Welshrob1974

Whats your thoughts on this?

We hope to have visa early next year and plan to stamp the books whilst on a reccie - would the following be a good way to do it

We intend to just look at 3 cities - Perth-Sydney-Brisbane

Plan is to spend a couple of days looking for jobs and house prices in each city, then couple of days relaxing.

We plan on 3-4 weeks visit, so what is the best way to go

London-Perth-Brisbane-Sydney-London??

We wil obviously fly from perth to bris or sydney - then maybe get a train between the last 2.

Anybody done similar?

L8r

Rob

Techno Freak

What's wrong with Melbourne?

ElleBelle

IMO, I really wouldn't recommend training it between Brisbane and Sydney. Did it on holiday the other year (Bris - Syd) and it was pretty dull. It wasn't as scenic as we'd hoped it would be (think we only saw the sea once).

14 hours later we arrived to find to find the station deserted apart from all the other passengers and we waited ages for a taxi.

To think, we could have been there in a couple of hours by plane.

Nu-Shooz

A couple of days here and there won't be enough to decide where you want to live. I know your time is limited, but it will be a massive decision to make.

Good luck anyway and happy travels.

AndyR1976

I'd fly between Brisbane and Sydney - flights (one way) can be easily bought for less than $100AUD - about £40 each - would be nicer than a 13 hour trip on the XPT

A

mindblower

[
Rob[/QUOTE]

One month in perth wasn't enough to scope perth !

Hmmm

owen709646

We did what your are doing but over 3 years and that still wasnt enough time.
My advise is , just go to brisbane and do your recci there. We found Perth to quite (Plus you could do a Recci in 3 days there, we did) Sydney is just like any other city (Ok if you want city life) Brisbane has it all, and reasonable housing.
PM me if you need more information.

Techno Freak

We were dead set on Brisbane, but then started to worry about it being too humid and there been little to do outside of Brisbane.

We turned our attention to Melbourne - cooler climate mostly, and stacks of differeing coutryside realatively on your doorstep.

We were going to reccy Brisbane for 1 week, have a weekend break in Sydney, then reccy Melbourne for a week. We ended up going to Melbourne for 3 weeks an loved it - can't wait to get there for good.

Do a search for Buzy-Bee's reccy reports - he did time in Brisbane, then Melbourne. They are two superb posts.

Techno Freak

Here you go, here are Buzzy--Bee's two reccy reports, well worth a read.

Brisbane:-

http://britishexpats.com/forum/showt...ighlight=reccy

Melbourne:-

http://britishexpats.com/forum/showt...ighlight=reccy

sprite_green

Rob,

That's exactly the approach we took earlier in the year. We spent a week in Perth, 10 days in Melbourne, 2 weeks in Sydney (and a week on Hamilton Island to chill out).

The people saying "a week isn't long enough" to check out a future home are correct, but at the end of the day you have to get the balance between practical and ideal.

We plumped for Sydney in the end (wife loved it, and was reassured that the Northern Beaches are sufficiently "not city" for her!), but saw a lot to attract us to Melbourne and Perth.

Main thing is to approach each city with a clear view on what's important to you. For us, this was work prospects, schools, safety, proximity to beach, proximity to shops. Obviously it'll vary depending on your priorities, but its good to have a clear view on what you think is important, and then to look at each option from that perspective.

The difficulty you sometime face is that you're not just evaluating cities, but suburbs within cities - e.g. Kew in Melbourne stacks up very well against Parramatta in Sydney; Mona Vale in Sydney stacks up very well against Scoresby in Melbourne.

Anyway - to answer your question; yes, a reccies does make an awful lot of sense. And to echo someone else's comment re. train from Brisbane to Sydney - not worth it, eats too much into your valuable time.

SG

Welshrob1974

Thanks for all the gr8 replies - still haven't really gathered how far places are from each other - thought the train trip would be more like 5-6 hrs

Your right a week here or there isn't enough to decide were we stay for good - its whats it says on the tin - just a reccie! Are we going to like it - etc We are a family of 3, so schooling and area is important for the nipper to grow up, at this early stage we fancy Brisbane, but we may hate it, who knows until we get of that plane, plus we have friends moving to Brisbane this Oct.

Anymore thoughts appreciated

l8r

Rob,Laura and Sophie

badger78

Hiya Rob!
When I went on my working holiday visa four years ago I started in Sydney and only wanted to stay there for a couple of months but ended up spending about 9 months out of 12 there. From the first day I've been there I was in love with the place. I think you got it all there.
Never warmed to Melbourne even though I worked and lived there for a month. Don't know what it was about the place.
Brisbane is lovely but I missed the beaches in front of your doorstep.
Darwin has too many crocs. Broome and Adelaide were in my opinion quite boring. Cairns was ok but I think it would be to humid for me.
My partner and I are hopefully moving to Perth on an STNI visa. He stayed in Perth for about three months. I still prefer Sydney but, hey, I always say as long as it is in Australia it doesn't really matter.
I think in the end nobody can tell you which place is best as we are all different with different ideals and interests.
I would say just enjoy your trip (defenitely fly between the cities) and who knows where the wind blows you.
Nobody stops you from having a second reccie once you've got PR and you need to find a place to settle.
It's a fantastic country and no matter where you end up it will be great!!!!
Have fun travelling!!!!
Kat

stevensfamily

Sshhhhh dont tell everyone its the best location or they will all come!!!!!

Cheryl

Centurion

You can keep your four seasons in one day climate thank you very much aka COLD

People seem to have very active imaginations when it comes to Brisbane weather generally. Its cold in the winter nights and around 20 during the days. The rest of the year it averages 24-28 with low rainfall and 300+ days of sunshine.

I've personally found the humidity never to be a problem and dont know many people who are bothered by the levels in Brisbane, compared to say way up north Queensland.

yanH

It's not just the distances it's the fact that trains are extremely slow here. The ones that I get to work feel like they are going not much faster than walking pace! It's the same with cars, the fastest speed limit on the Pacific Highway between Sydney and Brisbane is 100km/h (around 55mph). It makes travelling any sort of distance take forever.