Conniebygaslight

It's always a trade off, you may live in the sunshine and possibly earn more but the cost of living is higher, schools (even state all books, pens, pencils have t be bought) Dentist (fortune-even for children) Docs (perscriptions even for children) groceries etc. Petrol is cheaper but the distance is so great it costs a bomb to get anywhere. Books...?!!! ridiculous. There will be things that are arguably better- a nice beach or park, but if you like to go to concerts or comedies, appreciate the accessibilty of the UK both within and Europe and the choice that the UK offers for products, services etc then think again. Australia is such a vast country with a relatively miniscule population and this shows with what it offers. It depends what's important to you- if it's an adventure then go for it but be careful what you give up the tradeoff is massive IMO.

You forgot the Bull terrier/Blue healer in the back on the way to the dog &car wash....lol

The star filled sky at night, Our extended family, The friends we made,

It's strange really, that even after being back for over 2 years I get bugged by very little. The sense of belonging really is a warts and all feeling and I find a great deal of peace and acceptance.

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We did just that, we got a friend to view our house and we picked up the keys the day after we landed. It wasn't easy and at times we felt like throwng the towel in but so glad we did it. There is a current tread running on here about uk mortgages for expats. (think it's much harder than when we did it and that wasn't easy). Sure there will be a way. Good luck

Show them a bottle of Worcestershire sauce...gets them every time.... lol

In their defence (something I seldom do tbh) isn't there is difference in pronunciation of their metric 'tonne' to our imperial 'ton'...? I may be wrong..

Are you sure...? cars are much cheaper in the UK than in Oz and with the exchange rate being so good AUD-GBP it may work out very favourably that and the fact that your car will take 6 weeks to arrive in the UK and you may have to factor in hire car costs. You could maybe look online to see what your car sells for in the UK-with it's current age and mileage, compared to what you could sell it for in Oz. I'm sure you have researched all this but just wanted to say that even though the process was easy, if we could have sold our Galaxy in Oz we would have done. As this would have made far more financial sense.

We shipped 2 cars over to Oz and only managed to sell one when we were over there, it was a VW Passatt estate, we got back what we had paid for it nearly 5 years previously in the UK and the buyer flew in to buy it and then took 3 days to drive it home (mad Aussies lol ). Our other was a ford galaxy people carrier which isn't recognised in Oz, I took it into a ford garage and they looked at me as if I'd driven a moon buggy in...lol so we brought it home.

Ours covered damage so we thought it was worth insuring some individidual items, our car was British anyway so we just put the uk plates back on, took it for an M.O.T and taxed it....easy peasy.

We only insured our car and costly electrical equipment e.g computers TV's and large white goods. We shipped our car in the container and it was so easy, we drove it to the airport and handed it over to the shippers, we packed it full of stuff too. We insured everything on our way out to Oz which in hindsight was ridiculous....our shipment landed in Oz 19th march it wasn't until end of May we got our cars!!! Back to UK was so much easier- but I would say that the Oz company we moved back to UK with were excellent.

Lol mine too...my Aussie husband says that all the time and so do I.....

Exactly...why the need for them to try so desperately hard to be English...I find very strange

Of all the familes that I have ever seen on WDU they had to be the nicest IMO...they were so unmaterialistic and all about each other. They had no unrealistic expectation of 'living the dream' - the fact that they are going to try for a few months at a time (which they can do if they are home schooling their kids) for me is admirable- that way they may all get chance to try to see if they can find what they are looking for.....give me them over the 'wow it's an open plan kitchen so Oz must be brilliant' brigade any day.

Breaky, Big lunch, little lunch, morning tea, afternoon tea, smoko

She'll be right...

Going into Coles and upon paying for my shopping I was asked 'what size jocks' I wanted- apparantly men's underwear was a free gift with a type of soft drink....they actually handed me a pair of bright yellow pants....it was honestly like something out of the Twilight zone!

Calling tea towels Manchester....?!

Pain Stop.... Sting goes.... Beaut ute magazine...

And many go home because they don't like Oz....believe it or not

I actually choked up as we landed in Manchester airport...and thanked my husband for bringing me home. The feeling was overwhelming and as I went out running this afternoon in the snow I still feel just as overwhelmed. I'm sure I will love this place always.

We didn't like Australia at all and I've made no secret of that fact and we returned to the UK and haven't regretted it for one second. What I will say is this- my husband is an aussie and we had a lovely life in the UK, we gave it all up to move to Oz to be near his family and his 'home' we had 3 young children 3, 6 & 8 and after many visits to Oz we genuinely believed we were doing the right thing in moving to Oz.....how wrong we were- my husband missed our life back in the UK so much (as did I) we returned. If your life is good (for all of you) unless you don't like living there I would say that family alone is not a strong enough reason to move...homesickness for the place AND people is different entirely IMO. Basically we did the same as you are thinking of - but in reverse. Good luck....

"Big Dad's pies".......lol had completely forgotten about them.

We gave up everything to go to Oz and moved back to the UK after 8 months, started from scratch and that was with 3 small children- we held our heads high and started again. If we can do it anyone can....we are so happy If you do choose to come home it is possible.....