Hi All, hope you don't mind me joining in this forum. We found out today that we are moving from Western Australia to Spain for a year for work.

We are so excited. We are a family of 3 (5 year old daughter) and will be working in Ferrol so living nearby. I have never been overseas, know nothing at all about the country yet and will arrive in around 6 weeks.

any information at all on the area would be wonderful. We are starting our Spanish language lessons soon.

I am also an amateur runner who runs alone normally dawn or dusk so I would like to know about the crime rate and if it is safe to run alone at these times (I am female)

any advice would be so much appreciated

Sharon

Welcome to the forum. There are not many of us who post on this section who actually live in Galicia.
We once posted what we thought about the town of Ferrol and it upset someone who was born there. The countryside around is really nice.
You will feel at home in that region as they have a lot of eucalyptus tress, but no koalas!
Do you know the main language is Gallego? But don’t worry so much as Spanish is spoken too. But you will find all things related to officialdom in Gallego.
Here is a link to the local TV news. It will help you understand Galician.
http://www.agalega.info/videos/#
There are no crime figures for any part of Spain. But Galicia is not particular crime ridden when it comes to personal attacks.
Exactly where are you going to live? In the town or a village nearby?

Welcome mdsl.

I reckon the crime figures were stolen again on one of those lost CDs.

Oh goodness, i have no idea what Galicia or Gallego actually are - obviously the latter is a language.

does that mean Ferrol is not so nice? We are going over for a week first to have a look at surrounding areas to live in so any advice would be great as we know nothing of the area or the areas around it.
Is Galicia the name for the North of Spain?

Thanks you so much for the link

When are you coming over? a week may not be enough time to sort something out, but if that is all you have got it will have to do.

Spain is divided into several autonomous governmental regions, one being Galicia. Yes Gallego is the language of that region. Other regions include Cataluña (around Barcelona), Andalucia, Madrid, Extramadura etc. See http://www.spain.info/TourSpain/Dest...as?language=en for more. A lot of the regulations are delivered according to regional law rather and thus can vary from region to region.

When it comes to information, be careful what you wish for!

But treat everything with a pinch of salt and I'm sure you'll have a great time:

http://www.galiciaguide.com/Ferrol-galicia.html

We live about an 1.45 mins from Ferrol and I must admit it is not my favourite city.

I would recommend La Coruña por living. It´s - mostly - a beautiful city, more interesting than O Ferrol and the commute is easy. You´ll have to get used to wind (it´s a very windy area) and bad weather from time to time but the surroundings are truly nice with more beaches than you need.

Speaking Galician (akin to Portuguese) is not a big issue since pretty much everybody speaks Castilian-Spanish and don´t mind using it, but your kids will have some classes in Galician.

That web site has a quite a few inaccuracies and has not been updated fora few years. It seems the web master has given up on that project for some reason.

http://taxisjaviermillan.com/Imagenes/mapa_espana.jpg

Galicia, the north of Spain? Galicia is in the north of Spain (concretely, northwest), that is different. Four provinces form Galicia: La Coruña, Lugo, Pontevedra and Orense.

By the way, of Spain is native the sheep Merino, so famous in Australia and New Zealand

Different genetic strain.

Thought you were in NZ?

Thank you so much for all the advice. We are being sent over for only one week about a month before we leave. Once we see an area we like the company we work for will organise a home, schooling etc... there are already some people from here living in A Caruna (?) so we will look to see where they are also.

thanks again everyone

A Coruña is quite a nice city. It is more historical and thus more touristy. But there are plenty of small town or even smaller villages around the area too.
We live about 2.5 to 3 hours away from the city but Battlezone is your nearest neighbour when it comes to this forum.