To me, there is bush: outback, semi-outback and there is country.
So, there are country towns that are quite nice, especially in Victoria. Down near the Grampians etc.

Probably true. I say it depends where you are though. Just outside the captial cities in Australia you get Uk style villages...they are not common and if you find one - stick there! Where we are is nice...and I love walking to the post office with my kids. Even in the Melbourne autumn and winter it can feel very much like the UK - but it's still 'old Australian/UK' culture.

I couldn't live in suburbia.

I love the outback, and the real country - I like the harshness - but everything I've done with the bush has been connected with agriculture so I am closeted from the real mundane, or poverty of the bush in some ways...in fact all the people I know who are out bush are sort of 'wealthy', really. What I like is the fun things to do - even just hooning down a dirt road in a farm ute with the dogs on the back. 10k to the next little farm and a bite to eat. It's sort of isolating but also fun at the same time. Very hard to explain the draw - and it takes an interesting man or woman to be able to do it.

Now I see where you are coming from. I think there are exceptions though because Chris was telling us you can buy a 3 bed place for 250k and I checked up and there are corners of counties far from the madding crowd where there are bargains to be had like he says. Depends what you are after..

We would want an acre/half an acre and a run down 3 bed place too....and then build out the back to make it big enough to live in. It's only theoretical because why would we need to when we have it here - and a city like Melbourne to fall back on.

Funny you should say that...

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"I like the harshness"

That is what I did not like about Australia and I love the gentleness of the countryside here.

My friend who wants to go back to Oz also loves the harshness and the wildness, funny old world, wouldn't do if we all thought the same eh?

hmmm...but I bet I would not like the harshness if...
it was true boganville in Deliveranceville....or a tv theatre room in the suburbs of outer Melbourne...
- as apposed to hooning around on a property with people who I get.

I have come to the conclusion that it only works on my terms...that's the reality.

I have mentioned on these forums a couple of times, that now I get out walking in it - I do find some of the forest overly harsh. That's why I llike the high country and the Bogaine plains.
How the eff do you spell it...

I have been driving around with my mouth open most of the time, I really cant get over the sheer beauty of these places. I have never been attracted to Australian country towns but I know others are.
We have found many beautiful affordable houses, it certainly isnt fair to say that you have to go 'far from the madding crowd' to find a lovely place for 250k.

I believe you...I looked into it around the time you mentioned it.

I think that some people are focusing on the really flash places, or they're elsewhere. Certainly the 250 GBP places rarely come up on 'Escape to the Country'. But the Uk is not the size of a postage stamp.

Here we go:

http://www.findaproperty.com/for-sale/property-10695729

http://www.findaproperty.com/for-sale/property-9744155

Not surprising really, the whole Empire, especially Americans, are envious of our sleepy hamlets and magnificant rolling hills.... To be anything other than awestruck by the magnificance and sheer oppulance of that Sceptered isle, England, would be churlish.. Nothing compares.... God Save the King, land of hope and glory... Scones for tea and dark satanic mills

Watch out for the flies

They are certainly attractive properties, and for around £250k you would have a lot of choice in a lot of places.

However, the fact remains that a large proportion of the UK population cannot afford £250k. While it may be affordable to Chris and others, it does NOT mean that 'in general' UK property is affordable etc etc

Absolutely... For example

If a new police officer married a newly qualified nurse and they decided to buy... With a combined income of around 45k pa pre tax, how much realistically would the banks be prepared to loan them.......??????? How much could they afford to borrow?

And not everyone is in comparatively well paid jobs like police and nurses ... In fact there are a lot of people not in jobs at all.....

Most of Manchesters "dark satanic mills" and it had a lot of them, are now 'trendy' flats in an area that has been rebranded as the "Northern Quarter"

No no no - rural Australia is dirt cheap because thanks to the over-centralized nature of the economy there are no jobs outside of capital cities. This makes rural Australia unaffordable despite its 'cheapness'.

Rural UK by comparison is always within sensible commuting distance of a decent employment centre and therefore can be affordable: Wanna live in rural somerset? Get a job in Bristol, wanna live in rural Staffordshire then work in Manchester, Stoke or Birmingham.....etc etc etc....

Absolutely, some of the cheaper (sub 100K) properties we have seen on our travels are excellent as well, you certainly dont have to spend 250k. As most know also Australia apparently has the least affordable housing in the world according to a recent report, many young couples especially arent able to even get on the property ladder and must rent.

The early settlers in Australia bent over backwards to try and transform the countryside to a more 'British' style.

There were acclimitisation societies set up, birds and animals from England were introduced, trees from Europe, North America and Asia were planted all over the place in the south east of the country.

Where I live there are enough deciduous trees all over the place to have a genuine four season display, i.e. Autumn colour, spring blossoms etc.

FWIW, Australia does have heaps of places with green rolling hills, hamlets and villages etc. In Victoria for example, the climate is actually very similar to the south of England, at least it is along the Great Dividing Range and hills near the coast. Some of these places are if anything wetter over the course of a year than most of southern and eastern England.

Of course, it is nowhere near to the same extent as in England and Europe but it certainly exists. As I said, the original settlers from the British Isles and Europe bent over backwards to make it that way as much as they could.

There certainly is something fantastic about Australia's wilderness and wildlife though, especially when you're living in amongst it. Sometimes it is like living in a David Attenborough documentary with all the fabulous bird life, wombats, koalas, echidnas, kangaroos etc. unique and colorful wildflowers and the ancient Australian evergreen forests of the east and southeast of the continent that have direct links to Gondwanaland. Also the world's second tallest tree that grows to 100m tall and you don't have to go far to see them, they grow right on Melbourne's urban fringe.

I hear you - but I would question those places that are at 100k.

The only thing I would say from my own findings is that people looking for that idyllic life might get a dud one. I am quite a sucker for the old cottage, rural feel, but some of these photos of cute looking houses that look like the ones on the telly - here's a thatch - there's a white-washed wall - don't show the rest of the street, or the area - don't show the fact that the village it is in is quite ordinary...and that it's just not quite Midsomer murders after all.

it's a similar story in Australia - that nice house could be in a ordinary location.

True. I think people have to assess where they live and where they work...as you say those people in the country tend to have means of making a living.

Are you sailing from Weymouth?