Best place to live in the UK

[vince14]

2 hours ago, scvrobeson said:

Your entire country, including Scotland, is smaller than my single state.

And my house is older than your country! 

[LSP_Ron]

I've driven all over England, Wales and Scotland many times over the years.  Even though the entire country is only 7/8 the size of Alberta it can be a difficult to get around quickly in some areas.  I recall one trip driving from Heatherow to Poole then up to Cheltenham, it took FOREVER. We can drive almost the whole length of Alberta in about 6-8 hours or so, that trip took about the same if I recall.   Very pretty part of the country though.

[LSP_Ron]

I also recall my uncle's funeral there.  My mom and I wanted to join my aunt and cusins to spread his ashes somewhere near Newquay (can't remember the name) then head to Heathrow for an early morning flight to Germany for work. We were leaving from Cowbridge Wales where we had the funeral.  We never made it,  had to turn around and head to Heathrow or we would likely not have had much if any sleep.  It doesn't look far on a map but that is a LONG drive

[thierry laurent]

Indeed, the lack of highways in UK is a major problem.  Besides the M1, you do not have another major South-North axis and from East to West, you just have highways sections here and there. Moreover, as they are changing their two lanes motorways into highways rather than building a new road, this somewhat helps but there are often traffic jams close to cities...  As we are spoiled at that level in my tiny country, I'm really seeing the difference!

 

I really love UK and this is typically one of the countries where I would like living. However, you do not have to be in a hurry when you take your car. Last do not trust your GPS in the countryside! A 90 minutes drive commonly changed into a 2 to 3 hours journey... This is typically why I went on holidays so many times in UK!

[mozart]

22 minutes ago, thierry laurent said:

Indeed, the lack of highways in UK is a major problem.  Besides the M1, you do not have another major South-North axis and from East to West, you just have highways sections here and there. 

There’s the M5/M6 Thierry that runs all the way from Devon in the south to Scotland, that’s quite a long way! 

[Lothar]

I've been to the UK and Scotland quite a few times, admittedly on leisure trips. I've learned that when you're not in hurry

avoid GPS and the motorways, just buy a Road Atlas and work your way from A to B on sideroads or even detours. There

are so many fantastic places and spots to discover -. and I've never been turned down when asking the locals for information.

That way I found some fantastic offroad pubs and places to eat - and such a plethora of beautiful countrysides. The UK became

one of my all time favourite countries to visit.

Lothar

Edited May 10, 2020 by Lothar

[Dpgsbody55]

Where would I live in England??  My family left England when I was 12 and I was so glad to get away.  That was 1967, and we'd been through a lot of family problems in the previous year, and I never wanted to see the place again.

 

Come September 2015 and my wife, who is from south Devon, organised a trip back.  I didn't want anything to do with it and just went along to keep her happy.  We arrived at Heathrow at about 6pm and checked into our hotel nearby at 8pm and settled down for the night.  The next day, we picked up our rental car and headed for Amesbury for our second night, and Stonehenge, which I remember visiting, and climbing all over, when I was about 10.  As we drove along, I thought "this is great!!!"  Such wonderful history, so much scenery and nowadays, so many interesting car and plane museums, etc.  As we walked from the car park to Stonehenge, we were picking wild blackberries, like we used to as a kid at that time of year.  On the whole, the trip was wonderful and I had a great time.  We had another trip organised for this year, but you know what's happened to that now.  The worst day, from a touring standpoint, was when we went from Plymouth, following the coast, to Newquay, which is about 100 miles.  It took all day, literally, and even the main roads through Cornwall get choked up with traffic, thanks to the local farmers driving their tractors around at 20mph if your lucky, and nowhere to overtake.  Next time, we won't make that mistake again in our holiday planning.  Where I now live, driving 100 miles is nothing at all.  I've driven 600 miles in a day, and still had time for coffee and lunch breaks, photo ops etc.  And I''m still in the same state.

 

On a fine sunny day, the English countryside is the best place in the world to be, in my opinion,  but would I live there again??  Oh hell, no, but I'll be back for another (long) holiday.  The weather is a lottery, and you can keep the winters.  I have too many memories of the cold and snow living in the Cotswold Hills in my younger days to ever put up with them again.  Yet I know I'm missing out on a lot because of that decision.  Living in the countryside is wonderful, but I would never live in the cities there.  If I had to choose a place to live there, it would be the north Devon or Cornwall coast, of which I have many happy memories of holidays spent in that area, and I still loved it when I was back in 2015.  The area is not so good from the standpoint of museums etc, but there's ways and means around that problem.  But the Aussie lifestyle and climate is too big a draw for me to want to live there again.

 

BTW, I've spent a few months in the USA too, and love that.  Perhaps I should consider myself a citizen of the world, as there's so many wonderful places too.

 

 

Cheers,

Michael

[ade rowlands]

Yep, driving here can be a right royal pain in the ass, basically any time from Easter through to October (various kids schools holidays start in those times through peak summer months) the small local roads become clogged. There will also invariably be sections of road closed for repair making it even worse. At any time of year I consider myself to have done well if I can make the 250 mile trip to London to visit friends in under 3 hours, thats with 90% of that trip on motorways and dual carriage ways and being a good boy and sticking to speed limits. 

[RLWP]

Oh, it's nearly impossible to drive anywhere here these days, we are grassing over all the motorways and following the man in the bowler hat with the red flag makes progress very slow

 

Don't come!

 

Richard

[RLWP]

14 hours ago, scvrobeson said:

Your entire country, including Scotland, is smaller than my single state.

 

 

Matt 

 

You appear to have made an error, our entire United Kingdom is smaller than your county of California.

 

Richard

[europapete]

I live in Rhode Island, my entire state is smaller than Yorkshire! lol.  Regards, Pete in RI

Edited May 10, 2020 by europapete

[Coors 54]

5 hours ago, Dpgsbody55 said:

The worst day, from a touring standpoint, was when we went from Plymouth, following the coast, to Newquay, which is about 100 miles.  It took all day, literally, and even the main roads through Cornwall get choked up with traffic, thanks to the local farmers driving their tractors around at 20mph if your lucky, and nowhere to overtake. 

 

Ahhh, the combined joys of tourist traffic and farm tractors on narrow lanes!

I've lived in Cornwall for 12 years and wouldn't live anywhere else in the UK, generally decent but instantly variable weather, easy access to world class beaches, take your breath away scenery, good walking and surfing and (when they are open) great pubs and restaurants of all standards up to Michelin star.

I have to work up country so do (normally) travel the A30/M5 route every week, it's rare that I get held up but traffic flow in summer is very much slower so I time my trips at unsociable hours! Lockdown and working from home is therefore wonderful.

Access to aviation related places is admittedly a bit difficult, it's half a day travel to anywhere "up country" so a day trip to anywhere beyond Yeovilton is out. So I miss being able to go to an airshow or motor race meeting on a whim because the weather is good but for me the quality of life here compensates hugely.

 

Dave

[nmayhew]

18 hours ago, scvrobeson said:

It's always funny to see Brits talk about things being "far away" when it's a few hours' drive.  That's a short jaunt for most of us in the states, considering I can drive a few hours and still be in the same county in California. Your entire country, including Scotland, is smaller than my single state.

 

 

Matt 

 

in the same way it's always funny to hear Americans talk of 'history' and things being 'old'...

everything is relative old chap 

 

[mozart]

Ah Dave.....Padstow, lovely place and so convenient for St Enedoc (and of course the Doom Bar (beer and sea feature)), Polzeath and Trevose, three of my favourite places!  Funnily enough all have golf courses too!  Cornwall's great to visit off-season but I honestly wouldn't swap it for Dorset! 

[RLWP]

On 5/7/2020 at 11:02 AM, DonH said:

If you could live anywhere in the UK, where would you choose? I arm thinking about good access to aviation related locations - museums/airbases/flying clubs. Places where you could volunteer to help with restorations, etc. etc.

 

Sooo, after all this nonsense

 

I'd go for somewhere in the Midlands. We're just south of Coventry (Air Museum, modelling club and a couple of local restoration projects) London is 1 1/2 hours by train, Cosford is a bit over an hour by car, Shuttleworth and Duxford maybe 2 hours (M6, A11).

 

M1, M6, M5 take you to most places in reasonable time, and all the usual amenities are generally very local - not true of mid Wales or Lincolnshire for instance

 

Apart from that - it's a really hard question to answer. What do you like to do when you are not pursuing your hobbies? What sort of area do you want to live in?

 

Richard