What's horrible in the UK countryside?
 

I'm just about sold on reclaiming a bit of life in the English countryside but every now and again I get a bout of doubt.

Wellies stuck in thick mud, slipping over on ice, foxes killing chickens, shovelling snow off the drive... that sort of thing.

What are some of the other things that can mess up an escape to the country? Can rural dwelling expats confirm the pros outweigh the cons?

Re: What's horrible in the UK countryside?
 

Well, I'm not currently resident in England, I'm in Switzerland. Just behind our apartment there is a small patch of grass, then a single-track railway line....then a farm approx 300 metres away with a cute Swiss chalet style farmhouse. I often take a stroll there with a couple of empty milk bottles as there is a 24 hour vending machine (CHF 1.20 per litre of milk or 83p GBP) selling fresh chilled (AFAIK unpasteurised) milk direct from their cows. I also buy eggs laid by their hens, and they also sell local cheese, honey, apples and apple juice, plus home-made jam etc. It's nice to put a little back into a local farm, especially as a young couple are running it. Fortunately we don't hear the cockerel lol!

However the downside is.....the smell from the muck-spreading! Of course they like to use manure to fertilise the soil...but oh my goodness, the smell wafts across from the farm and you just have to close the windows lol! It's everywhere in Switzerland though...indeed we've just had a spell of beautiful weather and a few days ago I went swimming in the canton's open-air pool. It was lovely, until I got out to eat my lunch and a tractor went muck-spreading in the adjacent field! :lol:

Also something unique to this part of the world is that they put bells on all the cows, sheep and goats. This morning the bells seemed much louder....the farmer had moved his (pretty and brown) cows from one of his fields to the one just behind our apartment....it sounds like someone is bashing cutlery into a metal saucepan, it must drive the poor animals mad.

We also have a church a few hundred metres away too....it has five large bells. Unfortunately they don't sound like the beautiful church bells that you hear in English villages....it's a repetitive dong, dong, dong, DONG and they ring every 15 minutes and of course the hourly chimes too...:blink:

The 'downsides' aren't that bad at all - and to be honest we are only a mile from the nearest main town so it's not that rural and we do have a village 'Volg' shop, which is like a Spar store for getting in odds and ends like bread, toilet rolls etc.

I've just remembered something though.....we have a little house in Essex which we moved into when we were in our mid-20s. It's in a village in the Epping Forest area and at one time when we were living there a large group of gypsies/travellers parked up for a few weeks in a field nearby (on land owned by the district council) and caused a lot of mess (and petty crime) until they were evicted. It's unlikely that they will turn up where you may plan to live but it's worthwhile asking the estate agents or local police if there has been a problem in the past with travellers.

Re: What's horrible in the UK countryside?
 

Lack of the cheaper shopping options, you have to be more organized to remember the shopping you need on trips to town.
Smells? they bother a lot of people.
Long dark nights with nowhere in sight, feeling cut off maybe.

Re: What's horrible in the UK countryside?
 

Seeing all the dead critters on the road and avoiding those that appear in front of your moving vehicle.

Re: What's horrible in the UK countryside?
 

I'm in France so to a lesser degree in the UK - ticks
And, flies, midges, possibility of being snowed-in, wild boar digging up the lawn, moles, deer eating the veggies.

On the plus side, less noise (main roads, sirens), stars in the sky, though unless you're really isolated you still get lawnmowers. We live in a hamlet of 5 houses, and it takes one neighbour around 2 hours to cut his lawn.

It's a fair way to the shops but a lovely drive - I wouldn't swap it!

Re: What's horrible in the UK countryside?
 

Yes, our English village was surrounded by farms and had this problem from time to time also. You always knew which farmer was fertilising fields because one side of the village would stink, and if the weather was hot the whole village would reek for a few days. Luckily it didn't last long, though it all happened several times a year.

A village near ours had big problems with travellers....

Re: What's horrible in the UK countryside?
 

I've recently finished a book called (I think) Reasons Not to Move to the Country.

It did make me chuckle as it was all based on a journalists move from London to the Home Counties somewhere and the difference between rural living in UK and here in NZ is just astonishing. They felt isolated yet they could be at a station in half an hour and in London in an hour and a half :lol:

I'd give anything for that kind of isolation right now!

Re: What's horrible in the UK countryside?
 

Isolated from quick medical services . . . but then, you could be airlifted to hospital by helicopter!

Re: What's horrible in the UK countryside?
 

Around here - not much is horrible. The mozzies love my Aussie husband but haven't bothered with me at all which is totally opposite to the Aussie mozzies who won't leave me alone. The grass needs mowing more often. There were some weird black fly type bugs in one of the lanes I frequently walk but at least they weren't trying to crawl up my nose all the time. In the blackberry season, the temptation to stop and pick blackberries is overwhelming - not as good for he fitness workout thing. If you take a wrong turn you can find that you get stuck at a fence and can't get over it ( if you are monumentally stupid like I have been on occasion). Mud can be a challenge but it's only been difficult for me or a couple of weeks in the last year or so - I change routes to avoid it usually, and that is easy to do. Fibre East (wool show held in a field) was a real mud challenge and I bought wellies immediately after but have not worn them since. Living in the countryside you do have to exert your supremacy over a wide range of big and little animals who think they are more entitled to anything growing in your garden than you are. We live in a village with a church that strikes the quarter hour - it's far away enough that we don't hear it all the time but on a clear still night we do.

Still struggling to think of anything horrible - we don't get much slurry spraying - oh yes, annoying is the late night harvesting! That goes on for a while and in the spring you have the bird scarer guns going off all the time which can be irritating!

Re: What's horrible in the UK countryside?
 

Thanks for all the above posts... I remain undeterred! :) (Just got to convince husband and offspring now.)

Concern 1: Fertiliser smell. We get this in suburbia now from our neighbours who are organic vegetarians. The fertiliser smell is interchangeable for the smell of curry. The curry does smell delicious... but it does smell.

Concern 2: The sound of church bells and chickens. We currently live near 3 major highways and are on a flight path in a street where hoons have a Thursday night special. Church bells and chickens sound good.

Concern 3: Creatures eating the garden. We had to remove a mango tree a while back as bats were spitting and shi**ing all over the garden. Will assume UK deer, rabbits, moles and wild pigs don't carry rabies like viruses. (Note to self: Wild pigs ARE a potential downside to UK country living.)

Concern 4: Noise from mowers, harvesters and bird scare guns. Currently live next to council park, frequently mowed by slasher at 7am. Last time I heard a gun a man had been shot dead a few kilometres away.

Concern 5: Ticks and mosquitoes. Our garden is already full of these. Also spiders, snakes and stupid giant chasing lizards.

Concern 6: Isolation. Does this mean I won't have to listen to a neighbour woman who laughs like Homer Simpson?

Concern 7: Distance from big shops. Current local shops are a Westfield where parking is a nightmare and I only want to buy groceries.

Concern 8: Isolated from medical help. That is a worry. Helicopters are expensive to run (so those paying might be reluctant to use them). And they still take a while.

Concern 9: Gypsies. Concerning. My mother said that I never should play with the gypsies in the wood...

Overall, I am now mostly concerned by the possibility of being ill and isolated or being bailed up by a pig wielding gypsy.

One of these is an irrational fear. I hope. :lol:

Re: What's horrible in the UK countryside?
 

Stinging nettles!!!!!!!!

I knew there was something. I think I'm going to invest in a PNG machete so I will be doubly protected (cf your thread on safety in the countryside) and can clear a path through the jungle of nettles en route! Damned things really nip any exposed skin and how come I can never find any dock when I get stung? I thought there was always supposed to be dock in close proximity to nettles?

Re: What's horrible in the UK countryside?
 

Nettles!!!! :eek: I'd forgotten about them!

As a child I fell off a swing into a huge patch of stinging nettles and I've never forgotten the pain. (well, judging by my last sentence I did forget, but now you've reminded me!)

I do like the double-whammy machete solution. :lol: Probably easier to convince any passing pc that I'm carrying a machete for nettles rather than a pistol. :unsure:

Re: What's horrible in the UK countryside?
 

I think you can solve some of the problems with location - we live in a cattle farming area, so no late harvesting, but there's still a frenzy of silage and haymaking, and muck spreading, but I count that among the charms of the countryside. It's hilly so drains well and not too much mud, being hilly there's less potential sites for gypsies. In the UK I used to live in a flat area with wide verges and occasionally a proper horse drawn gypsy caravan would park up on the verge. They were never any trouble and kept the place clean and tidy, though possibly one of the minority.
I don't think the isolation necessarily means less health options, though of course this is France I'm talking about but I would think there are similar areas in the UK, our doctor has less patients, the district nurse visits my mother daily, and the fire brigade come out to check up if we're snowed in. The local hospital is about 15 miles with no traffic hold ups to get there. There's a village shop a mile away, so somewhere to get at least something if there's snow.
I don't think I'd like to be totally isolated, having neighbours can be useful (for both parties - we look after each other's animals if we go away, water the greenhouse, and someone to share the courgette glut with) and putting up with a few little idiosyncrasies is a small price to pay for that.
If you have acid soil, there's probably bracken - a devil to get rid of. Nettles make good dried fodder for animals, and revolting liquid fertiliser :)

Re: What's horrible in the UK countryside?
 

All Air Ambulances are run by charities and do not charge, it might well be nice to fund rise for them if you ever have to use one.

Re: What's horrible in the UK countryside?
 

Horrible? nothing in my opinion but there are some things to contend with depending on your willingness to accept or compromise.
It may be that more remote dwellings can be more easily cut of by adverse weather.
Remote dwellings are likely not to be on mains gas and have to rely on delivered fuel oil for heating.
Total reliance on a car
Properties can be more expensive if in a desirable area where townies want to move to / have a 2nd home.
Countryside living is more expensive than towns, say research. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/9370...of-living.html