A French Life - Welcome
Why We Moved To France
Why we moved to France
For many years we dreamed of living in Europe in general and France specifically. We longed for a little stone house in a country town where we could walk to the market to buy our fresh produce, sit in the town square on a warm spring day with an aperitif and charcuterie platter and go on adventures exploring the history of the area.
As Australians, France offers a very different lifestyle to that to which we had grown up with. A lifestyle we had had small glimpses of when we holidayed in the country that we liked very much and that we were keen to experience more of.
We had both lived abroad before so were keen to move overseas again, to explore new countries and cultures and as dedicated foodies the European (and French) passion for food appealed greatly to us. The idea of shopping weekly at a local market, buying fresh produce from the local farmers to take home to cook was our idea of food heaven.
We also love the sheer beauty of France, its incredible history which is evident at every turn and in every village.
There was also an economic consideration and the cost of living in France vs Australia. Australia had become more and more expensive to live in, the cost of food, fuel and day to day necessities seemed to be increasing daily and housing prices were spiraling out of control and beyond the reach of many people. France offered a much better cost of living and the cost of housing was a fraction of that in Australia
When we holidayed in France we gazed in the real estate windows dreaming of that stone cottage in the countryside. When at home in Australia I would trawl through real estate websites looking at properties for sale.
We never thought that that dream could become a reality until the 2010 GFC and the sale of a house placed us in a position to perhaps, just maybe turn the dream into reality. Somehow the planets aligned and I was on a plane to France on a house hunting mission.
How did we choose what part of France?
Read that story here where I talk about how we chose where to live in France.