How about Spain................??

[jmg1]

As some of you know I have posted about moving to Italy and about where to move within the UK.

Although I love Italy I think I could feel even more isolated living there

Now I am thinking about a move to Spain!

What ideas regarding popular areas/towns/International Schools do you have about where in Spain a Brit could move to?
I know some areas of Spain are full of Brits but as I am not moving to get away from Brits that is not an issue.

There are quite a few mumsnetters who live in Spain, jmg. SenoraPostrophe has been there for a few years now. (She lives in Granada but has lived on Costa del Sol too).

Hi jmg

the most popular areas are Costa del Sol and Costa Blanca. Both have lots of International schools, but I know some on the Costa del Sol have a bit of a bad reputation - I can check if i can remember who told me that.

Why do you want to move to Spain? If any reason other than "because it's hot" then i strongly recommend that you look at the slightly less popular areas. I am not anti-British (I'm quite patriotic now I live here, in fact), but the really big expat/holiday areas tend to have a high level of British fraudsters/idiots/scumbags (there are lots of nice people too, but we got ripped off too many times on the coast, and too many people seemed less interested in getting to know us wehn they discovered that we rent our house.)

Anyway i would recommend Granada and surrounding area, Orgiva, Almuñecar, and cadiz - of those Orgiva and Almuñecar have the highest proportion of Brits, but not as high as the Costa del Sol. Also someone said Almeria is a really nice place to live - I don't have friends in any other areas! There's a "bilingual" school in Granada, an International school in Almuñecar and i don't know about the other two.

sp, why do I want to go?
The weather is one reason. I do not know a lot about life in Spain. Many people go to live there from the UK, so it must have something going for it.
I have thought of moving to so many places but I just cannot make a decision.
South Africa is a place I really like but I have a feeling it may get really nasty over there in the next few years, although I could be wrong.

Avoid Mallorca, unless you can find a nice colony of expats.

my aunt lives in valencia and loves it

Try reading Driving over Lemons and A Parrot in the Pepper Tree by Chris Stewart, who lives in the Alpujarras (see, SP, I know how to say it now!) - lovely books and probably pretty representative of life in the country in Spain for an average sort of Brit. (Fairly hippy alternative area though so prob. not for you, jmg!) There are links on amazon to other life-in-Spain books too.

The guy who wrote driving over lemons is a complete nutter though!

For reasons to move to Spain, have a look at this thread

But the main reason I like living here is because it's an opportunity for me and the kids to learn about another culture. That was another thing we couldn't really do on the coast, partly because it's very difficult to practice your Spanish there.

Valencia sounds good too - there are a number of expats there but not too many (and therefore house prices are lower).

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ggg - where are you in France?

I'm looking for Gites for future holidays and France is so vast I don't know where to begin!

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don't know about the island! - has your friend got a website?

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link for you, gggl and JT

thanks Jan!

ggg - is your friends place on this site?

That's the island one, JT.

mm - not keen on islands they're a buggar to get to

perhaps I should start a recommendations thread!