florabundi

Hi ~ Been doing a lot of research on different areas to live and work, we hopefully shouldn't have too much bother getting hubby work as he is an auto electrician/mechanic. Been looking at houses/schools etc and have a vague shortlist of areas to concentrate our search on, Nelson, BoP or Dunedin. I'm far too much of a country bumpkin to consider somewhere too busy!! I guess we would love to be near the coast, have access to schools/colleges and room for some chickens (Haven't told hubby about that bit yet!) Any advice on lovely places/areas to avoid would be very very welcome. Thanks again Flora

Boopy

I would say..... go to Tasman / Nelson! It is beautiful, warm, has countryside & not too much of built up areas.

florabundi

Thank you Boopy. It does look lovely ~ will keep you posted

BEVS

That's certainly true.

I'm near the coast with my chickens and ducks.

Am Loolah

Bay of Plenty is really a large area with a choice of many different towns/suburbs. I think Tauranga/Mount Maunganui and even Papamoa now may well be busier than you would like, especially the Mount and Papamoa in Summer. But I love it!

Woodpigeon

Okay, just to keep things fair

Dunedin is nice and compact, with options of countryside and beaches within 10/15 mins of the city centre, but still offers theatre, art galleries, variety of restaurants. Always something going on due to it being a Uni city.

In some suburbs you are still classed as being within Central Dunedin but you are surrounded by open fields, hills, bush etc.

There are some nice areas outside of the city which would give you plenty of scope for chickens, but you'd still be within 15 mins drive of the centre - and rush hour traffic is nothing like any of the small towns I've lived in in the UK (if you miss 2 changes at the traffic lights it's a newsworthy event )

florabundi

Thanks so much for the advice. It will be a bit tricky until we are actually there, you can't get a feel for different areas until you are there in person. I would be quite happy if we could even decide between north island and south island. At the moment my preference is south but that is based my research and lots of input and adviceMy daughter who is 13 is really attracted to Dunedin for many reasons ~ one of them being she had read that there was jaffa cake racing at a chocolate festival!!
Flora x

Moomoo

Jaffa cakes ... bless. They roll Jaffas down the longest street - Baldwin Street, they are orange candy sweets with Cadbury choc in the middle. I hadn't heard of them until I visited the Cadbury factory down there! They are yummy though!

florabundi

Yes ~ she loves chocolate! If only the choices were so simple for us grown ups! If I were to narrow it down to Nelson or Dunedin, can I ask if anyone can tell me a little more about the different suburbs and schools? Also what is the shopping like ~ I can imagine Dunedin would have plenty of choice but what about Nelson? Any advice much appreciated. Huge change for us as we live fairly remotely at the moment and it's going to be so exciting to have some neighbours nearby and hopefully lots of little friends for our kids

Boopy

I think Nelson would be perfect for you, but your 13 year old, maybe a little bored. I'm not sure if there would be much for her as she gets a little older.
Nelson & Richmond do have good shopping with ample choice.

jen.g

Hi , we were looking at Nelson first ( logical thinking! ) away from pacific fault line, no active volcanos,slim chance if tsunami but still skiing not to far away, and lots of properties with land ( not that im much of a worrier )
we live rurally at mo, nearest town ( population of about 35 k ) 20 mins drive any thing bigger is around 45 mins - an hour drive, so thought nelson would suit us, but after some research there seems to be more choice of uni's around cantabry/ christchurch and thinking about our kids opportunities in the future we have decided to investigate that direction.
I know what you mean, it is really difficult to decide until you have been for your self to get the feel of each place

florabundi

Thanks for the advice ~ yes my concerns were for activities for the kids like a sports centre, pool etc. I did wonder about colleges etc and although there seems to be some provision, I'm not yet sure how comprehensive it is. At the moment we live amongst the hillsthe nearest small town pop 4000 is 20 mins drive away and we are over an hour for some real shopping (ie M&S!)
To be honest I thought that Nelson seemed all singing and all dancing in comparison!! Trying to find out exactly what is available in the area sometimes is a bit tricky and any advice however small would be gratefully received

BEVS

I live in the area.
Precisely , what are you after please?

florabundi

Thanks BEVS. I have manged to progress my research quite a bit on the Nelson area. Stunned about the amount of sports/leisure facilities available. Hubby plays pool quite seriously and he has even found out about pool leagues in the area. Schools look fantastic too. All in all, I want to live there! I guess it will depend on the work situation. I think we have narrowed our search down to either Nelson or Dunedin. I found the local council website which was useful, but any other sites you can recommend would be great. (we currently live in the sticks with a v slow internet connection speed which hampers our research a little!) Do you love it there? There seems to be lot of fantastic areas to live, any particular recommendations gratefully received. Thanks again. Flora

luvwelly

The weather as in sunshine hours is way better in Nelson than Dunedin. This is a benefit of NZ over UK so why go as far south as Dunedin if you don't have to?