Have we done the right thing by moving?

Peardrop you make it sound lovely. I hope this helps Judith. I know I said you have to be practical but this does sound appealing.

Out of London, in the villages that used to be working, but are now basically commuter/retirement/hedge fund types, they want countryside that is pretty but not too stinky! Even horses are frowned upon. Had one woman complain about me riding up a tarmac path. Residents had designated it as theirs.

We moved to the seaside 140 miles away from our first home as we wanted to downsize and move away from motorways that were gaining size and noise! Strangely our lovely new home is actually larger than our first one and we needed some more furniture to fill it! I found I had a knack for buying furniture from Gumtree and renovating it so our new huge garage became my workshop and I had a new hobby.

Our garden is much larger and sunnier and has become yet another hobby to share with hubby. The garden is so quiet and filled with birds which hubby is enjoying feeding so that has become his hobby. In fact our garden is so quiet that one day when we had first moved in I kept hearing gravel being moved as if it was being dropped from a lorry. After hearing this for sometime, I went to see which of our neighbours was having it delivered and was amazed to find it was the sea at high tide three roads away!!! A bit different to hearing the M2 roaring all day one mile away.

I noticed that none of our neighbours had hanging baskets which I thought odd until our first winter! Barton Winds come blasting across Christchurch Bay from The Needles and straight up our driveway at 90 mph! We haven't bothered with hanging baskets?

When you move you have to relearn how to survive your new locality and tweek your life and expectations and take each day. Enjoy the differences and go with the flow.

That black net looks really good Allule. Will look into it. We don’t have a problem with flies particularly, it’s mostly bees that come into our garden room. I spend a lot of time with a feather duster trying to persuade them out.

I live in a small dormitory town and the bird here make a ruckus first thing. I was woken up by pigeons at just gone five and then the sparrows started. Now I'm up and doing stuff they've gone quiet

We have thought about moving to our favourite village that we visit about twice a week to start our cycler rides. But after looking at the positives and negatives of both places we found moving had a great many negatives. Drs, dentist, nearby shops and very poor broadband! We have birds and green space where we are but also excellent Drs and dentist, which are important at our age. So here we stay

Moving to the country is not a bad thing to do BUT as with all moves you need to understand what you are moving into. So many times city/town people move out to the country with only a hazy idea of what life there will be like. There are many noises/changes/difficulties that need to be thought about. I particularly laughed over the story of a city couple who tried to sue a neighbour because the cockerel was waking them early every morning. Oh dear.

What to do? Get used to it or move again and next time do your homework. Sorry.

Clearly none of you who complain about noise from birds and animals have suffered noise nuisance from next door neighbours running am illegal woodworking business in their back garden and using industrial grinders saws and jackhammers from seven in the morning until eleven at night......!

My son in law complained about the twittering of sparrows nesting in our eaves one year.......Wild bird life is not confined to the country!

My advice would be to accept your surroundings, don't complain or try to change things if you want to integrate into the community.
One of the pet hates of many rural people is townies moving in then complaining about the local people going about their business. Animals, birds and farmers wake at first light and need to get on with the days living. At Harvest the combines will still be working after it gets dark, they have no other choice. We had people move into the village who complained the church bells were too noisy and wanted them stopped, also complained to the council that cockerels were crowing! Embrace your new life and enjoy it.

Judith all moves take time to adjust to.However if time goes on and you feel you made a mistake, move again ( we did just that.)

casssandra we had building work going on for years not far from us. I won't go into it on here but suffice to say I can sympathise with you.

I moved from suburban city living to a small market town but one with easy rail & road access back to the city. I now have the benefit of a quieter & cleaner environment and have both the countryside and social/ leisure amenities on my doorstep. It is not isolated or too rural for a townie like me!

Does anyone else hear a low rumbling sort of noise in the countryside or is it me going bonkers?