Originally Posted by Atlantic Xpat (Post 4668222)

Cask conditioned ale. Oh how a long for a decent pint.:( Surely dbd, it's something you can get readily easy when in downtown TO?

Originally Posted by iaink (Post 4667108)

Wow, its was soooo green. Spring had sprung, the weather was FANTASTIC too.

Yep, living on the west coast I tend to forget that the rest of the country is still waiting for spring. I've never had any complaints with the weather in the UK - I love the green and accepted the changeable weather patterns giving rise to it. Mostly (and more mostly than some parts of Canada) the weather will not kill you in the UK.

So much for kids to do, Warwick Castle was like a dream for my 4 year old. FANTASTIC. So many other options too.

Yep, though if you can afford the entrance fees in many cases. The problems are often also related to an assumed right - some older kids/teenagers seem to have an expectation of being entertained rather than having to actually go out and do something.

It was BRILLIANT to catch up with family, although obviously the circumstances could have been happier.

There are times when Skype just doesn't cut it!

Daily grocery prices seemed a fair bit cheaper than Canada.

Yep, certainly in Vancouver, but that has been true since our first research trip.

Driving was not too bad, the M1 was OK, getting around was OK, but not as easy as Canada. Borrowing a TomTom was a help though. Couldnt live with an M3 / M25 commute everyday though. Got used to narrow twisty roads, roundabouts and manual gearboxes again pretty fast. Lot of diesel powered german executive cars around, in fact a lot of new cars everywhere. Very few old beaters on the road that I saw. General impression was of a lot of disposable income...dont know if its rooted in debt though.

At present, I still look back with fondness at the excellent signage of UK road systems. That may change as the BC signposting (or short notice/ complete lack of) becomes more familiar. Fewer "old beaters" because of the MOT. Emissions standards weed out many vehicles and rusty holes in the bodywork would also lead to many failures - well, if the duct taped examples in Vancouver are repeated elsewhere in the country :eek: As for where the money comes from ... I still don't know how my former colleagues could afford to drive the vehicles they did. On the other hand, I've no idea how so many people in Vancouver can afford to drive round in the vehicles they choose.

Customer service is ABYSMAL. Girl actually answered personal mobile call while selling me rail tickets. Not impressed!

Generally the service gets poorer in more affluent areas where people can walk away from a minimum wage job secure in the knowledge they can get another one around the corner. I think Butch alluded to similar problems in Calgary that would seem to supprt this? Certainly I generally have much better service "oop north" and in Northern Ireland than anywhere in the southeast of England

House prices are RIDICULOUS in nearly all places.

Yep, great if you are on the property ladder, hard if you are not. Though again, a sense of entitlement comes into it a bit. People see big houses and that is all many (of my former UK colleagues) want to buy. After renting a room for years, I started out with a one-bedroom flat and worked my way up the chain. Most of my former younger colleagues expected to move from rental to a palace complete with grand garden. The general discontent with their perceived lot in life is one of the aspects of living in Britain I found unappealing. Ambition has to be more substantial than relying on buying lottery tickets. Perhaps I just have low expectations. Our current rental is approximately the same size as the place we left in the UK. Less time cleaning and more time in the mountains!

Travel costs are insane, $150 for 2 to travel by train from Gatwick to Bedford return...WTF!

Ah, but think in terms of density rather than absolute distance :D

Obsession with schools / living in the right area for a decent school is alive and well, but pretty well justified too.

Cameras EVERYWHERE. Looks like a police state to an outsider. Private security firms in city centers were a surprise too.

Yep, major incentive to leave IMHO.

Real Beer GOOD! (Fullers)

Hoodies / petty crime...didnt see any. Lots of graffiti on and around the train though.

Overcrowding. Actually the bits of London we went through seemed to be pretty well covered for parks and farmland areas around. Nice playgrounds seemed a common feature.

Pretty much agree with all of that.

Public Footpaths / Right of way. What a joy, paths everywhere! Dont get that sort of access to the countryside here in Ontario.

Yep, new public access laws have been a real boon - at least given walkers some concrete legal backing. One of the benefits of living in a place that has been more or less run by the same people with the same lives and land ownership (the need to transport goods to market, raise defending armies etc, etc) for a thousand years is the existence of many old rights of way I guess.

My overall conclusion, if you have a house and a decent job to pay for travel and a few awaydays, I cant understand why you would throw it away to come to Canada for the sake of a larger house.

Yep, me neither, but Canada is not just about a larger house for many people (well, us anyway). It is a fine balance and we were able to make the move without "throwing it all away" so we're having a go. So far, it has been very positive - but get back to me in a couple of years :)

England is a pretty nice place...IF YOU HAVE THE MONEY TO LIVE IN A NICE AREA. Based on visiting family in Woking Surrey and a North Beds Village, and a friend in Radcliffe near Nottingham.

Lots of people (most of my family for a hundred or so) in England have happy, successful (in their own terms) and contented lives. There are also many people who have unhappy or unsuccessful lives. Sadly, not all of them have the opportunity to make a fresh start whether in the UK or elsewhere.

Was nice to get back home though and get a decent coffee and a shower and sleep in my own bed too.

Nice to know where home is then :)

Originally Posted by dbd33 (Post 4668163)

I don't follow, surely one thing we can all agree on is the lack of quality beer in Canada. There are a few pubs that keep Fullers but they're a long way apart; generally if you want a good pint you either have to go home or to the US.

Originally Posted by iaink (Post 4667108)

Well. My mum died so we all went over for the funeral. Looking at the UK with my now canadian eyes here are a few impressions I got. (Bearing in mind Im pretty happy in Canada with my lot)

Wow, its was soooo green. Spring had sprung, the weather was FANTASTIC too.

So much for kids to do, Warwick Castle was like a dream for my 4 year old. FANTASTIC. So many other options too.

It was BRILLIANT to catch up with family, although obviously the circumstances could have been happier.

Daily grocery prices seemed a fair bit cheaper than Canada.

Driving was not too bad, the M1 was OK, getting around was OK, but not as easy as Canada. Borrowing a TomTom was a help though. Couldnt live with an M3 / M25 commute everyday though. Got used to narrow twisty roads, roundabouts and manual gearboxes again pretty fast. Lot of diesel powered german executive cars around, in fact a lot of new cars everywhere. Very few old beaters on the road that I saw. General impression was of a lot of disposable income...dont know if its rooted in debt though.

Customer service is ABYSMAL. Girl actually answered personal mobile call while selling me rail tickets. Not impressed!

House prices are RIDICULOUS in nearly all places.

Travel costs are insane, $150 for 2 to travel by train from Gatwick to Bedford return...WTF!

Obsession with schools / living in the right area for a decent school is alive and well, but pretty well justified too.

Cameras EVERYWHERE. Looks like a police state to an outsider. Private security firms in city centers were a surprise too.

Real Beer GOOD! (Fullers)

Hoodies / petty crime...didnt see any. Lots of graffiti on and around the train though.

Overcrowding. Actually the bits of London we went through seemed to be pretty well covered for parks and farmland areas around. Nice playgrounds seemed a common feature.

Public Footpaths / Right of way. What a joy, paths everywhere! Dont get that sort of access to the countryside here in Ontario.


My overall conclusion, if you have a house and a decent job to pay for travel and a few awaydays, I cant understand why you would throw it away to come to Canada for the sake of a larger house. England is a pretty nice place...IF YOU HAVE THE MONEY TO LIVE IN A NICE AREA. Based on visiting family in Woking Surrey and a North Beds Village, and a friend in Radcliffe near Nottingham.

Was nice to get back home though and get a decent coffee and a shower and sleep in my own bed too.

Originally Posted by iaink (Post 4668534)

Thank you all for your messages and karma. My mum had been in hospital for a few weeks with what seemed like a fairly minor ailment, without improving due to an underlying leukemia condition, and she got worse quite quickly with heart complications in the last week. It was quite sudden and she died between my booking a flight to go visit and me actually making it there. Of course the thought that something like this might happen is obviously something you consider when moving 3500 miles away, and I think I was sort of reconciled to dealing with it when / if it happened. Family have been great, especially my wifes no nonsense attitude (She lost her mother while working in Japan) and the fact that one of my brothers was there for my dad when he needed it. If it was just me over here and my Dad there, the whole thing would have been far more traumatic. As it is, you get far too busy organising passports and flights etc, and that helps you to keep going.

TV....I forgot about UK TV. Digital off air...why cant we get that going in canada?. Freeview is great. C-bbies, sky news and sports highlites and all the rest. Content is an individual taste of course, but the widescreen format and picture quality available off air for nothing, plus the additional available digital content, was an eye opener for me compared to the fuzzy crap I pay $50 a month for here. Well worth the license fee.

Originally Posted by The Smiths (Post 4669797)

Again condolances for your loss.

But thank you so much for your post. We have decided to postpone our move to Canada (after lots of deliberation and fact finding) due to my mum's health and realisations that we were putting so much of our lives on hold during the interminable wait for PR.

I now feel strangely liberated for having made the decision to stay. We live in a beautiful cottage in a lovely area of worcestershire within 20 minutes drive of fantastic shopping, culture, arts etc..and are looking at our current situation in a new light and starting to appreciate our close proximity to family, great schools, historical areas, and beautiful countryside.

Perhaps the beautiful weather has affected us all this weekend (global warming....bring it on!); nearly loosing my mum to brain tumour...I don't know. But I think that we have made the right decision for us right now.

Good luck to all of you who have taken the plunge. I admire your courage and resilliance. To those of you who haven't been home in a while please try to stay away from the Daily Mail for your information...the UK is still OK.


PS: We were at Kenilworth castle on Saturday, followed by dinner and pint in lovely country pub....just lovely!

Originally Posted by R2D2 (Post 4670771)

Sometimes, it takes some time away, to realise just what you had under your nose. After 2 yrs of living in Canada, we (yes, i'm backing my hubby now)...we, are making plans to move back.

I hope our trip back to the UK in the summer makes us realise we will be doing the right thing. I'm just so sorry Iain, that your trip came about under such sad circumstances. Its one of my biggest worries, being so far away from everyone I care about, should any tragedy occur.

Originally Posted by iaink (Post 4667108)

My overall conclusion, if you have a house and a decent job to pay for travel and a few awaydays, I cant understand why you would throw it away to come to Canada for the sake of a larger house. England is a pretty nice place...IF YOU HAVE THE MONEY TO LIVE IN A NICE AREA.

Originally Posted by Butch Cassidy (Post 4669736)

To be blunt???

Fullers and Quality beer? Not in the same paragraph never mind sentence. :eek:

Originally Posted by Hipster Contrarian (Post 4671703)

Sorry to hear about your mum, Iain.


I found the whole post very interesting, but especially this bit. I think I'm in a different situation to most other people here, in that I'm not hoping to move to Canada for a larger house, or to raise children or anything, but for other reasons. I don't think my expectations are too high, in that we would be fine with a 1 or 2 bedroom flat, and we're trying to get rid of the car anyway... I'm not dissatisfied with the UK, and I don't think it's all going to the dogs: we just want to see what else is out there (among other reasons).

I'm explaining this really badly, but your post made me quite nervous- which not necessarily a bad thing at all when you're considering emigrating- Is there anybody else here in my sort of position that knows what I mean? (i.e. who hasn't going out to Canada to build a huge house and raise 4 children etc?) How have you found it, bearing in mind that your expectations probably differed from those mentioned by Iain? Good idea/bad idea?

Thanks, and hope that isn't a hijack?

Originally Posted by iaink (Post 4667108)

Well. My mum died so we all went over for the funeral. Looking at the UK with my now canadian eyes here are a few impressions I got. (Bearing in mind Im pretty happy in Canada with my lot)

Wow, its was soooo green. Spring had sprung, the weather was FANTASTIC too.

So much for kids to do, Warwick Castle was like a dream for my 4 year old. FANTASTIC. So many other options too.

It was BRILLIANT to catch up with family, although obviously the circumstances could have been happier.

Daily grocery prices seemed a fair bit cheaper than Canada.

Driving was not too bad, the M1 was OK, getting around was OK, but not as easy as Canada. Borrowing a TomTom was a help though. Couldnt live with an M3 / M25 commute everyday though. Got used to narrow twisty roads, roundabouts and manual gearboxes again pretty fast. Lot of diesel powered german executive cars around, in fact a lot of new cars everywhere. Very few old beaters on the road that I saw. General impression was of a lot of disposable income...dont know if its rooted in debt though.

Customer service is ABYSMAL. Girl actually answered personal mobile call while selling me rail tickets. Not impressed!

House prices are RIDICULOUS in nearly all places.

Travel costs are insane, $150 for 2 to travel by train from Gatwick to Bedford return...WTF!

Obsession with schools / living in the right area for a decent school is alive and well, but pretty well justified too.

Cameras EVERYWHERE. Looks like a police state to an outsider. Private security firms in city centers were a surprise too.

Real Beer GOOD! (Fullers)

Hoodies / petty crime...didnt see any. Lots of graffiti on and around the train though.

Overcrowding. Actually the bits of London we went through seemed to be pretty well covered for parks and farmland areas around. Nice playgrounds seemed a common feature.

Public Footpaths / Right of way. What a joy, paths everywhere! Dont get that sort of access to the countryside here in Ontario.


My overall conclusion, if you have a house and a decent job to pay for travel and a few awaydays, I cant understand why you would throw it away to come to Canada for the sake of a larger house. England is a pretty nice place...IF YOU HAVE THE MONEY TO LIVE IN A NICE AREA. Based on visiting family in Woking Surrey and a North Beds Village, and a friend in Radcliffe near Nottingham.

Was nice to get back home though and get a decent coffee and a shower and sleep in my own bed too.

Originally Posted by smelly (Post 4670462)

I am really sorry to hear about your Mum Iain.


With your new perspective on the UK, does it make you want to return?

Originally Posted by iaink (Post 4667291)

As long as people are motivated for the right reasons its not "throwing it away", but my eyes were somewhat opened again to the access to the countryside, the numerous fantastic castles, kids farms, national trust properties, zoos etc etc that are two a penny in the UK and few and far between in Canada. The greeness was also extraordinary...and the lack of bloody mozzies. You cant buy that here (Ontario).

The point of the post was just to tell how I saw it after 7 years away, with a fresh perspective. Sometimes you just dont see whats right under your nose. Even Manchester has good stuff right on the doorstep. But it is an expensive place to live. One or two good jobs are a necessity I suspect to get the best of life there...far more so than in Canada.

Originally Posted by iaink (Post 4672380)

No, not really, I sat at breakfast overlooking the river here, sparkling in the sunshine, and reflected on my easy 20min drive to work and my £50k mortgage and compared it to a £500k mortgage and random acts of trafic my brother lives with.

The fantastic weather and meeting up with family and friends made for a wonderful, memorable trip (under the circumstances), but housing costs and a few other things (all those security and speed cameras must be there for a reason...right?) made me realise I dont have it too bad here. Its not like we would be visiting castles everyday in the UK if we lived there. Maybe a bit of the winter blahs factored in too, it really was quite a contrast going over in the beautiful green blossoming spring. Im told it snowed for 5 of 7 days while we were away.

At least we know the family can survive the trip back to visit... we just have to figure out how to pay for it now!

I guess what Im trying to say is its far to simplistic to simply decide UK=Bad, Canada=Good. Its interesting to see what SAW wrote above, the previous time I visited it took all of about 10 minutes to decide home was canada...this time it took a good while longer than that. Obviously there are some bad parts of the UK, but chances are 5 miles away is a nice part. Gotta be easier to make that move than move 4000miles to a new country, unless the challenge of a new country or something specifically canadian (family here, sled racing fetish, skiing, whatever) is whats driving you.

The advice to anyone thinking of returning to stick around in Canada long enough to get Citizenship is absolute solid gold. Visiting and enjoying what the place has to offer, and dealing with property prices, congestion, petty crime, etc on a day to day basis are two different things. I dont imagine too many people returning to the UK from Canada are going to be able to start up again where they left off in terms of the property ladder, not by the time the realtors and government take their cut, so I imagine there is a bit of a shock to the system and rebounding is not uncommon after the initial excitement has worn off. Just as Julius;)

Originally Posted by rae (Post 4672582)

. PPR landed on the mat. big smile which i guess says it all.

Originally Posted by rae (Post 4672582)

wow, fated must be, whilst considering my future for the umpteenth time and writing this.... PPR landed on the mat. big smile which i guess says it all.

Originally Posted by mkmurrays (Post 4672875)

On the thread itself though, it was enough to give me the willies as we are so close to going. But, having slept on it, I'm convinced we are doing the right thing. It's not a matter of having a huge house - been there, done that, had the mortgage and the cleaners. Nor are we running away from the UK. Both countries have much to offer.

We've been to Canada several times, and visited schools, done the shopping, spoken to the locals. Tried to get out of holiday mode. Done our research. And we love it. It's not Shangri La - there are pros and cons - but for us the pros outweigh the cons. We know we'll have to work hard at it to get established and settled, but we are prepared for that.

Originally Posted by iaink (Post 4672380)

No, not really, I sat at breakfast overlooking the river here, sparkling in the sunshine, and reflected on my easy 20min drive to work and my £50k mortgage and compared it to a £500k mortgage and random acts of trafic my brother lives with.

The fantastic weather and meeting up with family and friends made for a wonderful, memorable trip (under the circumstances), but housing costs and a few other things (all those security and speed cameras must be there for a reason...right?) made me realise I dont have it too bad here. Its not like we would be visiting castles everyday in the UK if we lived there. Maybe a bit of the winter blahs factored in too, it really was quite a contrast going over in the beautiful green blossoming spring. Im told it snowed for 5 of 7 days while we were away.

At least we know the family can survive the trip back to visit... we just have to figure out how to pay for it now!

I guess what Im trying to say is its far too simplistic to simply decide UK=Bad, Canada=Good. Its interesting to see what SAW wrote above, the previous time I visited it took all of about 10 minutes to decide home was canada...this time it took a good while longer than that. Obviously there are some bad parts of the UK, but chances are 5 miles away is a nice part. Gotta be easier to make that move than move 4000miles to a new country, unless the challenge of a new country or something specifically canadian (family here, sled racing fetish, skiing, whatever) is whats driving you.

The advice to anyone thinking of returning to stick around in Canada long enough to get Citizenship is absolute solid gold. Visiting and enjoying what the place has to offer, and dealing with property prices, congestion, petty crime, etc on a day to day basis are two different things. I dont imagine too many people returning to the UK from Canada are going to be able to start up again where they left off in terms of the property ladder, not by the time the realtors and government take their cut, so I imagine there is a bit of a shock to the system and rebounding is not uncommon after the initial excitement has worn off. Just ask Julius;)