I have been checking out Mollymock and Ulladulla on google earth as they appear closet as the crow flies form Canberra and they look pretty damm good to me!I also know that Batemans Bay is a very popular haunt with Canberrans have you ever been to any of those beaches?
I assume were you are you will go to some closer to Sydney, but as you say that must be hundreds all down NSW-I been told you can even take your car onto the beaches as some are so vast I don't think we could do that on our nearest beach in the height of an Essex short summer that we be classed as mass murder!
Mark.
Anywhere down the east coast is pretty stunning - Canberrans tend to be anywhere from Jervis Bay to Merimbula for their weekend places. They dont actually encourage cars on any of the beaches but some hoons do do it occasionally! You may want to look just a tad further - if you go directly south you get to the amazing beaches of Gippsland (about 4 hours) - from Lakes Entrance there is one called 90 mile beach and it is just that. Much less development down there whereas the east coast is getting pretty built up. Nice little places like Marlo for example at the mouth of the Snowy are little gems - not much good for fish and chips but if the beach is calling then that is the place to go. Lakes Entrance is your typical "seaside" so best avoided in the summer.
Places like Batemans Bay, Merimbula, Ulladulla are all getting very "seaside-ish" with fish and chip shops and souvenir shops and even the occasional amusement arcade but not in such numbers as Southend of course!!!!!
Here is 90 mile beach - well, a bit of it anyway
Thanks for all that detail on schools etc really helpful!
I take your point about finding the right accomadation before you can really look at schools etc,the basic requirement is being in right catchment area of the school you want to got to as is the same here .
Just let me know what schools or areas you think we should avoid if at all possible not wishing to upset anyone else who be living in those suburbs.
We hope to be in Canberra by end of Oct/Nov this year all being well and we have no pressure to sell our house here as Debbies sister will look after it for us for a couple of years until we think we have made the right choice to live in Aus/Canberra.
There are also 2 other couples with children we met at a meal we had in London with the ACT goverment so we are all in a similar sitaution and plan to come out at about the same time-so I reckon in about 5 years time they will need to make ACT bigger to fit in all the POMS say about WA size should do it!
I was told to avoid comming around Xmas as the rental properties are in very short supply and I was given the name of a property agent by the goverment who can sort out our rental requirements as we are skilled migrants we can't meet the usual rental criteria such as driving licence and referees etc.
A four bed with a garden may be single floor accomadation (no stairs for the Kids)and you guessed it a pool but I don't think we can expect that in ACT as only a few properties have pools from what I can see and it has to be fenced off with the children so I reckon we can forget that one for the time being.
Budget wise I reckon between $500-600 P/W would get you someting nice in a good area.
For the few ideal jobs for me I have seen they fall between the $80000-$90000 range which would be about right on cost of living side -I read a recent article saying that ACT salaries had steadily been climbing to try and attract more people interstate it has one of the worst skills shortages in Australia and all states have similar issues.
I would love to be able to cycle to work that really appeals to me and Canberra seems well geared towards cyclists- I don't know what the average cycle to work time might be but even in ACT some places must be too far out to cycle into the City or CBD in a reasonable timescale.
The weather may also play a part in this during the winter time although only heavy rain or snow are real problems for cyclists and there isn't too much of that in ACT it just gets colder.
The beach information is really good and I think the kids will like the seaside thing so anywhere sounds good although I know Jervis bay is really pretty and has the Whale watching with excellent diving and my eldest Amy has recently started Scuba diving lessons.
So if we drove from Canberra what would be the nearest beach to us you said it takes around 90 minutes or so ?
Also I know that it takes about 3 hrs from Canberra to Sydney by car along a pretty boring motorway or highway but could you drive to sydney via a more scenic costal route or would that just take too long?
[quote=Quoll;233115]Really, schools are going to be the least of your problems! Schools are much of a muchness but I will pm you with ones to avoid!!!! You have to live in your home 24/7 so better get that right or you will be unhappy. Amaroo is one of the newest suburbs - if you have a look on Google earth you will see big houses on small blocks without too much vegetation. It is about 18 km from Civic and even though we now have a super new "Gungahlin Drive Extension" which takes some of the pressure off, it takes about 20 - 30 minutes to drive into town. There is a good public transport network with buses going every half hour (to high density places) or less frequently to other places. They have tried to economize so if you are going from A to B you could go via woop woop and timbuctu in the process so you probably wouldnt want to be in a hurry on the bus unless you are going between interchanges. Canberra is a good cycling city - not great hills (although there is a bit of a rise on the way out to Gungahlin!) but you would have to be a bit dedicated to bike in from Amaroo (my DH used to cycle 20km each way every day in the opposite direction but he is a bit of a nut!). We have a super bike path network including an on street network. Taking the bus is a bit cheaper than parking your car in Civic - you can park your car for $10 per day on the rooftop of the shopping centre (cheaper in other places if you can find a space!). If you get a bus ticket you can get a 10 ride ticket for $22 (monthly tickets are proportionately cheaper of course but never buy one)
We have a thriving Catholic system alongside the government school system - by the time kids hit High School, parents are voting with their feet and almost 50% send their kids to private schools. The primaries are OK. You may have preferences for the type of school you want - we have one lot of schools of older design where you have classrooms with walls and doors but we also have a number (all of them in Tuggeranong for example) which are built in open space design - pods of 4 teaching areas which are with movable walls if there are walls at all. So you can have up to 120 kids in quite a small space with their 4 teachers. The ambient noise level can be quite high and if you have children who need few distractions they can be challenging. I think Amaroo has a cross between the two but it is a long time since I have been out there. Amaroo is a k -10 school and is getting to be one of the bigger schools so if your kids are used to small schools that could be a bit of culture shock. Gold Ck school, also in that area is a k -10 but the 6 - 10 is on a different campus across the oval. Gold Ck also shares a primary site with a Catholic school and you have hundreds of kids seething around at play times. You know your kids best though and know what will appeal to them/shock them.
We will possibly settle in Canberra...wouldn't mind the nod on schools to avoid. I am currently e-mailing loads of them...my boys are 11 and 15!
Thanks in advance
Thanks for all that detail on schools etc really helpful!
I take your point about finding the right accomadation before you can really look at schools etc,the basic requirement is being in right catchment area of the school you want to got to as is the same here .
Just let me know what schools or areas you think we should avoid if at all possible not wishing to upset anyone else who be living in those suburbs.
We hope to be in Canberra by end of Oct/Nov this year all being well and we have no pressure to sell our house here as Debbies sister will look after it for us for a couple of years until we think we have made the right choice to live in Aus/Canberra.
There are also 2 other couples with children we met at a meal we had in London with the ACT goverment so we are all in a similar sitaution and plan to come out at about the same time-so I reckon in about 5 years time they will need to make ACT bigger to fit in all the POMS say about WA size should do it!
I was told to avoid comming around Xmas as the rental properties are in very short supply and I was given the name of a property agent by the goverment who can sort out our rental requirements as we are skilled migrants we can't meet the usual rental criteria such as driving licence and referees etc.
A four bed with a garden may be single floor accomadation (no stairs for the Kids)and you guessed it a pool but I don't think we can expect that in ACT as only a few properties have pools from what I can see and it has to be fenced off with the children so I reckon we can forget that one for the time being.
Budget wise I reckon between $500-600 P/W would get you someting nice in a good area.
For the few ideal jobs for me I have seen they fall between the $80000-$90000 range which would be about right on cost of living side -I read a recent article saying that ACT salaries had steadily been climbing to try and attract more people interstate it has one of the worst skills shortages in Australia and all states have similar issues.
I would love to be able to cycle to work that really appeals to me and Canberra seems well geared towards cyclists- I don't know what the average cycle to work time might be but even in ACT some places must be too far out to cycle into the City or CBD in a reasonable timescale.
The weather may also play a part in this during the winter time although only heavy rain or snow are real problems for cyclists and there isn't too much of that in ACT it just gets colder.
The beach information is really good and I think the kids will like the seaside thing so anywhere sounds good although I know Jervis bay is really pretty and has the Whale watching with excellent diving and my eldest Amy has recently started Scuba diving lessons.
So if we drove from Canberra what would be the nearest beach to us you said it takes around 90 minutes or so ?
Also I know that it takes about 3 hrs from Canberra to Sydney by car along a pretty boring motorway or highway but could you drive to sydney via a more scenic costal route or would that just take too long?
Many thanks
Regards Mark.
LOL Mark, they are talking about making Canberra much bigger with some new land releases announced just this week!
Nearest beach is Batemans Bay and from there you can go either north or south and it is pretty built up in both directions. My son did a PADI diving course and they had regular dives down on the coast run through the diving shop so your daughter will not be short of opportunities.
As for cycling - there are some nuts who bike in from the outer suburbs into town. As I said, my DH biked from Ainslie down to Weston every day - round trip of about 40km - but he is definitely nutty. He did it winter and summer - only wore shorts in winter too! It helps to be a bit insane.
$80K - $90K is sort of EL1 level, top of the teacher range so OK but as a community we do tend to be a bit wealthier than the rest of Aus where the average wage is c $50K. Remember that we are well taxed though!!!!
Not that many pools in Canberra - we used to have far more than we seem to have nowadays. I think the attraction and hard work of the pool has sort of dwindled. We had one and got rid of it because it was too much work for the limited time we would spend in it. We are not alone! We have plenty of public pools so you dont need one of your own!
Most of our homes are single storey - just the newer MacMansions are branching out into double storey designs as people try and get a lot of living space on a small block. Just dont, whatever you do, call them bungalows!!!! (Bungalows are beach shacks) There isnt much movement in the real estate market around Christmas time - everyone leaves town! But dont leave it until after Christmas because then you will be vying with incoming public servants, military personnel and students for the limited rental places. If you can be here at the end of the year - Sept/Oct time then you will have a better chance I think.
Thanks again for the general info and the pm on schools really useful.
Everyone comments on how good the Grammer school is but Amy doesn't like the same sex school thing which I can understand even at 9 but they still now what they want!
I think being realistic about this it will be hard to find a suitable rental that we like within a short distance of one of best schools so we will just have to balance the two to start with and a year or so on to review the situation once we have got use to the new life and how different things are-go with the flow as they say and from what you have said I feel quite confident we can find the right location.
I received a really nice glossy welcome pack from our settlement officer at ACT Gov today loads of info housing,schools wine tasting(liked that one) makes a real pleasant change to look at some brochures rather trolling through endless web pages half asleep all the time!
Anyway off to swallow some more Canberra trivia.
back with more questions soon.
Kind regards
Mark.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Quoll
LOL Mark, they are talking about making Canberra much bigger with some new land releases announced just this week!
Nearest beach is Batemans Bay and from there you can go either north or south and it is pretty built up in both directions. My son did a PADI diving course and they had regular dives down on the coast run through the diving shop so your daughter will not be short of opportunities.
As for cycling - there are some nuts who bike in from the outer suburbs into town. As I said, my DH biked from Ainslie down to Weston every day - round trip of about 40km - but he is definitely nutty. He did it winter and summer - only wore shorts in winter too! It helps to be a bit insane.
$80K - $90K is sort of EL1 level, top of the teacher range so OK but as a community we do tend to be a bit wealthier than the rest of Aus where the average wage is c $50K. Remember that we are well taxed though!!!!
Not that many pools in Canberra - we used to have far more than we seem to have nowadays. I think the attraction and hard work of the pool has sort of dwindled. We had one and got rid of it because it was too much work for the limited time we would spend in it. We are not alone! We have plenty of public pools so you dont need one of your own!
Most of our homes are single storey - just the newer MacMansions are branching out into double storey designs as people try and get a lot of living space on a small block. Just dont, whatever you do, call them bungalows!!!! (Bungalows are beach shacks) There isnt much movement in the real estate market around Christmas time - everyone leaves town! But dont leave it until after Christmas because then you will be vying with incoming public servants, military personnel and students for the limited rental places. If you can be here at the end of the year - Sept/Oct time then you will have a better chance I think.
Wondered if you can answer a couple of school questions for me:
Firstly during middle school ages 9-11 do the kids have to sit SATS as we do have over here and everyone makes a big thing about them as they are regarded to be a valid assesment of your childs current age for their reading,writing and arithmetic?
Secondly I understand that some states in AUS have mixed age classes or ability led as they call it! are there any schools in ACT that support that method and if so how would they normally assess a pupil on entry to that school in the state sector?
Kids are assessed at years 3, 5, 7 & 9 here (8, 10, 12 and 14 years old approx) and they dont make such a big deal of it as I am lead to believe they do of the SATS. Some schools actually pay attention to what the results tell them about individual kids but usually the results are just scanned, the school pats itself on the back for having kids in the above average range, they tut tut at the kids they knew would do badly, may pick up one or two for a short burst of remedial tuition but generally just put it in the filing cabinet and forget about it.
You will find that most ACT schools have composite classes (mixed age) but they are not ability based as a general rule - they do it because the kids in each year level dont necessarily add up to a complete class - classes of 21 in early years and up to (but not desirable) 30 in upper primary. They dont do the composite thing in High Schools (trying to think of any that do and none spring to mind at the mo).
Aus is a very egalitarian sort of place and ACT especially so - there are a few schools which offer gifted and talented programs but otherwise it is a very mixed bunch in each class - tall poppies are not generally encouraged in Aus at all. Teachers do try and have small groups working on things at their own level but that is generally more lip service than actual individual planning I hate to say. They wont bother with testing kids, they are more concerned about their ages and they will place with kids of the same age when you first enrol. The ACT is not big on acceleration - it is quite a process that has to be approved at the highest levels and not often granted. In High Schools there are more "streaming" options and they will generally assess that through their own assessment processes or feedback from the primary schools about relative skill level but not all high schools do that, especially at the early end of HS. When the kids begin to have more choice about their subjects then there will be a natural sort of streaming.
Thanks again for your honest views on the ACT education system it seems that the schools questions/views are the same in AUS or here but I am sure it is a good thing to try and see how others do it to give a balance.
I know that ACT does have an excellent higher education performance against other states so I remain positive about the whole experience.
If Amy doesn't settle into the School thing then it would be a show stopper for us but she has a great outlook and seems to make friends and peer realtionships without problems,she is also very keen to see how things are done over there but for some reason she worries about her ability to fit in on a how well she will do level as they all seem worry about test results now and at 9 I am not really sure if that is good or a bad thing!
Anyway could I ask another more general question that is unrelated to the Education system in ACT and that is can you give me some idea of the weekly cost of living in ACT for a family like us for example we spend around £150.00-£170.00 a week at the local supermarket our Gas/Electric is around £25.00-£30.00 a week,phone and broadband £25.00-£30.00 a month.
We receive around £215.00 a month in Child benefits and tax credits and my salary is around £45,000($90,000 I think that is about right at the moment)
Petrol is now rocketed to £1.12 a litre and they reckon it could get to around £1.50 at the end of the year!!
things are just getting out of hand here prices have gone crazy but I know that its a global problem with the oil thing and Aus has been seeing pretty steep fuel costs as well.
I am sure Amy will fit in very well! Kids are kids no matter where you go and for the most part they are pleasant and accommodating and kids coming from overseas usually have a good honeymoon period. The kids dont worry about the tests here at all - they are usually considered more of an inconvenience than anything else! They do take up the best part of the week though and unless they have changed things to go along with the new national testing regime, they are incredibly broad so there is listening, speaking as well as the usual comprehension, writing and maths papers.
As for living costs - well we are a retired couple these days so our costs are going to be somewhat different but ball park rental here is about $450 a week - average mortgage would probably be similar or a bit more but we dont have a mortgage so I dont really know. Our groceries (and we dont hold back) come to about $200 - $250 a week I would think. Broadband, landline phone and cable tv (free to air channels via Transact) $75 a month, electricity anywhere between $120 and $200 a quarter depending on the quarter (we have solar hot water and slow combustion stove where DH scavenges for wood otherwise both would cost us a lot!). Water and sewage anywhere between $150 and $250 a quarter depending on time of year. Mobile phones about $60 a month, internet ISP about $50 a month, petrol hovering around the $1.50/l mark at the moment - goes up and down depending on whether it is pay day or not. Parking in civic $10 a day or bus fares at $2.20 a single trip. Private health insurance $240 a month. Average wages in Aus are about $60k just to put all that into perspective. No idea on child benefits etc other than that they are means tested. A good latte will cost you about $4
