Great post! I am glad you have settled in so well and quickly. It was the same for us and our experience with the NHS has been amazing really. We are of course in London in a non affluent area with thousands and thousands of residents, mostly council, around us. Yet our doctors surgery is so well organized! If you have a concern, you call the surgery in the morning, the doctor calls you back and it goes from there. On the two occasions I called, I was seen the same day. My husband was seen quickly too and referred when they felt it necessary. Even though we live in a big city, the people around us are quite friendly. After you have passed them on a couple of occasions, it is quite acceptable to greet them! There is quite a good community spirit as many have lived in the area for many years.

I smiled when you spoke about being being with each other 24/7! Same for us and our place is smaller than yours! But we have coped quite well. I have learned not to natter on too much! My daughter remarked on the fact that it could not have been easy but we were not really aware of how big an adaptation it was.

We go out together and we also go out alone. My husband has no problem with my disappearing to go into town shopping for hours! He enjoys the quiet alone time!

We see our children and grandchildren quite often even though both families moved out of town when we arrived!!

The weather has not been too bad over the past year and a half, though it has been gloomy lately. We just make the most of the good days. We have enjoyed long walks around London. We have enough small shops around us to be able to shop locally and we find the shop owners are friendly and helpful. I try to support the small shops and market stall holders as much as I can.

All in all, I love being back. My husband is relaxed after years of a most stressful and demanding job. My greatest nightmare at the moment is getting something wrong when applying for the next visa!

Well done, FB! You pulled it all together and now you are reaping the benefits

Michali, I remember you saying you had two flats in London? If your family moved, do you rent the other one out?

Yes we do and that provides us with income. Funny how you do things in life not realizing how you will benefit one day!

Good update sounds like you are both settling in well.
My Dd had the same complaint about tools. But we found over the two years we've been back, that most of the ones he left behind have come on offer at Aldi of all places. So he watches their sales each week for things he hasn't brought and needs. He also uses Toolstation.com for a lot of things.

That's a great idea. We have a property that we thought of doing that with but we will not be in the same country, and that presents us with too many headaches that we are not prepared to deal with at this time in our lives.

If you get good agents, renting can be almost problem free!

I noticed your mention of the allotments in the original post, FB. I put my name down on the waiting list in January 2014, as soon as I had a good idea that we'd be buying our flat. (I left it a bit vague with the town clerk, that I was a prospective resident, not an actual resident!)

At that time there were two allotment sites, and no great chance of a plot becoming vacant in either of them. Since then, though, two more sites are on the horizon, as two major new housing developments are coming on stream, and in each of them, the developer agreed to dedicate land to allotments. These new allotments are for the whole town, not just residents of the new development. I just got an update from the town clerk, and it looks like the site near me will be opened up this winter or next spring and hopefully I'll be eligible to get a plot.

Interesting that the new plots are smaller and more expensive than in the older sites! Still good value though, and it'll suit me as I'm in a second floor flat with shared grounds but no individual garden as such..

Agree, we had no problems and house was in very good condition when we came back. I would however not rent furnished.

Tempting as it is I think we are beyond taking a U-turn on that. We had so many prior issues with this particular property the OH just wants to be rid of it.