Rural bliss?

[Monison]

So what's it like living in the country? We're hoping to trade in citylife for a detached rural property in the south west. What are your experiences of making this move? And do you know of any particularly nice areas in the Bristol/Bath/Cheltenham/Stroud areas? Thanks x

Surprisingly noisy! Pretty much anything that goes on in the country is noisy (e.g. ploughing = noisy, harvesting = noisy all through the night, cows = low pitched noisy, sheep = quite astonishingly noisy at some times of year, car coming past = noise carries over the fields, visiting bell ringers = noisy all afternoon, shooting = noisy, bird scarers on fields of cabbages = noisy, neighbouring sculptor = the noise of stone being chiselled at, neighbour with posh car = noise of car being lovingly washed every Saturday morning)

It was much quieter living in a little cul-de-sac in a suburb

Muddy. You are a taxi service for your kids until they can drive.

I love it. I wouldn't go back to town living. I think I have always been a country girl at heart. There is absolutely nothing I miss about living in a town.

I drive 20,000 miles a year as a SAHM in the country. Village with no school. What a mistake.
I'd recommend instead that you live on the edge of a nice market town with schools and swimming pool and Brownies and leisure centre and buses and/or trains to big town/city. Would be much better. I also have a neighbour from hell that means we aren't out in our garden very much. I think we'll be moving to the location I suggested!

you get to watch sheep shagging in early November when you are bored and depressed because of the short days.

Everything GrendelsMum said, plus in our case when we were living in a really upmarket bit of countryside, the sound of the private security guards patrolling the village at night. And the local hunt. And the owls (loved the owls though; much nicer than suburban cat fights).

It all paled into insignificance compared once the new lambs were let out into the fields.

I moved from Bath to Wales..it's beautiful, in the middle of doing up a house more rural (if that exists in Wales). Beautiful, village school has 30 children from age 2-11. Bliss. No noise, no pollution, 30 acres for puddle jumping, tree house building, and out of the way for noisy fireworks should you have a tiny child!! ideal for noisy bbqs in the summer too :) wonderful. You can have an aga without looking like a fool too !

I strongly recommend you follow the advice of Novusleaf ".... live on the edge of a nice market town with schools and swimming pool and Brownies and leisure centre and buses and/or trains to big town/city."

I grew up on a farm 3 miles from the nearest village and 22 miles from the nearest small city. I was GLAD to go away to boarding school. Since I left home I have lived in central London or the edge of cathedral cities. I would never live in the country again.

The edge of a cathedral city or in a small market town with a rail station will relieve you of the burden of carting your teenagers around. You also get the benefit of being close to country and close to town.

We are in a village close to Stroud - I love the countryside and don't regret moving away from the city. Village school is great and Stroud has lots of interesting shops. I do spend a lot of time driving which doesn't worry me although kids may get a bit bored and frustrated when they get older!

As for rural bliss - well we are on a housing estate which could be anywhere really. We're very close to our neighbours (literally) so it doesn't feel much like having space as our garden is the size of a postage stamp! The problem is that space and land cost a lot of money around here!!

I grew up in a village in the country. It had a shop and a couple of pubs so not quite in the middle of nowhere. It was ok as a young child as we had a fair bit of land to play on, but when I was a teenager most of my friends lived in the nearest town so I spent a lot of time catching buses or waiting for my dad to come and pick me up. It was fine as soon as I passed my driving test I guess.

I now live on the edge of a town and life is so much easier. It did take a while to get used to the street light and traffic noise at night (even though I live on a really quiet street).

Believe it or not I am a lot closer to country walks etc as there are more footpaths/cycle paths around. There are hundreds of pleasant walks nearby. In my old village it was quite dangerous to go for walk/cycle as there were no pavements.

My family still live in my old home, but I don't think I'd ever want to go back to be honest.

Perhaps try a holiday in the country if you want to have a taste. Maybe a holiday cottage/ farm stay to see if you like it?

We live between Cheltenham and Worcester on the edge of a v small town which has shops/pool/community cinema etc and we love it.

I'd recommend working your way down through small town >village> real country else it can be a huge leap

We did the middle of nowhere for a bit in Somerset, it was a lot of driving. We then moved because of DH's job and are now on the edge of a market town. The DC's can walk to school, Beavers etc on the doorstep and acres of woodland 3 mins walk round the corner. Life a lot easier than our brief time in the middle if nowhew and as DD is coming up to 12, my life is most definitely easier than the friends I left behind who are driving all the time and worrying about the cost of petrol (and oil as they aren't on mains gas)

It won't be rural bliss when your children want a social life or weekend work.

I think there are different levels of "rural" though. We live in a village with an excellent primary school, pub, shop/bakery and church. The village also has a railway station that connects us to the next market town 4 miles away and a large town 5 miles away. We are also half an hour's drive away from two large cities. Brownies/Guides/Cubs/Scouts are in the next village half a mile away near a petrol station that also has a Co-op and post office.

This situation suits us beautifully. Our last house was in a more rural situation and was a little too isolated when DD came along, which was one of the reasons we moved here

I would also add that I really think no one should buy their 'forever' house in a remote rural location. Think how it would be if you were old and disabled and unable to drive.

You just can't expect it to be forever Beta - my town is full of over 60's who move in from the surrounding country/villages to be somewhere you can walk to the doctors/shops and which has a tiny hospital when the rural idyll becomes a burden

If your heart is set on a village I agree about choosing a village with a school; this will have a much more vibrant social heart than school-less villages. During daylight hours the village pub will be the residence of those local often disabled elderly who don't drive, mind.

I live on the very edge of a small town and agree about the advantages. That said, it's still quite parochial around here; some people have very narrow-minded views and experiences. Non-white people... I swear if I see one I almost want to stop comment loudly "Look! They still exist! They're out there somewhere! This isn't an entirely Brownie-free zone!" (which my Indian friend called it, once).

I obviously wouldn't start exclaiming such things. But having grown up in a big city with friends of all shades and religions, it kind of depresses me that DC are growing up in such a mono-culture.

We moved 12 years ago

Good things- privacy , gorgeous views (over a castle and a loch in our case), a fab house we couldn't afford in a city , safe for DCs and pets, lovely school,chance to watch nature on our doorstep.

Not so good bits- having to drive on very scary roads from October onwards-never gritted! Having to run 4WD second car because the possibilty of being snowed in is very real, power cuts frequently, noisy (sheep and cows are just as noisy as car alarms and city post pub rabble).Just the fact you have to drive everywhere really.Rabbits eat your plants and shrubs.Exciting shopping done on line.

Would I change it? Not a bit.

I love the space, that the countryside is changing, real fires, the kids can be noisy and run free, that the local community is still a community, the summer shows, the winter get togethers, feeding the family in part from what we can produce, the air smells fantastic, i love all the noises of birdsong, cows/ sheep/ horses, tractors and trailers bumping along the lane, that my younger son (country born) knows the makes of all the tractors where as his elder brother learnt all the car makes.

I find frustrating having to run two cars, having to drive the kids to friends houses as its mainly farms over a wide school catchment, its an hour to the hospital for scans and consultant appointments, very limited second job opportunities, the local supermarket is tiny and runs out of basics at busy times of year, its 40 mins on a good day to a bigger normal sized supermarket, getting snowed in for several weeks in the winter, taxis being very expensive as we're not on the edge of town so one of us is driving on the rare occasions we go out, the cinema and theatre are not nearby, having to be organised because if you forget something from the shops there's not a local to pop to and its a good hour round trip to pick up those forgotten bits.

I house swap with my parents for a few days twice a year to get a town fix - takeaways, shops, restaurants, cinema and theatre. I'm always really glad to be back home afterwards so the country has my heart.

I was brought up in the country. I would still be very happy there. Inspite of the inconveniences. I don't think DH or my eldest boy would be. DD would (especially if she got a pony) and DS2 probably would be.

I really think that children need to be brought up to it to appreciate it.

DH and I love it - great hacking out (for me) and bike rides (for him) straight out of the door. I love, and i mean, really love as in how lucky am am i, looking out of my kitchen window at my horse grazing in the paddock. However we both grew up in fairly rural areas so did know what to expect.
It's fab for younger children, my oldest teenager moans a bit but he is at a suburban school, next teenager is at a more rural school si it's more normal to be a bit stuck.
I live 40 mins away from where i work but it is the most delightful drive through the best of north yorks countryside and the whole thing is a pleasure. We have chickens, loads of space - the boys can be as noisy as they like, and peace and quiet(if that isn't a contradiction!).

To coin a phrase:

"In the country no one can hear you scream"

I have lived in Cheltenham, and Stroud most of my life, but moved to Pembrokeshire, mainly to be near the sea!and it's really really rural here in comparison!I can go for walks and not see another human being,my DS1 used to have fullscale band practices with no worries,don't need to lock the house.. It's lovely for me, rubbish for 12yr old DS2 though..

Stroud and Chelt landscape very similar to here i.e big hills and valleys,and therefore tough in Winter to get about.

Bath,and Chelt,(and Cirencester)have a bit more going on then Stroud, festivalwise,and musicwise because they are bigger,they are also beautiful places to walk around. Stroud is a lot more community based.

Landscape wise i would avoid Thornbury/Dursley areas towards Bristol,also Stonehouse/Ebley -Stroud.Bisley is pretty but dull.Nice villagey places are Nailsworth,Minchinhampton,Tetbury,Slad valley,Chalford,Painswick in Stroud area,and Leckhampton,Charlton Kings in Chelt.

Basically if the house prices are high it's because it's a lovely village/area!

Just to add, it's really worth trying to be on mains sewerage, as septic tank problems can be very messy and expensive (luckily we're on mains), and having to buy your oil up front is a pain in the neck - village not on gas. Even though our village is quite big, no school means kids go to around 5-6 different primary schools round here, and there's less community feel to the village.

Biggest blessing in our village though, is our lovely garage - not for petrol (extremely expensive) but they come and collect the car, have a cheap hourly rate and are really good. When you're as dependent on cars as we are (no useful bus service), this is more important than most things!

"I obviously wouldn't start exclaiming such things. But having grown up in a big city with friends of all shades and religions, it kind of depresses me that DC are growing up in such a mono-culture."

It's like that where I live. Our nearest town has one of the lowest ethnic minorities in the UK and there is only one "brown" child in DD's school. I find it strange because I grew up in South London and also had friends of all shades and religions.