cleverchap

You might want to think again about cycling when you see the hills around here
Petone is a rather industrial area that is out to the west of Wellington. You can cycle to Petone from Wellington (I see people doing it everyday) but its a harsh ride along state highway 2 and if the wind is in the wrong direction the sea washes over the road!! You may be best off looking in areas of the Hutt Valley to live. Look at trademe.co.nz for some rentals.

Wages?? live within your means and you can't go far wrong. Average wage in NZ is around $47K I think so work off that.

Hope this helps

dytopia

Wellington's weather IS crap compared to the rest of NZ. If you don't think it is, you're slightly deluded. I lived in welly for many years. It has its good points. The weather isn't one of them. I've still got friends who live there, and like other Wellingtonians, they are a bit fragile about when discussing this topic - e.g. don't mention it! Over Xmas while Wellington was freezing cold, windy and raining, I was sitting out on my deck, with the sun blazing down, lounging under a palm tree, and having a few quiets... If I was in Welly, i'd be huddled around a radiator drinking hot-chocolate to keep warm! :-)

Here's a dompost article about it the recent shitty weather:

And then there are a ton of comments agreeing...

To be honest, I'd rather live in the South of England than Wellington if I was moving just for the weather. wait till winter when it freezing cold, blowing a gale, and you're living in a shack without any central heating.. lorra lorra fun :-)

RobClubley

Personally I don't get hung up on the weather. I didn't come to NZ for the weather, or to get rich (good job eh?)

Weather is weather! There are better things to occupy your time than stressing about it.

simonmarkellis

I agree, the weather will be what it will be, by and large Wellington isn't that bad... at least we don't get the power outages Auckland seems to encounter...

cwrtais

Hey there, I haven't been on this site since May last year so I'm going to argue that I haven't felt the need to and have been enjoying getting on with my new life here in Welly. It's now coming up to my 1 yr anniversary (this Monday!) and I can honestly say I'm loving it here.

Ok, so the weather isn't the best in NZ but believe me it's better than Wales, where I'm from! I haven't worn winter clothes since August and last year put them on in May (which was an early nasty winter). Also there was the odd day or two in August when I was in my shorts and I'm very fussy about getting cold! Now this summer isn't great by NZ standards, but by UK standards it's better than most.

As for winter, I've yet to see frost at all (well, except for my 3 weeks back in the UK for Christmas). It does get cold indoors with the lack of central heating, but as long as you have heaters and warm clothes you'll be fine - ok so I did complain a lot at the time but it was part of my settling in and being the exotic foreigner.

Wellington has a great vibe to it, plenty going on and yet plenty of quiet to be had too. The bush is never far away for tramping, there are beaches galore, all the coffe shops you could need and more, amazing views around every corner.

Anyway I'd better stop, this by the way is the view of a single late 20s male, others will have other opinions and experiences!

mahoe

If you want to cycle to Petone you could look at living in Eastbourne as you would just have to cycle round the bays to get to work, all on the flat. Its about 10-15min drive so easily cycled, and its a very nice village with bush behind and the beach in front. Otherwise you could look at Alicetown in Lower Hutt which is just up the road, just along the Hutt River Valley. We rented in Alicetown when we first arrived and then bought in Eastbourne. You can live in Petone, many people do. My first impressions of Petone was that it is a bit 'light industrial' but there are some great houses there and lots of young families/young professionals. It has a very buzzy high street (Jackson St) with loads of cafes for the day and bars and restaurants for the evenings. If you want to try the hills then Korokoro is within walking distance, depending on your fitness levels. You get great views of the harbour from the hills, which you may not get if you live on the flat (unless you don't mind spending a lot on rent). Harcourts website may help with finding rentals. Most places are let unfurnished, by the way. Good luck!

PSW2010

I was mooching around the forum bored at work & found this thread.
I lived in Wellington for 2 years, and am due to return there soon, Wellington is a cool place to live, and you're rarely 5 mins from a sea view. Most suburbs are within a decent commute of the CBD, and the city city centre is small enough to get around, and for me, never too busy. The best thing about the city for me is the harbour, there's always something to do, even if that's doing nothing. The city centre has a beach, a great park, cinemas, theatre, sports, spaces, water, views, loads of restaurants and bars (I wouldn't recommend all of them though !). A good city to live in.
As for the suburbs, some have more facilities than others, but the ones that don't have shopping areas as such tend to have a beach, and will usually have a cafe, bar, etc. There are areas where I wouldn't travel 12000 miles to live, but not many, for me I loved living around the Eastern Suburbs (Lyall Bay, Evans Bay, Miramar etc), but nearly bought a house in Newlands and Churton Park ( a big area for New Builds, which we liked). The airport isn't too far from a lot of places, the ferry to the south island is basically in the city centre aswell.
We also lived in Christchurch for 6 months, and ChCh is a cool place to live, the people down there are great, luckily we lived near the beach (sumner), but Chch is really spread out, and we just preferred the proximity of Wellington, and the harbour and city centre. My opinion after a lot of travel in NZ and living in 2 cities is that Wellington is the best place to live in NZ.
I find Wellington vibrant, and NZ in general has a far more can do attitude than the UK, it has it's downsides, but life in NZ and Wellington gives a lot more than the UK. My other half always says that you can have a life like NZ in the UK, you just need to earn a load of money, in NZ that's not the case, and for me, Wellington ticks a lot of boxes.

teeym

I can only give you the experience of "passing through" as we spent 4 days there last year (hopefully a few more this year!) - but first impressions were very positive. After initially being a bit wary about Cuba Street/Mall we rather got into it and enjoyed the bars and restaurants a lot - possibly too much.

Awesome city for keeping fit too - the walk from Oriental Parade up to Mount Victoria nearly killed us, but well worth it for the views. And considering it was May, the weather was very, very pleasant - 2 out of the 4 days were glorious sunshine and whilst the other 2 were windy and a bit damp, it was still warm enough for shorts. I can imagine on a bad day though it would be fairly dismal and even with the slightly blowy days we had, just looking at the InterIslander was enough to make my legs go!

Hutt Valley seemed a little less characterful than Welly and certain parts of it we wouldn't want to pass by again, let alone live - that said, in Woolies (I think) in Upper Hutt, we stumbled into a Kiwi wearing the same Leicester Tigers shirt as me, which was enough proof for me that the locals were decent sorts!!!

SWMBO's main criticisms of the place were that the water made her hair go a bit straw-like (possibly a hotel specific problem) and that the zoo wasn't as good as Auckland. Certainly nothing that would stop me giving it a go! Then again, I also quite liked Palmy........

crap coffee

I totally agree with you mate.

I mean, if you work full time, there's no much time to enjoy yourself or sunshine anyway. I leave home early in the morning and come home late... and when I get home, have to do homework till the crack of dawn almost every day (even though I am not allowed to take loads of shit files out of the building due to security reasons)..... so... who cares about the weather? and at weekends.. busy to do house work, grocery shopping and cooking.. the weather doesn't bother me really unless I live somewhere minus 30 degrees or something - like Montreal or Calgary - but I wouldn't live such kind of horribly cold places.

so.. I've been taking Vitamin D 3 ...due to the lack of exposure to sunlight! ... You'd better taking Vitamin D if you live in Welly - especially in winter time - my Gp said that.

bananalana

If you are going to be cycling to work in Petone, then you can live in Petone near th ebeach, or a number of other close Lower Hutt 'burbs.

Welington IS windy, and it is bloody cold but when Wellington gets a nice day - it is glorious.

Lower hutt is not the same though - slighty warmer and way less windier than wellys

JMTCW

crap coffee

that is very Correct!! - that's why I prefer to live in Lower Hutt if it's possible. if I live there.. gonna ride a bike ..nice!!

turkeys

A few comments from the Lower Hutt side of things...

I'd agree and say live in Petone. I live there, well Alicetown, and travel in by train to Wellington. Only takes 15-20 minutes as I work in Thorndon a short walk from the station. I used to cycle loads in the UK but wouldn't fancy that journey in, I have too many acquaintances who have had close shaves with dozy drivers. The train system gets a bad press, but again, compared to the UK I think it is fine. The system is in the middle of an upgrade and new trains so some delays are inevitable. Its a really nice, scenic way to get to work though.

I actually like being in Petone with its little shops, op shops, restaurants and mix of people - a slightly different feel to Wellington. Yes it is industrial, but that is the reason for its existence at the end of the day. I wouldn't like it to get too gentrified.


Its easy to get into Wellington for events or nights out and also easy to get to Lower Hutt, which although it has a bit of a boring rep, I like for the mall and blockbuster cinema stuff with the kids. I even like Wainuiomata which many Wellingtonians turn their noses up at. But I like the drive over the hill and to visit the open air pool with a bush slide that my kids love. Always feels like a bit of an adventure.

Nice access to walks in the hills too and days out in the summer at Eastbourne and walks to Pencarrow Head.

All in all I am very happy living in the Hutt and working in Wellington


Oh yeah, and I wouldn't say Lower Hutt has noticeably better weather. Just as bad as Wellington on a bad day. The tourist board expression implicitly suggest that you can beat it on a bad day. My parents were here in Dec and early Jan and were amazed at how bad the weather was. (I did warn them but they kind of didn't believe me and convinced themselves it would be like Oz, then moaned for 6 weeks.) Its been great since they left though :-)

crap coffee

Who don't agree that. but I personally feel comfortable enough living there. used to stay in Waterloo area for a week or so every year at friend's place. Its really lovely... when I woke up in the morning... its nice happy warm feelings.. you know. That's me. think I'd be less miserable if I move to lower hutt...

bananalana

I think the weather in LH is most definitely better than the weather in welly...but I'd live in Wellington if I had to choose between.

I agree about Wainuiomata - in fact, I even lived there for a wee while. Mind you, I lived in Stokes Valley for a while too so it doesn't say much for where I would live LMAO

Have also lived in Moera...and Jville in Wellies and then up Kapiti (nice upt here)...

I do love the whole welly region/kapiti region.

crap coffee

just found this. you guys might be interested ..

read 33 comments ,,,,

I can tell this survey totally makes no sense...

http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/pers...ngton#comments

daimos #22 03:39 pm Apr 06 2010
There are more crimes in AKL because its too crowded. WLG is for professionals, AKL is for middle class workers. lol

I agree though,,,,,