Considered France but languages are NOT my strong point, beautiful countryside, great climate, charm, history and not too far from family and friends.
Australia because, good climate, lovely people (who sort of speak English ), I have family there and loved it when I went there! Only real draw back is distance from UK, not sure everyone in my family will be able to cope with just how far away it is, but time will tell!

Hi Sandy, yeah sure :

http://britishexpats.com/forum/showt...t=315382&pp=40

Beware tho, I DO waffle on ...lol, and am known to post as pic or two so you've been warned if your on Dial up!

I think I prob said a few times throughout the thread that we was finding it so wonderful out there, I didn't want to come across as 'rubbin it in', but it IS just soooo wonderful in Oz, we're currently doin everything in our powers to get back out!

Good luck with the daughter, she'll love it out there, don't worry about that ...

Yeah South of France led to Oz ( ?!?! ...lol) for the exact same reasons, altho to be honest after seeing Oz, both myself and partner do wonder how we ever considered France ...

Hi Paul,

Thanks for the link to such an inspirational thread! It brought back so many memories of our stay at Brisbane 5 yrs ago, we only visited Gold Coast for a few days here and there but we also went up the Sunshine Coast to Coolum & Noosa. My cousin and her family were living in Wynnum (South East Bayside) at the time. They moved to Melbourne a couple of months ago, which is good for us cos they will be able to sponsor us after 1 year (unless the rules change again.....). We've been knocked back so many times by rule changing visas over the last couple of years that I have been wondering whether the hand of fate was trying to tell us something! So I've been absent from the forum for a while but have recently realised that if it's going to happen, we have to take control, so I'm now back on the case - big time!

The message that echoed through your thread mirrored the feeling we had of Brisbane. We found the kids to be polite (I'm sure there are exceptions, but we had no bad experiences at all.), litter was minimal (the BBQ's were all cleaned up in Wynnum too!), I only saw graffiti on the railway walls close to the city centre, nowhere else. The local people were incredibly friendly and I suppose I should be slightly embarrassed at the fact that the guy from the local bottlo recognised us in town one day, but it was actually such a great feeling!! I went and bought an expensive bottle of wine from him the next day (well, expensive in Oz terms, not quite the prices I'm used to paying here in Tesco's!!)

The whole place had a time-warp feel about it. All the mod-cons but with that kind of old-fashioned family feel-good feeling that I was brought up in, in the 70's. We were an average family living in the subs in York, not much money about but family was everything. I see my kids now and know that they are materialistic and full of self interest (and I know I wasn't like that!) and I want them to experience more than that. (I have to add that our kids haven't been to Oz yet. We adopted our two at age 6 & 3, but they are so like us now that I kind of forget!)

I'm waffling now, I just know that this is the right decision for me and my family, despite what the rest of the family say. It will happen.

Good luck to you Paul and family!

Sandy

The Summer is 9 months long and the Winter is 3 months long, instead of the other way round like the UK.

And it's an undercrowded, rather than overcrowded, island!


Nicky