just to clarify, I fucking love London
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Born and bred in London and apart from a few spells working in Europe I’ve been here all my life, mainly south london, Upper Norwood / Gipsy hill when I was a kid but now been in Brixton for 30 years. Can’t imagine ever leaving unless it was for sunnier climes. In my experience Londoners stay, whilst others dip there toes in for a few years. Fucking sick the amount of times I’ve heard “ oh but how can you bring your children up here” 
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We seriously considered leaving a few years ago and joining the hoards of DFL’s in Margate (mainly to get a bigger property than what we had at the time in Acton), but my old job meant that I would’ve been spending about £700 per month on trains, plus the horrendous commuting times. We also, as someone mentioned, visited in winter, and there just seemed to be loads of gangs of teen roaming the streets with nothing to do. I mentioned this to some mates who had moved down from Clapton, and their answer was, “yeah, but they haven’t got guns !!”(we live a much more sheltered life in West London) 
Anyway, long story short, our son is now in a really good secondary school, and our daughter is about to go up this year, so we’ll be stuck in London for at least another 5-7 years I reckon, which I don’t mind at all. Although I grew up in the countryside in semi-rural South Oxfordshire, I adore London - the convenience of everything, the hustle and bustle, the variety of what’s on offer. One of the best cities in the world when the sun’s out.
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Thanks everyone for the replies/thoughts here - lots to think about/agonize over 
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The things I miss most about London are decent restaurants and art galleries, gigs etc. Although we’re only 40 minutes from central Birmingham so it’s not too bad. When we first moved to Worcester I was really surprised in local restaurants at the inverse of the quality to quantity ratio I was used to from London.
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a few people on here are in the area… Henry is North West Devon, i think and pre-cov was putting some events on there and Bude area? I’m in Exeter, Parker in Plymouth… Dave Green in Plymouth is the promoter for all the good parties. I do some low key bar gigs in exeter so i can always play what i want… let us know if you’re in the vicinity
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Here, just… unless it’s a lynching party…
we do all have our own pitchforks
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Exmouth here! Moved here 10 years from Brighton.
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Almost got ourselves a Balearic darts team!
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So true. Have reverse situation in BCN…
I’d like to give Lisbon a go, or maybe Basque Country?
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That was our plan too, great food, wine, surf… what’s not to love. Biarritz down through to Donostia love it all. Never been to Portugal but hear amazing things too. Not sure we can do Europe now, think the health insurance would be crippling… we shall see.
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I live in Canterbury, toy’d with moving to London for years, but just settled with commuting in. Can’t ever see us moving now all our friends are in the south east (Kent and Sussex). Only an hour on the high speed, and my works always payed for my travel, so have kept costs super low. Saying that, I expect i’ll never need to travel in now remote working’s so common place. Canterbury’s surrounded by all the typical DFL haunts (Whitstable, Margate, Ramsgate, Deal, Folkestone) only 15-30 mins away. The influx of people moving out of London has been pretty intense, and no doubt pricing out a lot of people. But if I’m being selfish it negates any need for us ever to move to the city.
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my daughter has been in Kent a few years now and we were considering a move in the next few years in that direction. i’ve always lived in university towns so we thought about Canterbury. Did visit end of last year so everything was shut… is much happening in normal times? House prices seem relatively sensible compared to the rest of Kent.
It’s nice, really safe. We’ve got two kids, they’re young. Confident that it’s an awesome place for them to grow up. The proximity to the all the beaches and the fast train into London is what makes it. And it’s super picturesque.
Canterbury got bombed fairly heavily in the war, so lots of post war housing which I guess has meant, without the appeal of large Georgian or Victorias terraces common to the local seaside towns (Thanet and Folkestone) house prices havent been hugely affected by the DFL exodus.
In normal times, I’d say it lacks culture. It’s got bags and bags of history but lacks in the Arts. I put this down to the huge student population being fairly transient. Saying that we both studied at KIAD (now UCA) and still here 15 years later. But I think thats a rarity.
Can really knock it tbh
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On another note, I grew up in Margate (and can be biased) but Thanet’s got tonnes to offer. I’d move back in an instant.
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it all seems to be happening in Margate at the moment!.. thing is, my daughter is in Tonbridge so, Canterbury’s an hour away and certainly don’t want to be any more than that… Thaks for the info though.
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Born and bred in London. Grew up in Ealing, now down south in Brockley which I love (most of the time).
Go through phases of hating London (daily commute, property prices, crime etc) and would love a bigger place but then that would mean moving out more.
Me and the missus thinking maybe Bristol (she’s from Cardiff) which is happy inbetween in the next 5 years to 10 years.
I think I’d find it really difficult leaving London and what it has to offers. But Bristol seems to have the same variety, on a smaller scale with a lot of greenery. We’ll see.
Would like to know if anyone else has made the Bristol move.
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Oi oi. I’m in Catford. Love it here. Though noticed a ton of hipsters out in Ladywell today.
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Ha was also in ladywell today buying DIY shit. Noticed a lot people queuing for coffee.
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