Nova Scotia
 

Hi Everyone
This is my first message :) We are looking at moving to Nova Scotia and have all our papers going through the motions at the moment and I am sending off our police reports today :) We recently took a weeks trip to Halifax and visited a relocation company and a real estate agent and did some house hunting etc. We have two teenagers a son 19 and a daughter 15. My husband is a joiner by trade so he's looking at work opportunities in that field and I am completely lost as to what I will do. My options are completely open but I do want to work thats for sure. Weve spent 15 years running our own business together !!!!! (not for the faint hearted I have to say). We want to have a normal steady life thats the plan with more opportunities for our kids. We laugh and say that we want to get in our cars in the morning and he drives to work in one direction and me in the other then at the end of the day meet at home and ask "how was your day" ? The area we mainly looked at was Fall River. We liked it but theres a little niggle in our minds as to whether its right for us or not :confused:

I have to say that when we visited, which was the middle of March the sky was blue and although a little chilly it was ok. The landscape seemed a little stark really as spring has been late so we were told. Canada or what we saw of it didnt blow our socks off like we thought it would. On the plus side the main thing we noticed where the friendly people which was so refreshing after the UK.

Were a little unsure as to good areas to live in the province and whether its for us or not. We know we need another visit as we didnt have enough time to explore properly. (we had squeezed the week out of our holiday we were having in Florida at the time so flew from Orlando then back again the week after) it was the cheapest way to do it and a good idea at the time.

Is there anyone out there whos moved to Nova Scotia who can give me some ideas of where else to look for housing and job opportunities. Our son has friends in sackville and bedford and wants to be not too far away but were open to any opinions. If you live in a fantastic area even if its not Nova Scotia I would still be interested in hearing from you.

Debbie

Re: Nova Scotia
 

hi :)

If you do a search through the previous threads, you will find a lot of answers to your questions.

I have to reply to the bit about it being bleak in March, well the green still hasn't come out on the trees here, which is pretty normal. I found that hard to get used to, especially when friends from England were sending me pics of cherry trees and daffodils and all I had to look at was brown! You will find that the colours here are a lot more muted than back home and I have to say I've never found anywhere in the parts of Canada that I've visited that have been anywhere near as beautiful as a lot of the UK is. But I guess it depends on your definition of beautiful........oh hang on, I forgot PEI! That is really nice, and much prettier than NS.

Anyway, we live in Shubenacadie, and my husband works in Dartmouth and I worked (until last week) in Truro, so we did the thing where he went one way and I went the other, it's great! I must say it took me almost a year to get my first job, I found there was definitely a bias against employing non-Canadians, and that can only be worse now in the current economic climate. However, once I got the first job, it was easier to get the next one.

Check out the price of living too, it's much more expensive than we thought it was going to be (we didn't know this forum existed before we moved!)

good luck with your move!

Re: Nova Scotia
 

Hi Louise

Thanks for getting in touch. I will look into the cost of living like you said. I cant believe it still bleak!!!! We arrived home to spring after our holiday and everywhere was lush and green and lovely and I remember driving back from the airport thinking Hmmmmm what a contrast. What took you to Shubernackadie. When my son visited last August his friends took him their for a ride out and he went to a zoo there.

The job situation is a worry I hope by the time we get our permenant residancy it will be improving. We have a house to sell (worst time ever in the UK to sell a house) :( and my daughter sits her GCSE's this time next year so thought we should just hang on until she's done them otherwise it will mess things up for her I should thing.

Would you say all in all its the right place for you and you made the right decision ?

Were all in la la land at the minute and its awfull (you will know what I mean I should think).

Well good to talk to someone over there - thanks

Debbie

Re: Nova Scotia
 

Hi Debbie,

I took a pic of our garden to show you what the trees are looking like now, not bad, but still brown! I miss spring!

We moved to Shubie as it is pretty central, also we have dogs (a lot!) and you aren't allowed to keep so many nearer the city, so we had to be in a rural zoning. ALso, we don't really like cities! Though Halifax is lovely. We prefer the peace and quiet.

We do really like it here, and love the people etc. (though they can be a bit odd :D ) we are planning on moving to the Yukon or BC as soon as we sell our house though, just for the dogs. I'm a bit worried as I can't stand the winters here :rofl:

But yes, we are glad me made the move, it hasn't always been easy, in fact the first year especially for me was horrible, but it was worth it. I agree about waiting until your daughter has her GCSE's out of the way. Maybe you could come over on another visit to see if it's really right for you?

Re: Nova Scotia
 

This is a good thread to look at to get some idea of the cost of living in the area.

http://britishexpats.com/forum/showthread.php?t=608948

Re: Nova Scotia
 

Thanks Louise

That view of yours is just exactly as I remember it when we were there so I can see the spring is taking its time coming...... There were a lot of trees down and Jerry from Remax who was showing us around Fall River area and Hammonds Plains said its from a hurricane 5 years ago. Ok I thought Hurricane it was a one off but the trees were still all over and it just spoilt the overall look :unsure: We like the seasons but I do worry about the climate over there. My son was there for the 1st week in August last year and it was foggy the whole time and raining !!! He said he saw blue sky on his last day !!!!

Some of the prices are extreme of insurances and we sort of expected the heating costs to be high due to needing to keep warm for longer months. My mind is a shed at the moment. I go from complete "cant wait for it to happen and get there" to "oh my god what are we doing" moments its awfull.

All I know for sure is we need to leave the Uk its getting worse. I heard so many people say how wonderfull and beautifull Canada was but dont feel like I saw that when I came.

Well thanks again for the info and photo (fab view though all the same you dont get that here in blighty do you) :)

Debbie

Re: Nova Scotia
 

Oh yes, they love to bang on about the hurricane :rofl: I think it's the only exciting thing that has happened in NS since the Halifax Explosion ;) but yes, the countryside is a lot more 'wild' than the UK.

It doesn't get foggy very often here, but I know it does a lot the closer you get to Halifax and the Atlantic. It's a lovely day here today, sunny and 26 degrees! But I find the winters very long, hard and depressing. Snow shovelling gets pretty old, pretty fast.

Have you looked at any other areas of Canada?

Re: Nova Scotia
 

March is mid winter. Spring doesn't arrive in Nova Scotia until late April, early May every year so this is no different to previous years. Our spring is short and yesterday we were around 15C and today we are forecast 30C but this can lower again tomorrow.

Around mid June the temps and humidity raise sharply and tend to stay that way all summer (30Cs). September is still hot but the air is fresher with less humidity. October is lovely and there is the colour change which is stunning. Temps last year was in the 20Cs until late October.

Last August NS had lots of rain. Temps and humidity was still high though. People said that amount of rain was very unusual. We live here the previous year and it was really hot with little or no rain at all.

I have been to Fall River a few times to visit people. Great proximity to Halifax/Dartmouth. Lots of lovely houses, mostly shrouded by trees. It's very spread out and because of the trees I wonder about the mosquitoes and blackfly in the summer. Lots of houses also built on steep driveways, something to remember when the snow comes.

I am not quite sure where the hub of Fall River is because it is so spread out, so with this in mind I don't know what the community spirit is like. Quite a few BE people live around that area so I am sure they call fill you in on all the details. :D

Re your daughter sitting here GCSEs. My son did, not because we planned it that way, it was just the timing of the job offer. He was awarded credits for them at his new school and joined his new school on the 1st day of the 2nd Semester (Feb) Grade 10. He has done really well at school and fitted in very easily.

Re Hurrican Juan and White Juan - it only happened back in 2004 so very fresh in people's minds. Hurricane Juan devastated most of central Nova Scotia and PEI. Five months later White Juan arrived and dumped an almighty 95.5 cm of snow in Halifax and winds in Nova Scotia reached up to 120 km/hr.

Re: Nova Scotia
 

Thanks for the weather info. Its all going to take some getting used to and we will have to adapt to it if we want the so called "better life". We noticed that some houses had really steep and long drives and the first thing that popped into my head was wow that will take some clearing when it snows!!!

as for other areas of Canada I dont know where to start really. We just picked up on Nova Scotia as our son had been and raved on about it. I feel more confused about it all now than I did before I went and I thought I would come back and be wow'd by it all.......

I booked the flights there trough West Jet as we did Orlando to Halifax and the lady was so lovely. She sent me loads of website links on different areas. She was from Calgary and said it was beautiful. She said why Halifax area as her sister lived in Dartmouth and she implied with out saying it out right that it wasnt such a great area and Canada had so much more to it than where I was going to look. She actually gave me a link to West Jets job vacancies and said they were a great company to work for. She then said if I wanted to go look out her way I could stay with her family and if she was away herself on holiday she would let us use her house. I was completely gobsmacked....... My son said "mum thats exactly what I mean about the Canadians there so friendly " I thought wow your not kidding......

Waynes a Joiner and reading some of the info on this site I am realising that it might prove more difficult than we expected to find him a job out there. We plan on moving then looking for a job or looking just before we arrive rather than try and do it before. Weve been dealing with Mike and Orla at UK2Novascotia who have been a great help so far.

Re: Nova Scotia
 

He flew from Halifax to Orlando (via TO) in October 2007. We were on a WP and in order to activate our PR visas we had to leave Canada and re-enter (that's changed now).

Only 1 hour time difference, a much shorter flight (3 hours from TO) and no jet lag compared to flying from the UK. Orlando is a popular winter destination and there are direct flights from Halifax during the winter months. We are thinking of heading back next March Spring Break and finally get into the winter sunshine vacations because you don't need to go anywhere other than Canada in the summer because the weather is so hot. :thumbsup:

Re: Nova Scotia
 

You know that was another good reason to move for us. We have a house in Kissimmee near Disney so go twice a year now. We thought it was fantastic with the shorter flight time and no jet lag. We left Halifax on the way back at 8am and were back in our house by 12.30 pm it was brilliant.....

I rent the house out its on the internet and I am part of a forum for the community our house is on. The people I chat to on the forum call the Canadian guests who come down for the winter the "snow birds" At first I wondered what they were talking about but now know :)

Re: Nova Scotia
 

Maybe you should read up about the Halifax Explosion (and both hurricanes) - the explosion killed over 2000 people and injured 9000 more. Many, many children and adults were blinded by the window glass in their own homes. 500 acres surrounding the harbour was completely obliterated and in Truro (some 100km away) they felt the tremors of the explosion.

Disasters are not funny at all :frown:

Re: Nova Scotia
 

March can be bleak but even in the winter we had plenty of days with blue skies not grey like the UK. This time last year we have photos of it snowing this year lovely with sun shining and blue skies. In fact going out to walk the dogs in a few mins.

Work may be hard to find, we was lucky that dh would be working from home so could pick where we wanted and after many mind draining days on mls house hunting we found Cumberland county fitted what we was after and for me as a nurse once I get everything sorted there is work for me

Re: Nova Scotia
 

I know all about the explosion thanks :rolleyes: where did I say it was funny :confused:

Re: Nova Scotia
 

Chill out. I didn't see any reference to it being funny, it was merely mentioned.