Woo Hoo..........we are here, landed on Wednesday after what seemed a very long flight from Gatwick with Zoom. Got to our temporary furnished apartment and all was well until I realised I'd picked up the wrong suitcase at the airport! Top it back up on Wednesday night and then had to go back Thursday morning as mine had been returned.

Thursday we went for a walk around the Chinook Centre and did a big shop at Safeway, to be honest was a bit shocked at the $250 cost of it

Today I'm popping into my work to say Hi before I start in a weeks time and then we are going to sort out bank accounts.

Glad to be here and looking forward to the adventure

Welcome to Calgary!

Know what you mean about the price of shopping, but as that was your first shop I expect there was some stuff that you wouldn't need to buy every week eh?

Howdy and welcome to Calgary!

Glad you made it over without too much drama.

Best of luck for your new start, Tanya

Congrats

Did you get a Safeway "members" card? The price for non-cardholders is deliberately shocking on some stuff... Ask for one at the customer services desk. You don't need to take it each time, they can ID you by your phone number. Assuming you don't mind giving them it when you register of course.

Oh yes, definitely do that ..... it saves $$$!!!!

Our phone number is registered to someone else with Safeway! We didn't realise until one day when cashier said "Thanks for shopping with us Mr ...." and it wasn't us!? However think we got our own back by using his fuel discount one time

It does save you quite a bit though, had my bill halved before when using my card, that never happend with my Tesco clubcard

Great to hear that you arrived safely. Enjoy the adventure

Welcome, Brownstar.

In case the information helps, Calgary's supermarkets, from most expensive to least expensive, are:
If you are disciplined, you can save money by doing bulk shopping at Costco. I say you need to be disciplined because you sometimes spot stuff and want to buy it even if it isn't on your shopping list. That sort of defeats the purpose of going there in the first place. It also helps to be familiar with prices, because Costco isn't always cheapest.

But, in general, British expats do say that groceries in Canada are expensive. And Calgary is more expensive than some other parts of Canada.

Welcome to Calgary

Just to prove Judy wrong (no offense meant Judy) the CTV grocery price comparison for February is now up and this month the rankings are:

Most expensive to least expensive.

Co-op

Soby's

Safeway

Superstore

Just goes to show things can and do change on a monthly basis and it pays to read the weekly flyers. I think it unlikely that the most expensive and least expensive are likely to change though. They seem to be pretty consistent.

Cheers
Steve

Welcome to Calgary

Food shopping is pretty expensive but you can cut your bill by eating slightly differently to in the UK. I find dairy products really expensive ans so we have cut these back slightly!

Gryph

Congratulations and best wishes!

My opinion is that life is short and food is cheap whichever way you look at it. So just eat what you like and don't worry about the expense - it's not going to make much difference if you save a few dollars here and there.

Thanks for the welcomes all, we are settling in slowly............spent 2 hours at HSBC opening bank accounts, got to sort SIN numbers and Drivers licences now.

Helen..........thanks for you help and emails, we are still looking for somewhere more permanent to rent if you have anything in the areas we are looking.