After 13 years in London I've moved to Ireland. Good job – running the LBS, great pay, honestly, superb boss etc. Flat is big too. Just lovely. But I'm missing English on the telly, Marmite on toast and beer at £1.69 at Weatherspoons. Will I ever stop wanting to go back? And it's so bloody far to Swinley and some of you lot' daaagh!!!!!
BTW I am in Skerries, Strand Street but we're only starting. Pop in for a chat and a cuppa if you're near.
Kris

good luck with the new venture!
ireland is awesome

moved to sweden from ireland 18 months with wife and kids. miss home a lot but sweden does have more to offer. Still doesn't stop me continually assessing if we've made the right move or not (when in my heart I know we have).

keep the chin up, I heard the first 10 years are the hardest 🙂

oh you lucky begger!!

go here, great place to waste a day drinking wine or an evening of good food followed by a spot of music in the evening!

Really, from my couple of visits i can see why coming from london would feel very odd. its a very quiet place with dublin being the only place that that could pass as a city. anyway you got to stick it out for month or so. I started new job last week and its naff.

It'll take you a while to wind down to the lower pace of life, but once you're down to speed you may well find you love it.

Been in Spain for 13 years, 2 years in Egypt before that… and I still sometimes miss living in London.

The homesickness is worse at about the 2 year mark, I reckon – when the honeymoon period's worn off. It slowly gets better.

Start to think in terms of other places apart from Dublin. Luckily you're not from Dublin so you won't find this too hard to do (similar to when we take the mick out of Londoners for thinking life doesn't exist outside the M25 …I'm only teasing, I know all Londoners aren't like this).

I'm guessing your weekends will be busy so hard for you to get away but start visiting the west – Galway, Mayo and Connemara (which is an area that covers a bit of both counties) and you'll see a different Ireland. Connemara is absolutely stunning – but seriously wet, all year!!

Donegal, again is beautiful (no personal experience but enough people say it is).

Kerry and West Cork have to be seen to be believed. The drive (or, hey you could cycle it) from Tralee to Dingle over the Conor Pass is special as are each of the peninsulas that just out into the Atlantic (Dingle, Beara and oooooh, I'm struggling….Kenmare?).

I've never "got" Dublin to be honest (though Howth, Skerries etc are all lovely). I always thought it was a bit grotty, with little infrastructure and bloody expensive. Dubs absolutely love it though and it holds a special place in their hearts – you might like it with an unbiased perspective.

Yeah I moved abroad just over a year ago. Still miss home and so I'll be returning to live in the UK sometime early next summer (hopefully). That said many of my friends over here have been here for 10 or more years. I think that it does get easier with time…

Hey Kris, I do hope it works out for you! Think of all those new trails to explore, you will soon forget about Swinley and the recent mud-fest Forum Ride 🙂

I still have your banner but am sure there will be another Forum Ride!

Good luck!

That's odd i really miss Swinley and i live in Switzerland – been here a year and a half and still have homesickness.

Be grateful you have work; I arrived in Aus, only really knew my partner, her family are out in the sticks, so I'd be at home alone, whilst she was at work, looking through the paper for jobs and doing the washing.

All I could think about was how it sucked at that moment. I had a few times when I looked at and considered applying for work back in the UK and giving up and coming back, even though it'd only been a month.

However, I finally found a job. Then made some friends. Then started to do stuff, cos we could afford to etc.

Be 4 years in May and I'll be claiming my Australian citizenship (Dual – can't give up the maroon passport or the ability to heckle when we win the rugby/cricket/etc!!), we have a cool little place near the beach, biking has become 'my thing' (as not much in the way of skiing in Adelaide), and a little one on the way. Went home for the first time back in May and realised that as great as London is, the chilled pace of a smaller town is, overall, much better. I am way less stressed and generally happier for it.

I still miss things at times, but I can get marmite, soreen and decent beer, I just have to look a little harder which makes it worth it. And Skype, Facebook etc means I keep in touch probably more so than I would if I was 'at home' anyway.

I even just got organised enough that I bought Chr***mas cards to send back to Blighty this w/end; just got to remember to write and send them now!!

Deep in my heart I know it is the right thing to do what I have done. Fresh air, little rain so far, beach, job, eveeything. Irish girls are lovely, blokes – who cares? They only talk Galic (sp.?) football here. It should feel perfwct, it's so much home-like. But it doesn't.
BTW it's such a great feeling when a local Chelswa fan dislikes 'the local rivals' Everton 😀 or places Arsenal in Putney.
I think I want to return to London when my kid grows up, childhood in a quiet place shoud be better for everybody.
Come to think of it I probably miss my girls who are still in Hampton, hopefully it'll get better when they arrive here soon.
Oh, CG, how can I NOT miss the mud at Swinley? My car interior keeps reminding me of it, I haven't cleaned it yet 🙂

Give yourself a benchmark date, like for example, say that you stick at it and give it your best for a year and review the situation then.

If you know you have a get out in a year's time and your 'job' in the mean time is to give it all without thinking about going back, i bet you that you'll enjoy it a lot and when you re-assess the situation in 12 months time, the answer might be very different.

We've just had our 12 months celebration and the conclusion was that it's still hard in many ways but we've come a long way since last october. I still think sometimes that maybe we've made a mistake, especially job-wise for me, but deep down it's the best thing we've done and I could never go back to the Uk.

I moved to ireland from london about 7yrs ago.
We've settled pretty well now, still miss a few things, beer gardens in the summer, but mostly its friends and family.
But, you can get marmite, our local tescos have just started selling twiglets (still miss proper beer though, guiness is OK, but its not as good as proper beer!)

The mtb side is a bit different as well, as technically, there's only two or three places in the whole country you're actually allowed to ride. But, once you get to know a few folk, you'll find trails everywhere, they're all built and maintained by locals, and constantly evolve as they get trashed and rebuilt. Also, the mtb community is quite small and pretty close, so you get to know people well (once you're accepted, which will take a while!! and you'll always be a blow-in 😉
The clubs are probably the best way to find your way around, I dont know skerries v. well so dont know if theres local trails to you (but i'll bet there's a few little forests with stuff in.
Most of the bigger trails are southside, and wicklow give me a shout if you want any info.