Moving to Inverness from Lincolnshire

[WorthyReader]

Hello, I am looking for some advice and views. We are looking at relocation to the outskirts of Inverness from Lincolnshire. My parents already live up there and we have visited a lot on holidays prior to the moving. We love the area it is beautiful has anyone else done this move with young kids and how did they find it?
I think I am overthinking as my main reason to move is to be closer to my parents. I have a 7 year old and 2 month old girls my oldest daughter hates the idea of moving schools and away from her friends which makes it hard. But k feel the work life balance will be better up there.
Any advice? Is there enough for kids, days out etc

I am a Highlander and live in Inverness and a lot of the comments are not accurate at all. My parents are both from the central belt though I was born in Inverness and we (or they are not treated like outsiders and never have been).

There are loads of English families here. In my small street alone we have 2 families who relocated from England. Both families are very welcomed, included and like it here.

I personally would avoid Tornograin. You will never stop driving in and out of Inverness for activities, swimming lessons etc and traffic can be crazy especially in tourist season.

Nice areas with good primary schools are Ness Castle (Excellent primary school and good secondary school catchment area). It has loads of families living in the area and is just of the West link road so close to the pool, park, shops and beach.

Inshes and Milton of leys are nice areas but Inshes school has a bad reputation. Drakies Primary school is very good and Milton of leys school is meant to be decent to. Drakies is a nice area but dont know how many families there are around. Milburn is the catchment secondary which seems fine as long as your child doesn't have a lot of high level support needs.

The new builds in culloden are nice and Duncan Forbes is a good primary school. I am unsure about Culloden academy though as I don't know anyone who goes there.

To guarantee a school space in your local catchment school you need to live in the catchment area. The council have school catchment maps online.

The bulk of activities, cinema, theatre etc are in Inverness so it maybe better being in Inveness long term. The nights get very dark and cold here in the winter and we get snow most winters so driving conditions can be hazardous. Summer nights are long and sometimes it doesn't get dark at all. Kids often play out till 9.30pm on a hot summer night and it's as bright as 1pm in the afternoon. Campevans and tourists are a menace from may to Sept and cause accidents, frustrations and often don't know the road rules.

It is colder here than anywhere else in the mainland UK. Often it can be hot further south and 14 here. Although it was 33 yesterday. The beaches are fantastic in the highlands and outdoor activities like paddle boarding and hiking are common pursuits are normal.

Shops are terrible. There are loads of restaurants and very few clothes shops. The A9 is a rubbish road but unless you drive on it daily I wouldn't worry.

There is loads of work available in schools.

@Fundays12 I'm glad you had a different experience but it certainly was accurate for my PiLs despite her teaching in the local school and him being involved in the church.
Maybe it was down to the small minded people in the village they lived in.

We live in Moray and any time we have to go to the airport traffic is always at a standstill in Nairn. I agree about the shops in Inverness - there's nothing there now. I left OH in a pub to go and have a look round the shops expecting to be at least an hour. He was very shocked when I returned 20 minutes later!

This experience is definitely rare but much more likely to happen in very small villages in the highlands. It's not an issue in larger towns or Inverness itself.

I agree the traffic is horrendous in Nairn especially in the summer.

OP are you renting or buying a property? Renting is really difficult and buying is very different. It's offers over on properties. Good properties in desireable areas can easily go a few thousand over so research the market thoroughly.

I would take a very close look at how good the catchment school is before deciding on anywhere. I hear schooling can be very mixed in the Inverness area.

I have recently moved home to Inverness after being away for about 10 years, it is a nice place to live but there are so many cons I would say don’t do it OP.

Work/life balance is 100% dependent on your job/employer rather than location.

Your husband will be able to get a job here but he will still be doing 12 hour plus shifts. (Side note- check out Highland Cops on BBC iplayer!). I’m not sure what the equivalent to pastoral in education is here - guidance I guess? If so, I don’t think jobs come up often in Inverness and you might want to consider how much of a commute you would be happy with, eg down to Kingussie or up to Golpsie. Keep an eye on myjobscotland.gov.uk or the Highland Council website.

On schools - primary schools in Inverness are fine but secondary schools are not great in general and there are 2 in particular I would avoid.

Healthcare - consider that you (or your parents) may have to be treated 3 hours away in Aberdeen as Raigmore doesn’t do everything. If you want private treatment you would have to travel south.

There have been so many new developments built/approved recently and the infrastructure won’t catch up for a while. I just don’t understand where everyone is coming from and why 🤣 Property prices just keep going up and up and are not cheap in comparison to other parts of Scotland. The rental market is an absolute nightmare too. I would also avoid Tornagrain, it is creepy and will be a building site for another 40-ish years.

We don’t really have any shops other than M&S and Next, and we don’t really get next day delivery. Some retailers won’t deliver here at all.

Remember that Glasgow/Edinburgh are a 4 hour drive away if you want to go shopping/go on holiday/go to a concert. The A9 is pretty but the journey can be really awful.

People here are not friendly and can be very cliquey and small minded. But you definitely won’t be the only English family!

The biggest negative for me is the lack of opportunity here. I had to take a huge hit to my career and accept I won’t have the career I could have done down south, which has been a real struggle for me. I worked in accountancy and there was only one firm I could have gone to, so i changed career to one that has no progression, so I’m stuck again.

Another thing is your children will have to move away for uni and employment, although UHI could improve in the next 15 years I guess.

I’m sorry to be so negative, it is a nice place but it’s just not somewhere I would want to move with children. Realistically, if you don’t move here, would your parents stay? If you want to move to Scotland, you can get the good points of Inverness in Perthshire, Stirlingshire or the Lothians whilst being closer to actual civilisation.

I moved from Yorkshire to Scotland when I was 15 and now live in Aberdeenshire. Whilst at the time it was hard I made friends quickly and had way more freedom than I would have done in Yorkshire.

Inverness is great. Yes it’s totally different from England as not as fast paced but loads of activities, different experiences.

Your parents won’t be around forever and some of my best memories are getting to spend time with my Scottish grandparents.

At age 7 they make friends easily.

I dont think your post is negative at all, I think all of your points are correct.

Its entirely dependent on your job here and career prospects are very limited for the people I know. If one of us lose our job, we would have to move south again.

Someone up thread said that there were plenty of jobs in Highland schools, as the OP mentioned she works in pastoral care. A lot of my friends are teachers, classroom assistants and office staff. I can only go with what they tell me, but they are all struggling with no permanent roles, roles being reduced and/or cut altogether. Travel too is expected.

You made a good point about healthcare too. There is only one NHS option.
From personal experience, Raigmore is a nightmare and waiting lists are long. So long, we have never even made it to get an appointment, or ever had a scan or treatment there when we have been referred! Even for a recent cancer scare, the wait was months so we paid and went to Glasgow.

We use private healthcare now and we travel to Aberdeen and Glasgow (3 hours away in both cases) for appointments and treatment.

The only dentist we have access to charges us a hefty monthly fee to stay on their books. We have tried to find another but nobody will accept us.

Thank you everyone for your insight.

to answer a few questions, my parents retired up to the highlands and live near Beauly and won’t be moving again.
we would want to be closer to Inverness for more to do.
Job wise- not concerned my husband is a police officer and I think I would be able to get a part time job somewhere ideally in a school.
we would want to move somewhere with good schools, parks etc. we have looked and Ness castle and are aware Fortrose is a very good school but house prices around Rosemarkie and Fortrose and too high. So we would be looking elsewhere like Ness Castle.
thank you for your comments on Tornagrain you have made some good points so we will probably rule that out now.

Those who are advising against it other than jobs and housing what else are the reasons? Someone mentioned not much to do for kids? In what way? What is it that you feel the area doesn’t have. We live close to Peterborough and the shops are rubbish there and not really any different to Inverness.

There are activities for young children, but classes at Highlife Highland and Eden Court are consistently oversubscribed. We struggled to get swimming lessons due to long waitlists, and I have to book new sessions immediately to secure a spot. It’s also been difficult to find places for school tutoring and music lessons.
Now that my kids are in secondary school, there’s very little available outside of school and sports. Fortunately, they’re sporty and involved in clubs, but they’re not interested in hillwalking or similar outdoor activities.
There’s nowhere in town for them to hang out on weekends. No museums with rotating exhibitions or cultural attractions. The Culloden Centre hasn’t changed in years and is quite expensive. Landmark is nice but clearly geared toward children under 10.
Live music events are rare and usually target the 50+ crowd. While we’ve had acts like Clean Bandit, Little Mix, and Olly Murs in the past, there hasn’t been much recently for younger audiences.

Oh and if you're over 25 and fancy any kind of night out, with somewhere that does good cocktails and a lovely meal at the weekend, I have yet to find it!

OP, would you still want to live there even when your parents have passed away or if your parents decided to move again for whatever reason? I think that’s something you have to take into consideration. If you wouldn’t move to the place if your parents weren’t there, it probably isn’t worth it.

My parents won’t move again, but I feel like it is more of a reason to move to spend time with them while I can?

I have seen some places on google to try but haven’t yet. We have been to The Clansman and had a lovely meal and cocktails but I appreciate that’s a bit further out and very touristy if you go at the wrong time.

Were Jack and victor there

😂

Boaby’s got some great cocktails and Buckfast on the optics.

That’s not boaby it’s Troy the gardener

We live close to Inverness and love it. Roads can be tough in the summer months, but as for all the comments about nothing to do...I don't get that! My son is busy every night of the week with activities, and there is plenty to do, exploring lots of fantastic communities in the Highlands, events, Eden Court theatre, concerts in the leisure centre....remember your life is what you make it, so is your community.

Really?? Cafe 1? Rocpool? The wee bar?

Be prepared that some people in Scotland are very anti English. We found this in Aberdeen. The school system is also very different and way behind our own. On a positive, house prices are cheap in most areas!

House prices are not cheap in decent areas of Inverness.

Plenty of lovely places for cocktails and good scran ( food) op.

Every meal I’ve had in Cafe 1 has been expensive, not great and I wouldn’t really recommend it. I have been there a lot with clients (not me booking).

I love Rocpool but the only thing that changed in 15 years is how the prices have gone up. I hope the new owners make changes.

Hou Hou Mei is fun and I like the monthly updates but we can’t go there every time. Sutor Creek is worth the journey, especially on the tasting nights but someone has to drive.

The Wee Bar is ok & Walrus & Corkscrew a nice place to sit for some wine.

We like to go out but there’s just not anything that changes and it’s more often not great for the money rather feeling like you’ve had a good time.

One recent exception was dinner at the River House, it was lovely and I was pleasantly surprised.

I’ve learned a lot about myself typing that out. I need a new hobby is one 😂😂

have lived near Inverness I would avoid Ardersier and Tornagrain you will be driving to Inverness every second day Culloden or Smithton Balloch would be better.

Nairn and Moray coast have amazing beaches and the Moray coast is one of the driest areas in the UK ( probably similar to petersborough) the Inverness accent is not strong; as English in places which were gaelic speaking primarily until 50+
years ago tend not to have strong accents I have not noticed much anti-English in Inverness there is some in Skye and villages that have lots of second homes and folks that sold for 800k in London and moved up
Education is different I personally can't think of much positive about the curriculum for excellence ( misnomer if there ever was one) but the no silly uniform rules about socks, colour of hair ties etc is great
your children are very young so no guarantee free uni will still exist

I find adults are generally ok, however I was bullied horrendously for my accent at school, so much so I dropped out at 15.

YES the school system defo is something op should look at. 1st year isn’t the same as Y7 and my parents assumed it was. Meant me and my sister got put in the wrong year.

If you do it, rent for a year - rent out your current place and rent somewhere in Inverness.

It’s a big move and you want to be sure it’s right

This would be extremely unsettling for her children moving them from pillar to post, back to their old school again too. I’d only suggest this if it was adults only.