams. Really, no need for most people to go all the way to Bristol.

You can get into London earlier....catch the sleeper. It's cheap and because it's off peak, often cheaper with the berth than travelling into London at peak times. Gets in early and depart train about 7. Free use of First Class lounge with the refreshments that are in there and showers at Paddington. I use this service all the time and it starts at Penzance collecting from some other stations on the mainline.

You can get back to Cornwall much earlier by train if you choose to live somewhere in SE Cornwall and not far down west. I can do London by train in 3.5 hours.

Great bike shop on the trading estate at Saltash. It's where all my tri mates go.

S E Cornwall rules!

seven-day-weekend

Thanks all for your replies.

I must admit we have had enough of having to drive for hours to get the simplest thing here in rural Spain. We had to drive for 1.5 hours the other day to get a glass-cutter! (It's a half-hour drive and a week's wait if you want the man in the hardware shop to cut the glass for you!) It's one of the reasons we want to keep our house in the UK West Midlands - We can be in a large city (walking) in twenty minutes!

Howver, we don't see why, when we sell our Spanish house, probably in a year or two, we shouldn't live somewhere pretty in the UK for a few months every few years - our son will look after the West Midlands house while we've gone.

Hence the question.

Out of all the places mentioned, Pembrokeshire would be our favourite, followed by NE England. Being Midlanders we are familiar with most of Wales - we like Snowdonia too, but the people are not on the whole very welcoming.

So, thanks again for all your tips.

seven-day-weekend

PasturesNew wrote: »

You would think at £1500/month that the furniture in this flat would be a bit posher:
http://www.rightmove.co.uk/viewdetails-15818386.rsp?pa_n=5&tr_t=rent

(see living room)

My word - why didn't they remove the deckchairs for the photos??

mummytofour

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/viewdetails-16977580.rsp?pa_n=1&tr_t=rent

this is about 1/2 mile from the beach, the walk can be via million £ houses if you like and we have nice beaches here, really quite quiet. I love living here as its quite close to worthing/Brighton but you can easily be away from the world.

PasturesNew

Norma_Desmond wrote: »

PasturesNew - can I hazard a guess that you're in S.E Wales?
Salaries are poor here with very few 'decent' jobs, we're 70 miles away from the motorway, there is one train a day to the north of the county and it's 15 miles to the nearest big supermarket/town of any size!

I am now. Deliberately. I chose it for a tick list of reasons.

But Cornwall qualified for Objective One funding - it's even poorer than most of those new poor countries that joined the EU recently, whereas Wales didn't qualify as poor enough for Obj One, only made it to Obj Two.

A motorway (from where I was) was 90 miles away, but it can be up to 120miles.

Towns in Cornwall are about 15-20 miles apart - and they're still not big.

Cornwall is perceived to be doing well because it's all so pretty. But it's a place of the haves (visitors) and have nots (locals). I knew many people who lived in sheds, complete strangers sharing a 10x10 shed with 2 other strangers. People living in garages. Close to my house two people died in different sheds in the first 4 years I was there.

Employers' attitudes down there are: "Well, you can't expect above minimum wage because there aren't many jobs and people come here for the lifestyle". My response to that is "There IS no lifestyle if you can't afford to leave the house". Anything that was available was priced at tourists, so pricey.

Even when you get out of Cornwall, you're still only in Devon - another Objective Two area. So the distance from there to get anywhere "useful" was really prohibitive.

PasturesNew

Kez100 wrote: »

Although there is an underlying truth in that areas are not commercialised, you are being rather overdramatic!

I buy petite with next day delivery from Next. Quick and efficient and plenty of free delivery postage rates available.

I don't buy online. I am an odd shape and would need to try anything on. And Next is posh, I've never owned anything that posh. Next tend to be skinny petite younger girls. I am a short, buxom older lady (that sounds like an advert!)

Kez100 wrote: »

Plymouth has Drakes Circus, Dingles and Debenhams. Really, no need for most people to go all the way to Bristol.

Drakes Circus is quite new. And even Plymouth would be 110 mile round trip and 2.5+ hours drive round trip to do it.

I never really went to Plymouth. I didn't have the disposable income to shop for fun.

Kez100 wrote: »

You can get into London earlier....catch the sleeper.

It's cheap and because it's off peak, often cheaper with the berth than travelling into London at peak times. Gets in early and depart train about 7. Free use of First Class lounge with the refreshments that are in there and showers at Paddington. I use this service all the time and it starts at Penzance collecting from some other stations on the mainline.

I know nothing of the sleeper. When I went for work they booked the train.

Eh? First class lounge? Showers? Blimey. Never heard of such things.

Kez100 wrote: »

You can get back to Cornwall much earlier by train if you choose to live somewhere in SE Cornwall and not far down west. I can do London by train in 3.5 hours.

Yes, but if you are where you are, the decision's been made and it's not always practical to move.

Kez100 wrote: »

Great bike shop on the trading estate at Saltash. It's where all my tri mates go.

If you know Saltash, then you'd know about it. But I was online for hours trying to track down bike shops.

And Saltash was 50 miles from me. So 100 miles round trip. I did work there for a year 7 years ago. It was all a bit grim with nothing much going on back then.

Kez100

I'm not knocking your experience but cornwall does not mean commercial isolation. You were clearly down west but SE Cornwall close to plymouth offers a very different experience to yours and is still Cornwall.

The sleeper was under threat and is the only time I have ever written to an mp! Its a brilliant service - i sing myself to sleep with skimbleshanks -
and the only way I will ever get to the paddington first class lounge!

Jorgan_2

PasturesNew wrote: »

But Cornwall qualified for Objective One funding - it's even poorer than most of those new poor countries that joined the EU recently, whereas Wales didn't qualify as poor enough for Obj One, only made it to Obj Two.

Many parts of South Wales have qualified for Objective One money. Likewise many jobs only qualify for the minimum wage. I guess it depends where you are.