reeni

I am hoping to return to Yorkshire one day. 2011 or 2012

Where in yorkshire you off to?

I am hoping to go back to Doncaster.

sallysimmons

We can't decide - that's if I do get my husband to agree to go home! He's from Manchester but luckily he's open to Yorkshire (I'm from Leeds).

I think we've narrowed it down to either the Yorkshire Dales, the York area, or the Hebden Bridge area. But now I'm looking at the small towns around Huddersfield and Halifax and thinking they might be nice. Indecisive!! I would love Ilkley but I'd need to win the lottery before that was possible

I do know I want to be in the country but my OH likes city-life, so the Halifax-Hebden Bridge-Huddersfield areas would give us easy access to Manchester and Leeds.

N1cky

Have you looked at Holmfirth?

sallysimmons

Yes! I was looking at houses online there yesterday. We're going back in September and I think we're going to visit Holmfirth and take a look. Do you know it well?

reeni

We took my mom there once because she loved the show last of the summer wine. It is a beautiful little village.

reeni

Google maps has the little man available for holmfirth - so you could walk around the village :-)

N1cky

Yes, I lived there for 8 years. It's a lovely place, lots of tourists in the summer, but, because of the tourists there is lots to do for a little town, there are plenty of restaurants, a couple which are very good. Lots of nice pubs, a theatre and plenty of shops, there are also lots of wonderful walks.

It has easy access to Manchester, Leeds, Sheffield, Huddersfield. We were always very happy there.

Steveclare

Hi
We are going back in August (if the house sells) and will be going to the York area, beautiful city, I can't wait!!!!

pinkkristen

We are from good old Yorkshire (Burley in Wharfedale, 5 mins from Ilkley). If we go back (which it looks probable, we will go back to our lovely little village and hopefully will be able to but a house there again! Its an expensive part of Yorkshire and we bought many years ago a small but pleasant enough house at the right time.
We gave it up in search of adventure and a new life. What this experience has brought home to us just what we did have, what a wonderful school my daughter was in and what fab, friendly people we had in our village.

I'll never forget an Aussie fella that lives in the village saying to us "what on earth do you want to move abroad when you have all of this on your doorstep".

I guess it comes down to taking for granted what we had had all our lives. To an Aussie he had hit jackpot living in a small friendly community with beautiful countryside within 5 mins reach.

My husband would have never got off the plane when we first arrived, it was me who always wanted to try it. My mum being Canadian and living here in her earlier years always raved on about how Canada was the bee all and end all and thinks the UK has gone to 'the dogs' and we would be giving our kids a better future etc. We though we have to try it. Plus my husbands family (all from Yorkshire had recently moved out).

Now i can see, to a Canadian, why you would never find the pull to live somewhere else, life here is convenient, pleasant, good for the kids, some would say good climate. For me though, i'm english and have seen more to life than this, i miss excitment, culture, history, countryside, the people, humour - i could go on.

So, i would never want to say anything bad about Canada (apart from i find it lacking a certain flair) its just not for us!

I go through the same emotions as others on here about making mistakes about the kids as they have lots of fun and where is the future best for them, but they are Canadians and can make their own choices later on in life. I believe truly that we all have to be happy and happy parents make happy children and we are just not quite there!

One thing i don't miss about yorkshire is the weather!! I am going back for a holiday in July and i can't wait - hopefully we will get some sunshine!

Sorry if this sounds all muddled but i'm trying to keep an eye on 3 kids running round outside whilst typing!

Graham and Maria

Waves to all the fellow Yorkshire folk,
I would swap places with you today but my wife likes it here

marbles

We felt like you all when we had spent 5 years in nz and so we moved back to Halifax which is where we grew up (but had not lived for probably 15 years) but 5 years on we think it was a big mistake and are hoping to move back out to NZ in December.
The weather - ahhhhhh, so much worse than i ever remembered, and when you have experienced it better you just miss it even more.

The countryside is beautiful but you sit in traffic everywhere you go so it takes the fun out of it, and its impossible to find anywhere quiet unless its an awful wet/windy day when everyone else has had the common sense to stay in.

The central heating - wonderful but boy does it cost a lot of money so you end up trying to not have it on much to save money and then sit around freezing.

My journey to work now takes twice as long as most roads have so many cars parked on them that they are now down to one way traffic.

We went on the M62 yesterday to the seaside and it took us 15 minutes to get onto it because the traffic was at a stand still and that was at 7.15 in the morning! It was because of the volume of traffic not road works either which made it even worse.

If your thinking of halifax then you need to image it being more like bradford now where every other shop is a takeaway.

What more can i say really........... somedays i look and think how beautiful it is but then i see the problems that the country has which i never really saw before, so in a way we needed to come back to settle our minds. I want my children to be outside playing as often as possible, to not be sat infront of a tv or xbox because its too grotty outside to play out, to not be in competition over what games they have or what consoles they want next, basically to not be as materialistic. I will miss the history, the castles, the theme parks, the shopping etc but we've decided that for the occasional times we get to do those things we could be having a much more contented lifestyle away from the rat race as they say.

Steveclare

I understand what you mean, but where I am a the mo its too hot for the kids to play outside and you get eaten alive. Constant running of air-conditioners also cost a fortune and you spend the whole of summer inside so not much fun.
Every country will always have it's comprises, thats one thing I have learnt from this whole experience. I had to sit down and really think about what are the most important things in my life and to me that means family and friends!!!
The UK will never be perfect but for some of us its home good or bad.
Good luck with the move I hope all goes smoothly
Clare x

sallysimmons

This would be the advantage of moving back from NY I guess - our traffic sucks and our utility bills are out of control! No difference

As for the weather, well today it was way too hot with hideous humidity and it's only the start of June. I'll barely emerge from the house until September now. I can't stand this heat.

I do know I would miss the sun streaming in through the windows almost every day. But not enough to stay so far away from my family and friends, who I miss terribly. Houses and traffic and weather are nothing compared to that - at least for me.

marbles

I understand about the weather, I couldn't go to a climate where I was stuck inside because of the heat, thats why australia has never appealed to us, my brother lives their and he is always inside with his air conditioning on and you can't open windows or doors. NZ has a climate very similar to here but milder in winter and warmer in summer so its just nice.

I understand about family too, but we have found that we don't see them very much, they go about with their lives as do we and because we have been away for so long with living down south and then abroad, that we haven't got that much in common with them. It certainly wasn't worth coming all the way back over here for them which is a real shame.

Nowhere is perfect which is hard, I think once you have moved once i think you will always have itchy feet and look for the good and bad in places and it becomes harder to settle down. You just have to choose which is the best one for you at the time.

Stormer999

Marbles....thank you for such a good post. So nice to hear the thoughts of someone who has been there and done that. I have had doubts about moving to NZ and settling into a strange country and environment but your observations are so simply put and true that I know it will work for us. A Kiwi once said to me in NZ when I came 'for a look see'.....If you are a City type chances are you will not settle in NZ as we have so little manufactured entertainment, you have to be happy in your surroundings.