To ask your experience of moving to a rural location with children/ teens

[MumEeeee]

Dh and I are always tempted to move out the city. We grew up in villages, but not in the UK.

Friends keep saying to us how difficult it would be. We’d be driving them everywhere/ no facilities etc.

My experience of village life was that people didn’t leave that much, maybe one a week to the nearest town. There was a bus. One friend says I’m idealistic and what I remember has changed or doesn’t exist anymore. She’s a Londoner born and bred though…

So, if you made the move from
the city to a very rural location with teens and children- how did they take it?

Thanks

I grew up in a quiet village and still live in one now. It was great from 0-10 and I love it again in my 30's but awful for the teenage years. Public transport here isn't too bad but the nearest bus stop is a 30 minute walk away with hardly any streetlights (it's a main road too) so not ideal for teens at all.

Pick your village well. Mine is very rural but has a train station so my teens can get into town every hour. It also has a British Legion that lets them in to play pool and a good MUGA pitch. If they are sporty there are football teams, also army cadets and air cadets. My ds spends his spare time fishing in the rivers and lakes and clay shooting or swimming. Dd is far less outdoorsy but she and her friends meet up and train it into town or have endless sleepovers. They do also camp a lot in the summer on farmers fields (with permission) and have gatherings. There's a tradition of midsummer teen parties in a strawbale den that they all look forward to.

Our nearest leisure complex is about 25 mins on the train, so not too bad. I don't mind driving them somewhere if necessary- when Iived in London it would often take over an hour to get somewhere, and my journeys now are far more pleasant.

They do have to get a school bus and there are times I drive them to and fro but we are pretty lucky to have a village station. Probably the biggest problem is shit phone signals and being off mains- teens taking hour long baths when you are on oil can be expensive!

@Festoonlights and others who say rural living works well for their teens. Do they go to boarding school?

When I was 10 and dsis was 8, our parents moved us all to a remote village on the side of a Shropshire hill. Looking back, I am sure they did it because it fulfilled all their dreams, but they didn’t stop to think whether it would be good for dsis and me - and it wasn’t. We had no way to get out of the village except dad driving us - mum couldn’t drive, and we couldn’t have afforded two cars anyway, and there was a minimal bus service - by which I mean a bus that came round the villages on a Wednesday, took people to the nearest small town, and brought them back a few hours later. If you wanted to use the hourly bus that ran during the daytime, the bus stop was over 2 miles away.

We did not fit in at all. The village school we went to had a total of 32 pupils - 10 Infants and 22 Juniors - and every single one of them had known each other from their cradles and they all knew everyone else’s families - and dsis and I were total strangers who didn’t have the local accent (we spoke BBC English), knew no-one, and where all the other kids had been brought up outdoors, on farms, we were indoorsy, bookish kids, and we did not fit in at all.

I was bullied from the early days at the primary school until I left the local comp at 16. The few friends I did make at senior school all lived too far away for me to see them outside school - dad was out at work from 7.45am until about 6pm, and he had no desire to drive my sister or me to visit friends - he wanted to spend his spare time in the garden, which was why he and mum had chosen to move to the country. So I spent years basically on my own, reading, when I wasn’t in school being bullied. I did tell mum about the bullying, but she did nothing.

About 12 years ago, dh and I were considering a big move - from Essex to rural Scotland, and we took the time to make sure the boys were going to be happy with the move - we discussed it with them, and found out what mattered to them, about where we might choose to live, and they came with us to visit schools and house hunt.

We picked a big village, with a good school and good transport links, so when they got older, they could get out and about without having to rely on us - and we did a lot of driving them around, to enable them to join things like sports clubs that helped them to make friends.

The village was a lot less insular and clique-y than the one my parents chose, and the boys all settled in well - they all made good friends, and we kept a close eye on things to ensure they were happy and settled.

So to answer your question, @MumEeeee, I think moving to the country can work well for kids, but you need to be careful where you move to - is it friendly and welcoming to outsiders. You need to be aware of transport links, and the availability of local clubs - sports clubs, Scouts/Guides, drama, choirs etc etc - within easy reach so as they get older your kids aren’t completely reliant on you driving them everywhere. But when they are younger, you probably do have to bite the bucket and be prepared to drive them to see friends or do hobbies.

My dad would drive us to our music lessons, and that was it.

@SDTGisAnEvilWolefGenius your village sounds like mine with a bus on a Wednesday going to the nearest town for two hours, or a two mile walk to the bus stop. That was exactly what it was like.

Fortunately I did make friends with the village children and I’m still friends with a couple of them now. But being classed as an ‘outsider’ is hard, it can take years for new people to be accepted. Everyone knows each other and no one forgets anything.

At my high school you either got pregnant or went to university.

Never understood why parents would move rurally then refuse to drive their children places. They chose to move somewhere with minimal public transport. What did they expect?

I thought the poster that described people sharing their views on being a teen rurally with shit public transport as “hysterical” was not only incredibly rude but reading a different thread 🙄🙄🙄

I ended up being quite angry as a teen, probably because I was so bored, lonely and isolated. My parents favourite way to punish me was to refuse to give a previously agreed to, lift. I missed countless parties because my parents decided to punish me by refusing a lift. I climbed out of my bedroom window one night and hitched to one of the parties I was desperate to go to. Makes me shudder now.

I also remember the tragedy of a 15 year old boyfriend of one of my friends being hit and killed by a car as he was walking an hour back home from a rural party.

I live in a small market town (really large village size) about 15-20 miles from 2 large towns and one city. We moved here when the DC were small.

Certainly, they would say they had pretty idyllic childhoods - lots of playing out with friends, swimming in the local rivers, bike rides and a much greater freedom than they would have been given in towns or cities. Many of their friends grew up with horses etc...

Our village is large enough to have a primary school, and a village hall that has various clubs, a rural cinema once a month, a tennis club, the next village across has a community swimming pool, which we have been members of, and so the DC spent many a summer's day at the pool, just seeing who turns up to play / hang out.

The teenage years are trickier. My DC didn't choose the local school, so for my youngest, her school friends can live up to an hour's drive away. Meeting up outside of school has always been tricky, but my DC have always had school friends and out of school friends and they have friends in the village that they can hang out with too.

However, we always said moving to the village was our decision, so we have always driven them wherever they wanted to go. It does mean I'm driving into the big town 3/4 times a week, but the DC just accept that as normal. In terms of meeting friends after school, they tend to use social media to chat (houseparty etc). However, my friends DC in the towns tend to do this too.

Eldest did learn to drive at 17, and so drives herself everywhere now. But when looking at unis, she ruled out all the big cities, as she didn't want to live anywhere too large. She's going to a large town with 250,000 people (similar size to our local town).

Have asked DC if they'd like to move somewhere bigger, and their answer is no... they're actually quite snobby about city living, but they do wish we had a better bus service.

My criteria for choosing a university was that it was properly in a city. None of this campus in the middle of nowhere thanks.

Still get a kick out of being 25 min walk /10 min cycle from bars restaurants theatre art gallery cinema etc. can also do a proper country walk from the front door. Love small cities.

Another one whose parents moved from suburbs to a rural location aged 12

I was absolutely furious. I was bored, lonely and isolated and moved out as soon as I possibly could. Not because I didn't like living with my parents, I actually adored my parents but I was so isolated and needed to be able to go and do normal things, work, socialise. I never learned to drive because I really struggled with it

I now live slap bang in the middle of a large European city with my children.

We moved to a rural location with much younger children and it was wonderful. I think there's a timing issue and the teenage years is too late to make the move though. There isn't enough to do so unless the bus service is great they'll always want to leave the village and feel frustrated at how they need you instead of being independent.

We moved with a 9 and 6 year old from the city to a house properly in the sticks.

We have to make an effort with the elder to make sure lifts to friends are available and that we see people. But we knew that would be the case.

Youngest is less sociable but there is a kid next door the same age so that's working well.

We're in a small group of houses and honestly it was such a good move. It'll be harder as kids get older but I'm happy to be a taxi, as is their dad, as ultimately this was our choice.

I’d wait a few years until the kids have flown the next or can drive … mine would absolutely hate it to move somewhere rural

İ grew up in a rural town of about 8000, ie big enough to have a high school. That was ideal, easy access to safe countryside for roaming about but a choice of friends and activities plus a train station for independent travel. It was ideal. I live in a much smaller town now (my home town is so nice it was too expensive to move back to) it was great when the kids were primary age but did restrict them when teens, they didn't have the freedom I had, I have some regrets about that.

I think this depends on a few things: how old your children are, how rural is rural, and what their/your expectations are.

We moved when I was 13, so year 8. This is as late as I would want to move with a teen really as people weren't so far through high school that I couldn't make friends etc. Making new friends was a bit difficult but it was okay after a few months. I think it was actually helpful that we moved far enough away that keeping my old friends as main friends was basically clearly hopeless as it meant I couldn't hang on to that.

For us, rural meant very rural - no neighbours, nearest village 2 miles away had one pub and one shop. Next nearest 4 miles away (population 2000) had maybe 5 shops, a hairdresser, a fish and chip shop, a couple of pubs and the high school. A few miles further again there was a small market town with shops and cafes and a couple of restaurants, and even a swimming pool (but membership only not an LA one). I think the latter might have provided a better balance for kids who had more expectation of going to cafes etc but it still wouldn't provide a multiplex cinema etc etc.

Which brings us on to expectations - I had an idyllic childhood - I was expected to and did cycle a lot which increased my freedom significantly. I used to regularly cycle 7+ miles to a friend's house and semi regularly back even in the dark. In the summers we all met up on bikes and cycled round the countryside. We played in rivers and in river beds. I did scouts and we camped both for scouts and for parties. I had a lot of freedom that I'm not sure I would have had without living rurally.

But I didn't have pre-existing hobbies that I kept up. I had one that I had enjoyed before we moved but it wasn't feasible after we moved - I don't remember feeling a great sense of loss and it was very very unusual so I don't think there was anywhere even vaguely nearby it could have been replicated. I think if I had been a keen swimmer/some more unusual type of dancing or did Stagecoach or whatever that would have been much harder because it would have required masses of ferrying round by my parents. As it was they probably picked me up late from school once or twice a week (15 minute round trip) and maybe once every other a week from a friends with the rest of my trips being made by bicycle. My mum worked very locally in a school hours job - if they had both been off to big jobs where they didn't get home till gone 6 every day I think it would have been very isolating.

Not a negative experience for me at all overall - I have very fond memories of my teens. But one has to be realistic. (And definitely accept the cost of facilitating learning to drive and running a car for late teens.)

I grew up in a rural area. I have just been back home this week. It is pretty and as a small child it was great but every single one of my friends moved away as a teenager for University or big cities for work and it had its limits. It means none of us lived near family at all. A couple of my friends have moved back to retire. They have retired early like me, aged 50.

I would say if you pick the wrong village, well some are very cliquey. Where I grew up has had an influx of Londoners and lots of locals are unhappy because it has pushed up housing prices and made it harder to rent or buy due to second home owners. People want legislation like Cornwall has or is pushing for put in place.

My teens love living rurally but the key thing is being near friends. Ie the high school has to be very local. They get free buses to school which is a few miles away and play local footy/ hockey … they bike to friends houses or I drive them. They can get the bus into town to do cinema etc. loads of freedom, swimming in rivers, kicking a football about, they have jobs in local cafe/pubs/paper round. For us living in a village where you know most people is really important and gives sense of community for them growing up.

Choose the village well. We are in a village with a train station. Both kids take train to school - different directions. I do still think it effects their social life everything has to be planned. Large garden became pointless when they started secondary school. Glad we left London but we probably should have moved to the nearby town.

Every single thread I've ever read on MN about rural-living and village life is incredibly negative, especially when teenagers are involved 🤣

I think there's a big difference between rural and isolated. We're rural and our small coastal town has nothing in terms of non/outdoorsy activities, but we have trains that run until almost midnight and it only takes half an hour to get to the nearest big towns which have pretty much everything - shops, cinema, bowling, swimming etc.

If you're outdoorsy it's heaven - several local riding stables, wild swimming, miles of unspoilt coastline etc. I see loads of teens here out riding horses, biking up the woods, walking dogs, going down the beach, or doing things like wild-camping and wild-swimming or motocross etc.

I suspect it's very personality driven and lots of MN'ers don't seem to understand that lots of teens are actually quite happy with rural life - even if they weren't!

I grew up rurally, and whilst there was a bus into the local town, which we did use, all other social activities involved parents ferrying us about. I had very few friends within walking distance, my school essentially served many little villages so if we went to each others houses, parents had to drive us about. Things like youth clubs and sports activities didn't tend to be in the town centre, they were in one of the villages, so again, parents drove. If you move rurally, with teenagers, you will just spend a lot of time driving them about. People aren't exaggerating about that. And as soon as they're old enough, they and their friends will be driving each other everywhere, sometimes safely, sometimes not! I think suburbia is just easier (and possibly safer) tbh.

Yes @Adversity that's the same with me and my friends. For lots of rural locations, it's very very unlikely that grown up children will end up living near their parents. I think that's quite significant actually, when I think of the relationship with my DH and his parents and family, who all live closeish to each other in the suburbs, compared to my parents, who are alone and only see their children every couple of months, it's worlds apart really. My parents have good friends where they live thankfully, but it's not the same. I think my in-laws have a better quality of life because they have family around them.

We moved pre DC and live in a hamlet of 10 houses. However there is a bus stop at the top of the lane with buses every hour to the nearest town (4miles) one way and a small city (9 miles) the other way.

DC get the bus to school and can hang around at clubs or in town as they just get the bus back. At weekends they meet friends there, go bowling, to the cinema, play badminton etc.

When DH and I split I asked them if they wanted to move (either to the village a mile away - has weekly pop up takeaways, monthly cinema, shop, pub etc) and they said no, they wanted to stay in our house. They are now almost 16 and 14 and still love our little hamlet.

They aren't party goers though - usually lifts are to take them babysitting!!

Lots of factors to consider. I liked it, well I knew no different, until I started secondary school. After that it became a pain in the arse and I realised other people had a better quality of life than me. We moved to the countryside when I was 5 because my parents wanted to do up an old cottage and grow vegetables which was fine for them but there was so much driving everywhere and so much boredom in between. I read every book in the fortnightly "mobile library" and started reading them all over again. Since then I don't really like being reliant on a car at all. Even for holidays. When I went to uni and I realised what I was missing out on, even in a small town. Just the convenience of being able to walk to classes, shops, friends houses and I've never looked back. Now we live in a large village sandwiched between two cities on a major bus route. Its not exactly a rural idyll but its quiet and safe and the DC have easy access to everything they might want.

My dh grew up in the countryside and loved it. He's almost a recluse though! He used to play tennis with his friends but his parents drove about a lot.
We have moved from a city to rural countryside albeit with a train station about 2 miles away but because we have no pavements it's a nightmare walking anywhere.
I have actually gained a lot of weight because whereas in the city there was no point driving, even though we had a car so I'd walk everywhere or train wherever I couldn't walk. Now I drive drive drive. That's also super expensive and ime you have to pay more to upkeep your as well as pay out £££ in fuel, I also now change my tyres asap before they are anywhere close to worn, I'm constantly making sure the car is ok because there are winding lanes and then rubbish weather and idiots that think lanes are actually a race track so I've done more emergency stops than I ever did in the city!

I don't have teens only going dc. They aren't overly into horse riding but enjoy walking down the field to say hello to the horses. I think because I'm slowly getting more and more bored it's not good for the dc either. None of my friends cba to come and see me so again I'm driving everywhere/ it's beautiful and peaceful and dh dreams of staying in the quiet zone but I will be going back to a town at least at some point and I think teens would benefit from having the freedom to travel with their friends instead of parents taking them everywhere.

However in the countryside it is just the norm. There is no public transport where I am, I don't think I've ever seen a bus. The train is an annoying route where we live so you have to change to really get anywhere. My dc do travel in the car a lot. Our play dates are between 15-45 mins to get to.

When I drop them off it doesn't even seem worth going home because I effectively have over 1hour driving round trip for some play dates with dc at our school! If you're driving your teens about your might find it's the same. Personally I'll be going back to the city at some point, my dh on the other hand is still enjoying it so it depends on if you believe your family will cope with a lifestyle overhaul.

@Frances658 my experience is the opposite to what you describe.

DH was raised rurally and every single one of his siblings stayed rural. His parents have all their children and grandchildren within walking distance.

And it's the same for most other families. Children are raised here, and raise their own families here. We have no cinema, no bowling, no bus service - no typical teen activities and yet they stay and choose the same upbringing for their children, so it can't be all bad